The Journey Home

Early Monday morning we gathered our equipment crates and carry-ons and boarded the bus for the airport. We loaded 24 of the crates onto the bus (2 for each of the 12 of us heading back today - the Galapagos crew will bring the others back with them) and headed out to the airport. About 2 seconds after Ralph commented that we were leaving 4 minutes earlier than we planned, and about 3 blocks from the hotel, mission leader David Ritter questioned if his bag had been loaded into the bus ... it had not. So, back to the hotel we went to find David's bag.

Things went well at the airport and we soon were airbourne over the Andes on the way to Miami. From the air, Ralph pointed out where he had lived in Quito in the 60's and we were able to see several volcanic lakes.

In Miami, we had to reclaim our crates and go through customs and then re-check the crates. This used up most of our 90 minute layover.

We arrived at National in D.C. on time, 7:30 pm, only to find out that 6 of the crates still were in Miami. After filing the lost-baggage claims, we boarded the bus for the trip back to York. Everyone agreed to a McDonald's stop since we hadn't had time for a dinner break. We arrived in York around 10:30pm and were back in Etown about a half hour later.