"Coach, why don't we ever play any tournaments out west?" My response is always quick and to the point, "because it is too hard to get to!" I gave in and decided to try something new.
Last week we packed our bags for Arizona, where one of our Big Ten rival schools happened to be hosting a tournament. We decided to fly Southwest, which we never do, since they offered a direct flight from BWI, both ways, that would still get us back in time for classes. We are not allowed to miss more than eight days of class time in a semester.
The first order of business when you fly Southwest, for those of you that do know, is to be sitting by your computer at exactly 24 hours prior to your flight departure to secure your place in line, so when you board the plane you can snag the best seat. That is if you get a good "placement" and we were lucky to get through among the hundred other passengers logging in at the exact same time. A little like that game you played when you were young, "musical chairs". Be quick or you will be caught in the middle seat! I personally find this ritual that the loyal Southwest flyers seem to regard as "normal" a bit of an inconvenience or less politely a pain in the butt!
The trip began with a three-hour van ride to BWI airport that started after classes of course. Traveling toward the city on a Friday can be stressful but we arrived with time to spare. Checking in was so smooth and we did not have to pay for any of our luggage! I guess the commercials are right, "bags fly free"! Maybe I will like this airline after all. On the way to our gate, we heard our flight would be delayed one hour because they could not find our pilot! After hearing that I wasn't sure I wanted them to find this person, where could they be? We boarded the plane, happy that we were finally going to be on our way, when the pilot came over the speaker to alert us that our flight may take an extra hour once airborne due to the strong headwinds we were facing. Still, I was thankful for the two-hour time difference (in our favor) we would experience once we landed. Our flight would get in at 2 a.m. not 4 a.m. eastern standard time. However, when we did finally land in Phoenix, all the gates had been filled, due to having diverted planes heading to Los Angles on account of bad weather. We waited almost thirty minutes for them to move a plane, before we could pull in. Yea, it's still only 2:30 a.m. and thank goodness our practice round tee time was not until ten o'clock. We could sleep in! 😊As my assistant and I ran to grab the rental cars the team waited for the luggage. Apparently, this late the staffing is limited, so getting our bags and cars took a little longer than expected. Again, thankful all the bags arrived! We headed to our hotel after some struggle getting the rooms situated, I plopped on my hotel bed and looked at the clock beside the bed. It read 4:01! I was wondering why I felt ready to go downstairs for my morning coffee, back home it was my normal waking hour.
The return flight seemed to be off to a great start, as Carrie, my assistant managed to hit the lottery when she found out we scored boarding group B! Amazing work! We easily had enough time to get to the airport for our 6:50 p.m. flight back to Baltimore. When we boarded, we found plenty of seats for all of us and were even more delighted to hear the pilot say that due to the tailwinds our flight would now be cut by an entire hour! I overheard my players, Michelle and Drew, discussing this and how does it make sense? One was making the comparison to hitting your shot into the wind vs. downwind! Brilliant analogy! So, they concluded it must be a three-club wind behind the plane. 😊We made it back to BWI in record time just past midnight and time to get the players back to campus for classes! Theoretically of course. Again, I don't know if after a certain hour at airports they let most of the employees head home, but it does seem they work with a very light crew and consequently jobs take much longer. Getting the shuttle back to where our van was parked was at least a 45- minute adventure. Waiting for our luggage was an exercise of who could stay standing and focus on when the belt would finally start. In the interim the players worked a crossword puzzle. Yes, finally after a long wait, we had our bags and counted the luggage several times. The belt had stopped, and we were still one bag short. My heart sank, this could be yet another delay to our travel. They made a short announcement that they still had more bags to place on the belt they just had not arrived from the plane yet. Probably because the poor "soul" that was working the late shift had more than they could handle. After some time, we finally got our last bag. We closed the door of the van and I looked at my phone, 2:15 a.m. and we were just leaving BWI airport. I told my assistant the first thing we needed to do was fill up with gas and grab some coffee. After two failed attempts of getting off the exits, we finally found a gas station that was open. I ran in to grab some coffee. This was a Sheetz, as I ran to the back where the loads of glass coffee pots were typically all lined up, I only found a large computer with a touch screen. After pounding the screen with my finger because surely it just wasn't working because I wasn't pressing hard enough, the women working the register said, our coffee pots shut down this time of night to clean! Thankfully, she was not part of the "sales prevention team" and came to my aid or I suppose she saw the desperate look on my face! After a few minutes she got the machine working and I was out the door armed now with a couple hot cups of coffee and a full tank of gas. My assistant was willing to take the wheel as I played DJ with the radio and the players nestled under their blankets trying to get a few hours of sleep before arriving back to campus. Needless to say. it was 5:45 a.m. when we rolled into the Penn State golf course. Again, grateful that we were back safe, however not sure many of us felt ready to start the day!
Sandwiched in between the travel we managed to play 72 holes of golf in a three-day span of time! Quite a remarkable feat in itself. We had some new experiences and for that I am grateful.
I am not sure anyone from this team will ask the question again, "Coach, why don't we ever play any tournaments out west!"
