Happy Homecoming!

Parkway students dealt with the distressingly long plane delays with great patience.  They endured two separate delays.  The first one was the Nice-Paris connection.  Storms in Paris kept our flight grounded in Nice for two hours.  Eventually, we were cleared to go after sitting on the runway for about an hour and a half.  Students kept their hope, and we arrived in Paris just in time to go through one last passport control, find something for lunch, and board our plane for America.



Once we landed in Atlanta, the long wait began, but we had no idea of this turn of events when we landed.  We sailed through U.S. Customs and Immigration and found our gate with plenty of time to spare.  However, the Delta staff told us that the flight crew had been delayed by storms in Boston, so our 10:52 flight would not be taking off until 11:30 or so.  We were dismayed because we were ready to go home.  But students did the best they could with the situation, recharging phones, chatting, or sleeping.  At this point, we had been traveling for over 20 hours.


Once the flight crew arrived and commenced their pre-flight check of the aircraft, they discovered that we had a broken plane that needed to be replaced.  So, we had to wait another hour for a new plane to be located and readied for flight.


We were so happy when they told us the new plane was ready to go.


Parkway bombarded the gate when they called our zone to be seated.  We wanted to be home NOW!


After an uneventful flight, we finally arrived at 2:30 a.m., ecstatic to see family and friends.


We're so grateful for family and friends who waited through all the delays in order to pick us up at the crazy early morning hour.


Lots of hugs, tears of joy, flowers, and a cat were on hand to celebrate the homecoming.


France 2013 was an amazing trip, and we had lots of wonderful adventures. But we're so glad to be home after 26 hours of trying to get to St. Louis!  Paris and every thing is great, but there's no place like home!