Dakota's Timeline

 We are friends with a couple who have become RVers. They bought a travel trailer and a truck several years ago and began taking trips, at first for a week or two, then for a month or more. Last year, they upgraded from their smaller camper trailer to a larger fifth-wheel camper trailer and a bigger truck to pull it. They were hoping that the larger camper would allow them to host visitors while they are on the road. So, when they set off on a four-month long, cross-country trip this summer, they extended an open invitation for us to come out and meet them somewhere on the road. After looking at their itinerary and researching flights and rental cars, we decided that we would join them on the Olympic Peninsula of Washington.

The best airfares were for late flights both directions, so we flew out on flight that left Dulles Airport at about 10pm, landing in Seattle after 1am. Our friends were scheduled to be at their campsite near Port Angeles until afternoon the next day, so we booked ourselves into an AirBnB near the airport, where we could get some sleep for the night.

Unfortunately, there was a line of strong thunderstorms that passed through the DC area. This severely impacted the operations at Dulles Airport, delaying departures and stranding incoming flights on the tarmac. The plane for our flight sat on the tarmac for two hours after arriving before it reached a gate and was able to deplane. After that, our flight was further delayed because several of our scheduled crew of flight attendants was on board another aircraft stranded on the tarmac, and we had to wait for their plane to reach a gate and for them to make their way to us. As the delays built up, I began to worry about our rental car.

When I booked our rental car, the website indicated that the rental site was closed from 2am-5am. I also received a text message that seemed to confirm this information, indicating that if my flight was delayed, my rental car would remain available for 8 hours. Mentally, I was making alternative plans to use an Uber to get to our AirBnB for the night, then return to the airport in the morning to pick up the rental. Ultimately, we landed in Seattle about 1:20am, and I rushed to the rental center while my wife collected the checked bags. At the rental center, the main rental counters were all closed, but there were signs that indicated that the booths in the parking area were open and that we could pick up our rental there. It turns out the rental facility is actually open 24/7 and I had no reason to worry.

So I managed to get our rental without any issue. I had booked a special rate where they didn't reveal the vehicle type when I booked it. Based on the price, I was assuming that we would be getting a compact car, which would have been fine. In fact, in some ways, I might have preferred that because it would have used less fuel. But when I received my keys and found the car in the parking area, it turned out to be a Toyota 4Runner, a bigger truck than I am used to driving. But in the end, it was fine, as it provided a comfortable ride for the four of us for the week.

Staying with our friends in the RV worked out fine. There was limited privacy, but that was something we anticipated, and we were able to work around it. We stayed at two different campgrounds over our stay (because they couldn't get a reservation at a single campground for their entire stay), and at the first one, they didn't have a sewer hook-up, so we ended up using the bath house to shower so that we didn't fill up the waste tank on the RV. This brought back memories from camping trips with my family as a child. I wasn't sure how comfortable I would be with that, but it ended up not being an issue. And at the second campground, they had a full set of hook-ups, and we were able to shower in the RV, which was nice.

At the end of our stay, we were scheduled to fly home on an overnight red-eye flight, so we didn't start back towards the airport until afternoon. Because it was a Friday and we were concerned about traffic delays, we left far earlier than I had originally thought we needed to, with plans to take the closest ferry across the Puget Sound, north of Seattle to avoid possible traffic delays in the Tacoma area. We expected to have a wait for the ferry, and to then get something to eat after crossing the Sound. I left a LOT of extra time in the schedule to accommodate delays, so there was little chance of missing our flight.

Of course, that meant that nothing went quite to plan. A tandem fuel tanker truck drove off the side of US route 101 along the north side of Olympic National Park, landing upside down in a creek and spilling fuel, which left the highway closed. We had to take a long detour around the scene on winding state highways that couldn't be safely driven at the same speeds at US 101, which set us back by at least a half hour early in our drive. Then as we neared our turn off for the ferry we planned to take, the programmable signs indicated that there was a 2 hour wait time for the ferry and that pre-booked boarding passes were required. So, we weren't going to be able to take the ferry, at least not if we wanted to be at the airport on time.

After reprogramming our route on Google Maps, it showed little, if any, traffic delays going south to the Tacoma Narrows Bridge and through Tacoma to the airport. In fact, it showed us arriving at the airport far earlier than I had expected. This gave us enough comfort to stop for some food along the way. Then as we finally neared the airport, we started trying to find a place to fill the fuel tank before we returned the rental. Unfortunately, the stations near the airport were priced above $5.00/gallon, so we end up backtracking a little bit to a station where we got it for almost $1/gallon less.

The return to the airport was slightly stressful at times, but we ended up turning in the rental an hour earlier than I had planned, and we were checked in and through security with plenty of extra time. The flight home was slightly delayed because our aircraft was delayed getting out of Dulles, but we ended up home only about 20 minutes later than scheduled.