Friday 8/27
The Parking Spot guy made car seat fall to floor heading back to terminal.
Go through security for first time with Em and as TSA precheck, K had to take off watch and bracelet and C had to go through a different scanner and got yelled at for having shoes on.
Plane delayed on tarmac at KCI due to backup in Denver.
Had to let people off the plane in Denver to catch connection flight, but nobody but us waited and we were last to get off plane.
Left K and Em at terminal while C went to get car but line to get on Hertz shuttle was enormous and missed the first shuttle.
Second and third shuttle showed up at same time and C chose to get on shuttle 2, however, there was a returning vet that had a cart of about 10 duffle bags so C waited because the Vet deserved to go home but no one else did that and just pushed their way on shuttle 2 in front of vet. At least the vet got on shuttle 2, but since I was the only one nice enough to let him go ahead I missed shuttle 2 and shuttle 3.
Finally shuttle 4 showed up and C was determined to get on that shuttle and he did but was the last one on and had to stand.
Got to the Hertz rental place and got to my car easily but the car, which was an Infiniti QX80 SUV, we got was the last one we wanted as C & K don’t like those cars…oh well.
Get everything loaded in car and just had the car seat to put in…of course, that was a new car seat that C had never installed in a vehicle…needless to say it took a while.
C finally gets the car seat installed and gets going back to the terminal to pick up K and Em but gets held up at the Hertz rental exit gate due to at least 30 cars all exiting at the same time.
Meanwhile as C is experiencing his adventure, K and Em meet and have a good conversation with the first woman in the US west of the Mississippi to have an IVF transfer 27 years ago.
So C, K, and Em are all loaded in car and needed lunch, so C picked an old fashioned diner to eat at and after a screaming argument with one of the customers and a waitress, three different tables walking out, us waiting for over an hour to get our food, and our waitress almost crying because she screwed up we finally ate and headed out to Veil.
As we are headed up and over the mountains the car we are in starts reving up like it’s in too low of a gear, but it wasn’t.
We arrive at our hotel and get checked in and order room service and unpack. Put Em down for bed…
Saturday 8/28
…then at 2:00am she wakes up crying and throws up on K when she gets her out, K and Em head to the shower and we could tell Em had a fever but had no thermometer.
Later that morning Em still didn’t feel well and still felt, so we decided to go to store to get food and thermometer. Em fell asleep on the way to the store and C stayed in car with Em while K went in to get the groceries. C decided to do a little research on Em’s symptoms (got to love Google) and found Altitude Sickness as a likely culprit. These are the symptoms Em was experiencing that also aligned with Altitude Sickness. They include but are not limited to fever, fatigue, loss of appetite, sleepiness or sleeping difficulty, nausea or vomiting, rapid breathing or shortness of breath, fast heart rate, headache, and insufficient urine production.
Got back to the hotel with the groceries and ate some lunch. After lunch C was holding Em and she threw up all of her lunch and all over C.
Got both of them cleaned up and afterwards took Em’s temp and it was 101, so called our Pediatrician and she was concerned about her breathing so wanted us to take her to ER or Urgent Care and we decided to go to Urgent Care.
At Urgent Care the PA (a dude named Pepper) on duty didn’t think it was Altitude Sickness, 🙄, and thought was just a viral infection. Em’s lungs, heart, throat, nose, and ears all looked good.
Feeling relieved we headed back to hotel and on our way back the car did the same thing it had done the day before…
Sunday 8/29
…K woke up on Sunday with a sore throat and a headache and didn’t feel a lot better, but Em hadn’t thrown up anymore. Between K and Em we stayed in the room all weekend.
Later that day we decided to take the stupid car to the local (meaning 30 minutes away) Hertz rental place and had to exchange it for a Nissan Armada…
Monday 8/30
…that morning we all woke up and K felt the same except she had a little cough and a runny nose as well and Em felt better and didn’t have a fever anymore but still had a runny nose and then also a cough. C woke up with a sore throat.
We still decided to get out and go to Vail village and walked around and was very disappointed.
Came back to the hotel and took naps because C & K felt worse and by Monday evening we were ready to go home. We were extremely disappointed in what Avon (where our hotel was) and Vail had to offer in terms of things to do and even considered to go to Denver for a few days, but decided at dinner Monday night that we would stay until Wednesday and drive back instead of fly due to Em’s issues and with all of us coughing, blowing, and hacking.
Strangely enough we felt better when we were outside of the hotel room, but as soon as we got back to the room we got congested and felt like it was hard to breathe…I know, it probably was all in our heads but it did make us dread to go back to the room each time…
Tuesday 8/31
…Em still had her cough but otherwise was healthy that morning. K woke up feeling the worst yet with extremely sore throat, cough, runny nose, and headache. C felt worse that day as well with major congestion, runny nose, and sore throat.
We had planned to take a day trip to Craig, CO that day but after the way we woke up feeling we decided against it.
As K and Em laid down for naps, Em threw up all her lunch all over K, so K and Em went in and took showers and then got back in bed.
While K and Em were taking naps, C started the process of first, canceling the return flight (which luckily we got our money back because we purchased the insurance). Second, calling down to our hotel front desk and let them know we were checking out two days earlier (again, no problem there and just had to pay for the five days we were there). Third, book the hotel in Burlington, CO for Wednesday night (that is what we chose to be our stop for the night on the way home). Fourth, call Hertz rental car to have our drop off location changed to KCI airport instead of Denver Airport (now this was a problem…they wanted to charge us $2,700 more just to drop it off in KC!!!), so needless to say we did not do that and instead had to drop the car off at the Denver Airport on Wednesday and book another car there to drive back to KC.
After naps C and K started the packing process with help from Em, of course.
That evening we did have a good dinner on the terrace at the hotel and had a great waitress. Again, we felt better when we were out and dreaded to go back to the room.
That evening K was starting to feel better, but C was starting to feel worse and made for a long night…
Wednesday 9/1
…Got up that morning and K was feeling better, Em still had her cough but otherwise felt good, C on the other hand had a cough, runny nose, headache, and sore throat.
Ate breakfast and got car loaded and headed out to Denver.
Went to the Hertz rental car place first at the Denver Airport and dropped off the car and had to walk to the other side of the Hertz rental place to pickup the new car (which was a Yukon) with Em and all our baggage in tow.
Got everything loaded up again and headed out and want to get lunch, so we ate at Ruby Tuesday right across the street from the Diner we ate at on Friday when we landed in Denver and the service was horrible here as well and was extremely hot inside. We decided after that we would not eat on the street anymore.
Got out of there and headed out on the road again. We had already determined that we would stop at Burlington, CO for the night, which is about 2 hours east of Denver and got to our hotel about 2:30pm and the first thing we noticed was that smelled like cow crap outside and it was extremely windy.
Got checked in and went swimming in the tiniest indoor pool we have ever seen and then afterwards got dressed and went out on the big town of Burlington (which has a population of 3,000) and found a working old fashioned carousel but Em had fallen asleep so we drove around a little and found a really good restaurant with good service.
Got back to the hotel after dinner and it still smelled like cow crap outside, still extremely windy, and now was starting to rain.
Got Em to bed and C started feeling sick to his stomach, so we all were asleep by 8:30 that night…
Thursday 9/2
…We we’re awoken a little after midnight very hard rain and extremely high winds and then shortly after that the power went off and C was awake for an hour till the power came back on at 1:00am and then at around 2:00am C was woken again with the power out and starting to feel warm in the room. C was awake for another hour until the power came back on around 3:00am, but yet again C was woken up at around 3:30am with the power off again and then came back on around 4:30am for good and C finally fell back to sleep until 6:00am when we all got up.
We got up and got ready and loaded up the car and then came back in for breakfast. While eating breakfast someone came in asking who owned a Ford F-150 because it had sustained damage from, what we were assuming was, the storm. As we were leaving the hotel we noticed that someone with a minivan was cleaning up broken glass from there drivers side back window and again assuming it was caused by the storm.
We got all loaded in the car and was getting ready to back out when K noticed what looked like a crack in the drivers side window and asked C if he thought it was a crack and sure enough we had about a foot long crack in the drivers side window.
We headed on down the road and our first stop was going be at Hays, KS and as we got closer to Hays we noticed the crack in the window was growing and by the time we got to Hays the crack stretched from one side of the window to the other side.
Fearing the window might shatter while driving we decided to go by one of the two Hertz rental car locations in Hays to have them check it out and of course the first Hertz location apparently did not exist in the location that showed online, so we went to the second location which was at the Regional airport and C had to go inside but once he got to the Hertz counter there was no one there. Right next to the Hertz counter was the United Airlines counter and C asked the guy there if anyone from Hertz was there and his response was they have really weird hours, 🙄, even though it was about 11:00am in the morning.
After two failed attempts to find a Hertz, C decided to investigate the crack himself, because you know he is an expert, and the glass seamed pretty strong still and you couldn’t feel the crack from the outside or the inside, so we decided to move on and find a place to eat for lunch.
The place we ate at in Hays was great and had good service as well.
After lunch we headed out on the road again and our next stop was going to be at the small town of Wamego, KS where they had a Wizard of Oz museum we wanted to check out, but K’s bladder had other plans and we had to stop at Junction City for a pit stop.
We decided after that we were just ready to get home and headed that way and got home around 5:00pm.
We unpacked, had dinner, took showers, and all went to bed where we all slept good…
Friday 9/3
Woke up and Em still had her cough and C still had a runny nose and cough, but was starting to feel better.
We headed up to KCI airport to get our car that had been parked at The Parking Spot since we flew out of KC a week earlier. Wasn’t sure if the would let us drive in to the car so C called The Parking Spot place on the way up there and they said yeah with no charge. We get there and get ticket that whoever was driving the rental car would have to scan as they were leaving, so we get to our car and park the rental car behind our car to unload the car seat, Em and K from the rental car and put them in our car and as we were doing that a Parking Spot shuttle was trying to get by and couldn’t so C had to move the rental car over. Finally got Em and K in our car and got into the rental car and went the closest exit point, but when I scanned my ticket it was wanting to charge me $11 so I backed up, thinking I had to go through the main gate, and we had to meander our way through the parking area to get to the main gate. K and Em go first and scan and get through and C scanned and still showed to pay $11, so C backed up to the window and waited for the woman to come to the window and when she did she apologized and said I could go on through, while K and Em are waiting at the front entrance because K had C’s phone to use to get them out.
C got his phone and then the next stop was the Hertz rental car place. All the rental car places are located together in an island with one way in and one way out and you could only drive way around, but we finally got to the Hertz return area and C goes through the gate, however, there was no place for K and Em to park or enter so they had to park out on the street and wait for C.
C got to the return lane and being the honest guy he is asked the Hertz guy what we needed to do about the crack in the drivers side window and he said C would have to feel out an incident form and that they would send through our insurance. Keep in mind that C never gets the insurance that they offer when you rent because he thinks it’s a waste of money and we also have a $500 deductible on our insurance, so needless to say we will be paying for most if not all of the window replacement.
Once C was done filling out the incident report he had to walk all the way out the we he came in to meet up with K and Em.
One last thing we had to do was take Em to Pediatrician because she still had her cough. We get there and the PA checks out and says she has another ear infection in the left ear and said that if she gets one more we have to go see an ENT. Em’s lungs sounded good and clear and her throat was a little red, so the PA thought the cough was due to a sore throat that was caused by a viral\ear infection, so they put Em on Augmentin.
After all that was over we headed home and said “Thank goodness that vacation is over”…
The End
