Bonaire 2024 (page 9 of 9)

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Day 9: Feb 18, 2024

We got up early, as the driver from Buddy was picking us up at 5 AM (which is 3 AM Minnesota time). The night before, when checking out, they gave us bag-breakfasts, which is awesome! They explained that we'd paid for the breakfast, but were leaving before breakfast started - they really do a great job of taking care of their customers. In the bag breakfast was a ham & cheese sandwich, a frosted doughnut, two kiwis, a cup of yogurt, a crispy peanut bar and a bottle of water. We definitely weren't going to starve on our morning travels. We were dropped off at the airport by the same guy who'd picked us up a week ago. A guard out front asked us a few questions, and then put a sticker on the back of our passports. We got in a relatively short line for baggage check (maybe 12 people ahead of us) and then noticed there was no one working yet. We probably waited 20 minutes or so before the staff started to show up. Mike took this time to weigh our dive bag to make sure it was still under the maximum weight (it was) and then other people followed his example and went up and weighed their own bags. Eventually we checked the bag, went through exit customs and then waited at the gate. We were the only flight leaving at that time, so it wasn't as chaotic as other flights home from Caribbean islands that we've had in the past. We were able to gate check our two roller bags to Houston, so it was nice to be able to get on the plane with just smaller bags. Mike took some video of leaving Bonaire, and got a picture of the pink control tower (it is Flamingo airport and the building itself is also pink). We had a very non-eventful flight to Houston, which is great.

After landing, we walked through the upstairs of the terminal for quite a while. Going through the first step of customs is easy - we have Global Entry, so we walk up to a kiosk, get a face scan, and head off to the next stop to meet with a live guard who "allows" us back into the country. We then picked up our checked bags, which all came off pretty quickly. Then we saw a MASSIVE line that wound around & around to go back through security to get into our next flight. Someone said there was no TSA PreCheck (that we get automatically with Global Entry) and Mike started to wonder if we could just go through "normal" security, like the people who live in Houston do. Greta had noticed a sign pointing a different direction for TSA PreCheck. The airport is under construction, so there are a lot of signs posting to spots that you can't walk through but eventually we found our way to an underground passage, which also had a subway. It listed the walk time to our B gate (just under 20 minutes) and so we opted to do that, versus taking the subway. After sitting on a plane for over 4 hours, the walk was a good thing. It felt like an old part of the airport and there were very few people down there. We eventually got to the B terminal and rode some escalators back up. There was as sign pointing to TSA PreCheck and we walked right up and went through the security scans. Greta's bag with the securely wrapped glass flamingo got flagged for a closer inspection. We explained what it was, and the guard took it out of the collapsible cooler (extra layer of padding) but he didn't unwrap the layers of bubble wrap and tape so we didn't have to worry about getting it repackaged correctly.

From there, we entered Terminal B, which is actually small. There are three "legs" off a main hub. Not much for restaurants/bars, but we found one place we could sit down, have a brisket sandwich/fries and beer PLUS plug in our phones to charge (none of the planes had charging ports, so if you watched a movie or used your phone a lot, the battery would drain down). We were there for about three hours, then went to the leg that corresponded to our gate (along with 10 other gates). It turns out that this is for planes that you board outside, on the tarmac (no jet way), so 30 minutes before departure, they open the doors, and you go down an escalator and get in line for your gate (There were three lines) and from there, you'd walk outside to get on to your plane. All this went pretty smoothly. We had a smaller plane going back to MSP (2x2 seats) and the flight home was uneventful. We did get more of the chocolate quinoa "Undercover" cookies on both flights back - these are REALLY good. A quick check on Amazon indicates that you can buy them in an 8-pack for $20 - so while they are very tasty, we probably won't be buying them any time soon.

Back in MSP, we headed right to the baggage claim and our dive bag was one of the first bags off. Awesome! Then, on to the little tram, which would bring us to the light rail. On the tram, a woman had a backpack with a plexi-glass body and she had a full-sized cat in it! He was travelling in style! We JUST missed the light-rail back to our car, so we had a 17 minute wait in the underground station. It was a bit chilly (Mike had opted to wear shorts home) but there were heaters you could stand under. By the time the train arrived, and dropped us off at the Humphrey Terminal parking where our car was, the sun had already set. But then we just hopped in the car, and headed home.

Tomorrow morning we'd pick up Mr. Remi from Back Forty. We'd gotten a bunch of pictures that last day from Nick at the kennel (his phone didn't want to send pictures a couple days ago) and we could tell Remi was having a good time with lots of new buddies. Monday morning, we left before 7 to pick him up (not hard since we were still on Bonaire time) and Remi was quite chatty to let us know he'd missed us. That's the best part of coming home - seeing Remi. The house is much too quiet without him there.

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leaving_bonaire.mp4
02/18/24 11:55:16

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