Monday, July 05, 2010

The truck/Morrow

We had pre-booked and pre-paid for the largest car we could book with Virgin Holiday's. We all knew that we were going to struggle with luggage space, which is why I'd taken the smallest bag possible. Everyone else had a somewhat larger case though. To that end the guy at the desk tried to sell us an upgrade to a larger vehicle than the minivan we had booked. Thinking of the cost they decided not to upgrade (I was looking after the bags at this point, not being a driver). When we got down to the garage though we realised what a struggle the luggage was going to be in the minivan class. I reckon with a seat dropped and maybe camera/ day bags on laps we could have just about managed. Andy rather lost it and flew into a bit of a strop of the "I told you so variety".

I told Gemma to run back and stick the upgrade on our card just to get us into a larger vehicle. One of the hire place employees came over and spoke to them about upgrading. Gemma asked about cost and was told that there would be no charge, we were doing him a favour as he wanted to keep the minivans back. Bonus - it pays to talk to the guys in the parking garage obviously.

So we ended up with a huge truck, a Suburban. It's got more than enough room for all the luggage in the back, and, I think room for 8 people. It really is super-huge. We all piled in and with Andy muttering, "On the right", to himself we set off.

Finding the general location of the Red Roof Inn on Morrow was fairly easy. Finding the entrance road not so. We ended up doing quite a bit of driving backwards and forwards because the directions I'd written out were rendered a bit useless because of roadworks and quite small signage pointing out the access road. The frustrating thing being that we kept driving past the big sign for the Red Roof. When I say big, I probably mean massive! We got there in the end though, checked in and had showers.

Jo was trying to have a sleep so the rest of us had a bit of a poke around. The motel is in a typical American off the highway sort of place, so not too conducive to walking, so we didn't make it too far.

Jo surfaced so we went for some food at the Cracker Barrel just up the road. I think the others were quite impressed by there first experience of American service, and also the gut-busting portions of food that we had. On top of the multiple aircraft feedings it was a bit of a struggle. Still I managed to polish off a plate of chicken in gravy and rice, and drank about a gallon of iced tea.

After over 24 hours awake and wobbling slightly from all the food and, in my case, the weird rocking dizziness left over from being on the plane, we all headed to our respective rooms.

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