|
|
|
Phnom Penh to BangkokAs happens for most of my US trips, I needed to take an evening flight to Bangkok, stay in Bangkok overnight, and then catch a United flight first thing in the morning to the US. Usually I sleep in the airport gate area because the trip to the Maryknoll Bangkok office takes so much time and money, but this trip I decided to try one of the cheap hotels near the airport, that others have been telling me about, to see if it made a difference in the travel. |
The first part of the journey is always through the Phnom Penh traffic. This time I took a tuk-tuk because Maryknoll New York asked me to bring 12 special crucifixes to give to major donors and they filled one suitcase by themselves. Usually I have just one suitcase and can jump on a motorcycle taxi which is cheaper and faster. |
 |
My friends had recommended the Queens Garden Resort as a cheap place to stay. Queens Garden is undergoing renovation now, though, so I was put up in the Great Residence Hotel nearby, just 2+ miles from the airport. |
 |
The room was nice enough, offering a refrigerator and cable TV and free pickup and drop off service for the $20 price. The only disappointment was that my flight was delayed out of Phnom Penh so I got to use the room one less hour than I had planned. |
 |
|
|
|
|
|
Bangkok to New YorkThis was the long day that is part of crossing the International Dateline going east. I left Bangkok at 7:00 AM Monday and arrived in New York City at 6:30 PM Monday after flying for fifteen hours. |
|
- The van from the Queens Garden Resort picked us up at 4:30 AM and took us back to the Bangkok airport. Check in was quick, this time with ANA which was operating a code-share flight with United.
- Because it was a code-share flight to Tokyo, I had not been able to make a seat assignment online but was lucky at the airport to still get an aisle seat which would enable me to get up and walk around. It was the very last row of the economy cabin, 42H.
- For the first time in my experience, this international flight did not serve a meal after taking off but waited 4.5 hours before we got to eat. Since people had to get up about 4:00 AM to get to the airport, most people had not eaten breakfast so I found the delayed meal quite unusual.
- In Tokyo we had less than an hour between flights and soon we were on UA804 to Washington, DC. I had been upgraded to Economy Plus and was able to switch to an aisle seat which was nice.
- Arriving at Dulles, I found that the flight to LaGuardia had been canceled because of fog. I was offered the option of staying overnight (at my expense) or flying in a few hours to Newark instead. I chose the latter.
- Arriving in Newark--my first time at that airport--I found that my luggage had not made the change of destinations with me. I filed a claim for lost luggage and then headed to Maryknoll, NY. Unfortunately my coat was in my luggage so I spent the next 2.5 hours outside in 30º+ weather in my shirt sleeves. It got rather chilly!
- I took the airport bus to Grand Central Station in Manhattan, changed to the MetroNorth railroad and took a train to Croton-Harmon, going past Ossining because at that time of night (11:00 PM) there are usually no taxis operating in Ossining. From Croton I took a taxi--at three times the fare it would been from Ossining--back to Ossining to Maryknoll, getting there about 11:30 PM.
|
|