Paris to Swiss Alps: Jaunt to the Cleveland Airport (3/24/2017)

Friday, March 24, 2017
Today was to be the start of our Paris to the Swiss Alps Land and River Cruise Tour. Not yet!
We drove down to the Avalon station of the RTA Rapid, parked, took our suitcases and waited for the Blue Line train. (Brynne would walk down to the station to drive our car home that evening.)

Cleveland RTA Rapid train

At E 55 we changed to the Red Line.

More Inter|Urban murals (2016) on the west side of Cleveland: (L to R)
Yes by Margaret Kimball (inspired by White Pages by Martha Collins
and Obama’s 2008 presidential campaign slogan, ‘Yes we can"),
Noblesse Oblige by Alan Giberson (inspired by The Autobiography of
Malcolm X by Malcolm X with Alex Haley), and Untitled by Ryan Jaenke
(inspired by the poem, Montage of a Dream Deferred by Langston Hughes)

Present Tense (2016) by Alex Yanes, inspired by
“I am accused of tending to the past” by Lucille Clifton

Totem Pillars (2016) by Louise Chen,
inspired by the book, Eleven by Sandra Cisneros

We arrived at the Cleveland Hopkins International Airport (established 1925). (The airport was named after its founder, former city manager William R. Hopkins.)

Kent has disembarked from the Red Line train at the airport

As you entered the station through a tunnel, the walls were lined with tin-type portraits of local residents, done by Kelly Anderson-Staley, as part of the Inter|Urban project.

Wall decor inside the airport station

Tile work on the floors

The Red Line commuter train at the airport station

We were very early when we checked in, and the agent put us on standby for the 15:05 flight to Atlanta. However, it was already overbooked. Yet our luggage went along on that flight!
We waited several hours for our scheduled 17:25 flight.  A plane arrived and disgorged ts passengers, and the waiting passengers readied to board.

Ill-fated Delta Flight 1158

That's when Delta announced that there would be a 4-hour delay! The plane had arrived with an engine compartment panel that was open. They would have to wait two hours for a Delta maintenance crew to arrive, then two hours for it to be repaired.
That meant we would definitely miss our connection to Paris.
Everyone scrambled to make alternate arrangements.
Next they announced that they were bringing in another plane, but now it was a 5-hour delay!
After many calls, we were re-booked for flights the next day, meaning we would miss a whole day in Paris... And we had to have our luggage re-routed!
Brynne picked us up from the airport and we will spend tonight in our own bed!

Next: Arrival in Paris.