September 25, 2006
LAS-STL 4:25p – 9:30p AMERICAN 757-200 N624AA Economy Class
September 26, 2006
STL-MIA 6:57a–10:35a AMERICAN 757-200 N627AA Economy Class


Although I’d tried mightily to get a midday departure from Las Vegas to Miami, the only seats available on the 25th were the 11:30pm redeye or a 4:25pm departure through St. Louis connecting to a Miami bound flight early the next morning. Life’s too short to fly domestic redeyes, so I reserved a seat on the overnight connection via St. Louis and then arrived early (10:30am) at LAS in hopes of standing by for an earlier flight to Miami. According to the ticket agent at American’s counter, Mondays are notoriously busy days to fly out of Las Vegas. The huge crowds backed up at the security checkpoints lent credence to his statement. People were backed up in a line close to two hundred yards long before they even got to the zig-zag lanes at the security checkpoints. Given the crowds at security, I was too late to standby for the 11:30am departures to Chicago or Dallas. Unfortunately, the 12:30pm departure through Dallas was oversold by five and there would be seven people ahead of me on the standby list. Guess I’ll stick with my connection through St. Louis then. Thankfully I scored reclining exit row seats on both flights.

Now faced with a five hour wait until my St. Louis departure, I was reminded of an old adage from my childhood: When life gives you lemons, make lemonade. So inspired, I headed over to the old America West Club and brought this report up to date. By the time I emerged to head over to the D Concourse, the wait at security was only 20 minutes.

Interestingly, the 757 into St. Louis was only about half full and there was plenty of space for everyone to spread out. I had the exit row to myself and had beautiful sunset views of the Grand Canyon off the starboard side of the aircraft. Half an hour later, it was dark.

I hadn’t been in the main terminal building of St. Louis’s Lambert Field since 1977. Now, twenty-nine years later I didn’t even recognize the place. Gone were the comfortable leather chairs and the full service coffee shop in the corner. The lighting used to more comfortable too but now the entire terminal was brightly lit and the full service restaurant had been replaced by a Burger King and a take away rib joint. I sure do miss the days when TWA, Ozark and Eastern were the primary carriers at Lambert.

My flight into Miami the next morning was noteworthy only for the fact that American no longer offers Quaker Oat bars with its coffee service on early morning departures. We did see some impressive cumulonimbus cloud formations as we descended into Miami International.

The next two days were spent visiting with ex-Denali drivers who are now National Park Service rangers at Everglades National Park. The drive from Homestead down to Flamingo at the south end of the park is, I think, the prettiest drive in all of Florida. Here are some pictures:

EVERGLADES NATIONAL PARK