Shriner's Hospital Trip: Up And Back In A Day

Lauren and I started our day at 4:45 a.m. at Eppley Airfield.

Eight boarding passes for our four flights: Omaha to Chicago's O'Hare to Minneapolis and back.

Lauren patiently awaited her breakfast at a nice little place we found tucked in the back of one of the food courts at O'Hare.

A plain omelet, lots of hash browns, toast and hot chocolate were on the menu for Lauren and her other travel partner.

When you're as skinny as Lauren, there's quite a bit of seat belt left to go around.

Lauren even got a little reading in on the flights. We had a different type of aircraft for each one. (She liked the flight from Chicago to Minneapolis on an Airbus 320 the best.)

We joked that "Gate Gourmet" is where we are going to eat the next time we dine out.

There was a flurry of action in the lobby behind Lauren. A local high school football team was doing a workshop activity with patients.

Lauren's longtime friend, Dedra, caught up to us several times. It's always good to see her.

Dr. Lael Luedtke is Lauren's new physician,  replacing Dr. Ken Guidera, who had treated her since our first visit back in the early 2000s.

Lyndsey, the X-ray technician, had the same Nike shoes as Lauren.

So many flights out of Chicago ... but only two going back to Omaha.

Here is the cake Lauren designed herself.

Can you tell some of her sisters were pretty jealous of Lauren's birthday cake?

Lauren wasn't the only one smiling about not having an ice cream cake this year. The Cake Gallery creation broke our habit of usually going with something from Dairy Queen.

Can you tell the birthday cake was a huge hit?

Back In Europe

It doesn't get more Euro than this (lobby of my hotel).
So I'm back in Europe. Seems like I never left. And it's nice to be back.

My trip out of Omaha was a bit hectic. Lots of errand-running (thanks, mom!) and then a delayed flight as we sat on the tarmac for 22 minutes waiting for other planes overhead to clear. When I got to Chicago, I didn't have much time. About 25 minutes to make my connection, in fact. But I made it – and even managed to get an important e-mail sent out.

That important e-mail distribution was kind of funny, actually. I had to rush to send it and they were already boarding. They had done a "final boarding call" and I was still waiting for the distribution to wrap. But the friendly gate attendant asked to see my boarding pass and said I had "plenty of time." And get this – she even switched me to a row where no one was sitting next to me. Wow. Fantastic. I love United Airlines.

Though the pilot didn't turn on Channel 9 (so you can listen to cockpit communications), the flight was good - and short. Only a little more than seven hours. I ate dinner (even had time to watch "Spinal Tap"), then went to sleep. It wasn't entirely uninterrupted sleep, though. We had a lot of turbulence and I needed to go to the restroom somewhere over Ireland. But everything else went well. There were even some Americans going to the race, which always makes it fun because they knew all about the BMC Racing Team.

Speaking of knowing about the team, the border patrol agent asked me about the nature of my travel. I told him I was here for a "bike race" - thinking he wouldn't have a clue. "The Tour of Flanders?", he asked. Wow. Not only did this guy know, but he knew all about Greg Van Avermaet (the Belgian rider on the team) and the BMC Racing Team. Only in Belgium, right? It's a cycling crazy country. Think Nebraska football for Nebraskans.

Following an hour-long drive to the hotel, I had lunch, followed by some interviews to moderate (one with Alessandro Ballan show at right). Everything up to this point has gone smoothly. Let's hope it continues.

Tomorrow (Saturday) is supposed to be extremely warm (up to 25 Celsius, which is about 70 degrees Fahrenheit) and sunny. But get ready for Sunday: rain, cold, wind. That should be epic. And yes, I did pack my own rain jacket this time.

Notebook:
- Best moment of the flight? When the purser came on this morning and said, "Ladies and Gentlemen, good morning. We will soon be landing in London. Please begin stowing away your electronic devices. (pause) And happy April Fool's Day."

- My room is huge. Seriously. But there's a lot of wasted space, too. And only two outlets (one in the main room, one in the bathroom). But there is (good) wifi.

- Here's a look outside my room. The city where we're staying (Kortrijk) is actually where Greg LeMond lived for most of his cycling career. I haven't seen much more of the city than what you see here. And that's usually how it goes. I do know that our truck is parked out back and that we are one of two teams staying here (Lampre is the other one).

- It might have still been March, but the movies were already switched over to April on the plane. We didn't have a guide, though, so it was a matter of trying to figure out what was on each of the nine channels. One had the "Tron" sequel, but I've seen that movie three times already.

A look at my room.

The invitation on the right is for "Americans only," according to the hotel.

My "Belgian phone" which was issued upon my arrival.

Parking passes in the car, leftover from the race that ended yesterday.

Julia won't be getting a key card from this hotel.

The pool area has a dungeon-like feel to it.

Julia, the restroom has its own room.

Paris-Nice: The Arrival

My credential for this week's race.
Paris – I told myself I will take 15 minutes each day to report back on things going on while I'm in Europe.

Well, I've been here almost 24 hours and still haven't pounded out an entry. So here goes.

Things didn't seem to get off to the greatest of starts on this trip. Unless you consider my luggage actually made it (which it didn't in my two previous trips across the pond). First, it appears I left my micro-recorder somewhere other than my black bag. That's not a big deal, though, since my Blackberry has a recording function. I also encountered about a two-hour delay getting out of Chicago. It was apparently a mechanical thing, though the weather (stormy) wasn't the greatest, either.

What was nice about the trip was Scott Nydam (BMC Racing Team do-everything-guy) joined me on the flight. We met up in Chicago. He bailed me out with his carry-on razor after I discovered I missed a spot shaving the back of my head. A big spot, I might add. The other nice thing about the eight-hour flight was the fact that United has TVs in its seat backs – unlike Delta, which has a couple TV monitors scattered about the cabin. So I started watching, "The King's Speech" and quickly lost interest. I had eight other movies to choose from and chose "Tangled," which I have seen twice already. Apparently a lot of other passengers liked that one, since it appeared to be on nearly every screen as I walked down the aisle.

After a nice dinner in my cramped window seat (the flight was full), I slept for nearly seven hours. This turned out to be a good thing, as I usually am exhausted the first couple days over here. So far, so good.

The rest of my first day here was spent covering a race in Italy and getting organized. My room is nice (though small, as expected) and I received a ton of new BMC Racing Team gear, including T-shirts, socks, two pairs of black jeans (not Hincapie Sportswear, unfortunately), hats and new Thule luggage. The backpack is my new "travel" bag for on-site use. We'll see how it works out beginning on today's stage.

The race today is on a circuit, so we'll see the riders come by at least three times. Jacques Michaud, one of the BMC Racing Team managers, is going to take me around. He's a former Tour de France stage winner so everyone knows him. He says he's going to introduce me to Bernard Hinault and take my photo with the former five-time Tour winner. That would be nice since I've been a fair of Hinault since I first got interested in the sport in 1981.

My office area – with a view of the highway nearby.

No room for all the new gear, so it went on the bed.

More new luggage – courtesy of Thule.

Two phones for this race. The red one is my French number.

Here's the bathroom (photo for Julia).

Not a big room, but nice.

Check out the room numbers. Laser-printed paper.

Trudi Rebsamen was ready for our arrival, as usual.

Living Like An Olympian

My (single) room at the U.S. Olympic Training Center.
Colorado Springs, Colo. - So I'm back in Colorado Springs for the first time since 2006. That summer, I was here for a USA Cycling officials upgrade seminar. This time, I am here representing the Nebraska Cycling Association at the fourth annual Local Association Summit.

One of the more humorous things about the summit (in my opinion), is its abbreviation - "LA Summit." It's almost as if the folks at USA Cycling were trying to (in a sneaky way) remind us that cycling is all about the initials "LA." And you know who I am referring to...

So my travel began at Eppley Airfield, where the first signs of winter were beginning to appear. (I saw a snowplow at 50th & Grover - but no snowflakes.) The wind was blowing pretty good, driving temperatures that were in the 70s earlier this week down to the low 40s. So I hauled out my trench coat and stocking cap for the trip.

This plane (and mine) took a splash under the de-icer.
I got absolutely nothing accomplished on the 71-minute flight from Omaha to Denver. But I did meet a teacher from Northwestern College in Orange City, Iowa, who teaches public relations. She had a new (2009 edition) book titled, "Public Information Officer" that I absolutely need to buy.

Here's the "puddle-jumper" I boarded in Denver.
Once in Denver, I grabbed a bite to eat (KFC, not my first choice) and tried to take advantage of the free wi-fi and catch up on e-mails and phone calls. My plane was scheduled to board at 2:30 and departure was at 3:05 p.m. What I didn't initially realize (because I am always looking for open space and outlets) is that I wasn't anywhere near my gate. At about 2:15, I realized that I didn't have my boarding pass because I initially flew United to Denver, then switched to Frontier.

With boarding pass now in hand, I resumed work. At about 2:45 and not having heard them call my flight over the intercom, I figured I better pack up and start looking for the gate. Much to my surprise - and near panic - the gate was a long way down a hallway. I practically had to do an OJ to get to the gate, where I found I was the second-to-last to board.

But the nice thing about being late is that there is less time to sit in the plane itself. And having not bothered to check the boarding pass for the arrival time, I chuckled when the (male) flight attendant said the "wheels up to wheels down" time would be 15 minutes. Certainly he had to be joking.

I had a nice view of the port (left) side landing gear.
He was not joking. No sooner had we made it to our "cruising altitude" than the pilot came over the intercom to let us know we would soon be arriving in Colorado Springs and that the flight attendants needed to prepare for landing. No beverage service. No in-flight use of electronics. No time to do much of anything. But I did get to watch that little poof of smoke when the tires first touch down to the runway.

This astronaut statue is at the Denver airport.
The drive from the airport to the U.S. Olympic Training Center is done by shuttle bus - with seat belts. It must be some type of government thing. Anyway, I knew six people on the bus, which was pretty cool. There are 46 of us on the conference roster, so I only have 40 more people to meet (and I already know four of them).

Two years ago, these sprinklers got me wet. Not this time!
As for my accommodations, I was looking forward to rooming with someone like I did the last time I was here. But they put me in a private room and I'm enjoying that, too. There's free wi-fi, but no coat hangers or iron. And I'll have to hunt down a cup because I have a sink in my room. And the restroom is just one door down the hall. The one drawback is that I'm on the third floor. Oh well. Stairs are a good thing.

The goodies - and a stack of towels - left on my bed.