To fly or to boat, that is the question

Transportation from one island to the next is sometimes an issue here. We have small commercial planes that go back and forth, a "high-speed" passenger boat that goes between Clove Island and the bigger island which hosts the international airport, and then some fishing boats or other small fiberglass boats which make the trek between islands.

But sometimes the options start to disappear, or become less appealing.

Fishing boats and little fiberglass boats never really seem like a good option, but when even the fishermen don't want to brave the seas, they seem rather unappealing.

The passenger boat can be a pleasant enough experience, but when it's stuffed with 200+ passengers and the seas are rough, pretty much anything seems better than being trapped for 6 hours between puking passengers in a poorly air-conditioned interior as the sea rocks in and out of sight through the windows.

And planes? Well, one airline had an accident and hasn't been allowed to resume work. Another airline ran out of money and their leased plane was repossessed... and they haven't gotten a new plane again. 

So that left us with a single airline, flying one plane. And when that plane broke, we had no plane.

No planes, one highly unappealing boat option, and my parents were visiting, with a return ticket to the US departing from the big island, not Clove Island. Well, no worries, they'll fix the plane, we have a week before we need to travel.

Except they didn't fix the plane. From Monday to the following Sunday there were no planes flying. We bought boat tickets, discussed seasickness plans, packed lunch, and made sure the motion sickness medicines were conveniently available in my purse. Monday morning we were packing and cleaning, getting ready to leave by the boat, when I decided at the last minute to call a friend with the airline on the off-chance things had changed.

"The plane is flying today! Get to the airport an hour from now and you'll travel!" 

I didn't believe him. "Are you sure? People said it would fly on Saturday, and it didn't go."

"No," he assured me, "they did a test flight with a few passengers on Sunday afternoon, so everything's ready to resume flights today."

Well okay then. We did the mad scramble to get out the door, shifting some things in bags now that we would spend 30 minutes in the air instead of 6 hours on the open sea.

And we made it to the big island! By plane! 

Island life is sometimes unpredictable, but I'm always happy when things work out.