We woke up early on day 7 and headed to the LAX airport. Our flight went from LAX to San Francisco, then San Francisco to Chicago, and Chicago to home. LAX to San Fran was beautiful, San Fran to Chicago went smoothly, and in Chicago, we ran into a little problem.

We knew we had a scheduled 3-hour delay in Chicago, so we had planned on doing lunch and hanging out at the airport for a while. After our scheduled delay, we found out that there were issues with our plane. Our 3-hour delay turned into a 4-hour, and then 5-hour, and then finally, was cancelled until the following morning.

The airline provided us with a room for the night; all we had to do was hop on a bus to get to the hotel. By this point, it was close to 11 pm and most of the airport employees had gone home. We met up with a group of other travelers headed in the same way we were and together with them, we got lost in the Chicago airport.

In our defense, the route we were supposed to be taking was closed because of a suspicious package. They had called in the ‘bomb squad’ and were using a robot to check things out and everything. It was all very exciting, but it meant that it took us an extra hour (or two!) to get to our room.

In hindsight, we should have just forfeited the room and stayed the night in the airport. But at long last, we found our room and settled in for a short nap before heading back to the airport for our flight. From there, everything went smoothly—Chicago to Nashville, Nashville to Sweet Home Alabama!

We loved almost everything about our California vacation and can’t wait to go back. On our next trip, we plan to hit the Northern half of the state, so if you have any tips or must-do’s, please let me know!