Belgium, Pt. 1- Australian surfboard upset

Levi took his first international flight to Europe last week, and @delta gave him a front row seat!

A photo posted by Garth Hamilton (@garth_hamilton) on Oct 12, 2015 at 5:59pm PDT

A second round of Australian surfing just wasn't meant to be.  And to make it worse, Australian Surfboard Upset sounds more like a crowdbreaker game I'd devise for my church youth group than a respectable blog post title.  It can be hard for a youth pastor's brain to switch modes.  


Just prior to this month's Hamilton family European vacation, I had sent my parents to Australia for a few weeks.  My plan was to meet them in Sydney for a couple days, fly home to the U.S., and then bring Kathy and the kids to Europe the very next day.

In Sydney, I would do the tourist thing with my folks, visit some Aussie friends while I'm in town, and finally hit Bondi Beach for some surfing.  Australia boasts the BEST surfing I've had in my life, hands down.


Long story short, I screwed up my visa.  Everything got fixed... But after all that hassle, the flight from L.A. to Sydney was oversold anyway.  Ironically, a solid year of scoring a ton of Business Elite seats for my Delta buddy pass riders had lead to me getting stuck in L.A.

Thankfully, one of my favorite buddies Joseph saved me from an overnight stay in LAX airport by letting me crash in one of his rental houses in Hollywood. After a post-midnight nosh at In-N-Out Burger, Joseph set me up in a room so I could write my most recent blog post (see link to that previous "Salt Lake City- Delta Velvet 360" post) and get some sleep.

I'd make one last attempt to fly out to Australia the next evening.

Open air breakfast of paleo coconut pancakes and coffee in Hollywood, courtesy of Candace

None of my photos with Joseph are really worth sharing here, but my Instagram followers may remember this photo collage of my most recent Hollywood visit:

Sunset Blvd, Hollywood last weekend, with my good buddy @joeshoots3d

A photo posted by Garth Hamilton (@garth_hamilton) on Jun 14, 2015 at 3:25pm PDT

The next evening's L.A. flight to Sydney was also oversold, so I flew home to start our family European vacation a few days early.  Sadly, little Lena was ill when I got back.

Rather than flying to Europe early, we spent those extra few days waiting for Lena to get better.  I even stayed home on Sunday to take care of Lena, so Mommy could watch Levi in the church nursery.

Other than getting out to climb or seeing the occasional friend, most of my remaining week of Delta vacation was spent at home.

Climbing intro lesson for my friend Gwen, just to get her belay certified at Stoneworks Climbing Gym

A few days later, Mommy finally gave Lena a clean bill of health.  We scooped up Lena and Levi, hurried to PDX Airport, and loaded those little Ls on the very next departing plane.

Economy Comfort seats for all of us: That's airlinese for Fancy Coach

Coming next, after leading a NW Wilderness climb to the summit of the South Sister volcano and our thrilling scramble/ rappel down the Mystery Trail...

Belgium, Pt. 2- The story finally begins!

From Rome: Traveling to Africa, Nicaragua, South Korea, or ANYWHERE?

Flying standby overseas in early December is usually pretty easy for us.  Flights loads are lighter.  But our recent winning streak of hassle-free international trips came to a screeching halt this week.

Update 12/8/14:  Originally uploaded from Italy on Saturday morning, I reposted this story today with some bonus photos from Rome.  Plenty of more Italy photos are coming!

Kathy's and my South African safari should have wrapped up on Friday, freeing up this weekend to swing by Italy to see some friends.  Even if I ran out of time to make it to their villa, we could still meet in Central Italy for a Saturday night out in Rome.  It all seemed like a sure thing.

But then this week happened.

Nervous, Kathy?  Not to worry, Kathy totally gave me permission to share this pic, en route to Seattle.

Attempt #1:  PDX to Atlanta to South Africa

Kathy was fearful of traveling back to South Africa on Monday, even more so than our recent overseas trips. The anxiety was too much for poor Kathy, and for days there was nothing I could do or say to console her. To make matters worse, last October our South African outlet adapter had literally caught on fire in our dorm in Spain. We knocked out the power to the entire wing of our Madrid hostel!

The night before we were scheduled to fly down to South Africa for our safari, I mercifully suggested an alternate destination. South Africa would be our first of many attempts this week.

Attempt #2:  PDX to Atlanta to Nicaragua

I stayed up all night on Monday reworking our plans: where to surf in Nicaragua, which active volcanoes to climb, and which hiking trails would be enjoyable for Kathy. But Tuesday morning, we were unable to get on our Atlanta flight to connect to Managua. We flew Business Class to Seattle instead, attempting to catch a red eye flight to Atlanta. Shortly after we landed in Seattle, the red eye became completely oversold.

Central America was out, and we were stuck overnight in Seattle until Wednesday.

Attempt #3:  Seattle to South Korea

Wednesday's Seattle flight to Seoul looked open. We overnighted in Burien with our good Warner Pacific friends Michael and Melanie. Readers may remember Michael from little Lena's first Daddy-daughter trip to Seattle this fall. Here's the link to that story.

Camera one, camera two.  And camera three?

But on Wednesday morning, we were unable to get on our flight from Seattle to Seoul. And all flights to Atlanta (or to any of Delta's international hubs) were oversold for days.

Making progress:  Seattle to Los Angeles

Finally!  We got unstuck from Seattle and flew to L.A on Wednesday afternoon.  This was our last chance this week to transfer to Atlanta and fly overseas, though the LAX-ATL red eye flight was slightly oversold.  Regardless of which country we visited first, the clock was ticking until I had to be in Italy on Saturday night.

More progress: Los Angeles to Atlanta

Against all odds, we didn't get stuck in LAX overnight. The oversold red eye flight to Atlanta gradually opened up enough for Kathy and I to grab the last two seats. Together!

Upon landing in Atlanta before dawn on Thursday morning, we discovered that our doable international connections from ATL now looked horrible until the NEXT day. We had run out of time to visit any counties prior to our arrival in Rome, which wasn't even our main destination.  Italy was merely intended to be a fun way to cap off a week of continent hopping.

The white flag:  Atlanta it is.

We made the most of our extra day in Atlanta. We hiked to the top of Stone Mountain, negotiated an outrageously low rate for a premium hotel suite, and kicked off our tour of the Atlanta nightlife with the Cowboys vs. Bears game at J. R. Cricket's.  Dallas steamrollered Chicago, of course.

A quick afternoon hike to the top of Stone Mountain, Georgia

Our flight to Rome was less than a day away. But Kathy decided that she was content with our unplanned domestic vacation as is. The night before our flight left for Italy, she eagerly removed her name from our listing and booked a flight home to Portland instead. The tail end of our vacation week would be solo.

Back on schedule: Atlanta to Rome

This is where our vacation went back to normal (for us): A Business Elite cabin seat over the ocean, an early arrival in Rome with plenty of time for sightseeing with my friends, and an opportunity for the craziest Saturday night out that Rome has ever seen!  Let's hope!

But that will be a story for another travel post.

12/8/14:  Here are a couple pics from my upcoming Rome post:

The Roman coliseum: Who knew that the Eternal City would take an eternity to get to?

Video: Dance war!

1, 2, 3, 4... I declare a dance war!  Our Delta Airlines dance crew has a new challenger.

Poke the play button above to watch us dance in our 2012 "Delta Wanderland" Christmas music video.

Our choreographed dance routine for last year's "Delta Wanderland" Christmas video was a novel idea at the time: encourage actual Delta employees to audition, send the finalists (myself included) to L.A. to learn the dance moves, and shoot the music video all night on location at the LAX Airport. As an actor, it was a change of pace for me to rehearse dance moves rather than block action and memorize my lines from a script.

My blog offered a series of behind the scenes looks at shooting our music video last year. Three of the four most the popular posts from that series are listed below.  Here are the links:

Behind the Scenes in LA Pt. 1- Dancing Near the Stars
Choreographing our dance moves at L.A.'s International Dance Academy on Hollywood Boulevard

Behind the Scenes in LA Pt. 2- On Set: Delta Wanderland
Stories and production stills from our all night video shoot at LAX airport

And of course...
Bonus Documentary: "Delta Wanderland: Behind the Scenes!"
Sharing our official behind-the-scenes video, including a rare, brief clip of me busting some moves during our freestyle dance off!


We were proud of our production. Our Delta music video even beat out companies like HP to receive a trophy this year, winning an OMMA award for best Online Media, Marketing, and Advertising!

**********

But a few weeks ago, Virgin America challenged us on our own turf: the dance floor. Their creative new safety video features professional dancers (unlike us) and pizazz to spare. Clocking in at a whopping 5:00, readers may want to skim through the clip:




I'll concede, our Delta dance troupe seems to be out-sassed on this one.  But does our 2012 "Delta Wanderland" music video stand on its own merits?  And is it fair to compare our one night production using authentic, non-dancer Delta employees against a professional music video?  Personally, I think it's impressive that we pulled off "Delta Wanderland" on such a tight shooting schedule last year.  Our team did such a great job!  Readers can be the judge of that.

We may have barely lost this dance battle, but not the dance war.

Coming this weekend on Garth's Blog...

Yesterday's day trip to Noordwijk, Netherlands: An almost daddy-daughter visit!

And then....

Cold water surfing in Oregon with the fam!

Bonus Documentary: "Delta Wanderland- Behind the Scenes!"

Our new “Delta Wanderland- Behind the Scenes” video is here!  A brief clip of my Soul Train dance moves is buried at 1:15.

Before watching the short documentary video above, I would recommend first checking out the finalized version of our “Delta Wanderland” holiday music video. My two previous posts highlighted our choreography rehearsals at the International Dance Academy in L.A. and the all-night filming of the video at LAX airport (links).

The all-new behind the scenes video above finally dropped last weekend!  This short, fun documentary features never before seen footage of us creating “Delta Wanderland.”

A deleted “Soul Train” dance scene from the “Delta Wanderland” script was rehearsed but never filmed.  Most of raw footage will probably remain private, but we’re all ecstatic to see a few clips surface here.  Check out a blink-and-you’ll-miss-it shot of my contribution to our dance-off at 1:15!

Thanks for reliving the magic with us!!

Behind the Scenes in L.A. Pt 2- On Set: Delta Wanderland

As seen in our “Delta Wanderland” holiday video above, our hard work at the International Dance Academy paid off!  Check out my last BlogSpot post for what went down during our choreography rehearsals earlier that week in L.A.

We dancers relished the 24 hour rest period between the final dance studio rehearsal and the all-night video shoot the following evening. Visiting friends, hanging out together at the Hilton pool, light choreography practicing, working out at the gym, jogging, relaxing… we all had different methods of recovery and preparation for the video shoot.

Tuesday night at LAX airport, a special security line at CTX was set up for the production crew, actors, dancers, and anyone else displaying a “Shilo, Inc.” security badge.  Inside the concourse, the documentary crew and hair & makeup station worked in the background as principal filming began.

The director watched the monitor intently as the interior scenes were shot.

The production crew set up the lighting and camera cranes on the airport ramp outside…

…While choreographers Tamarra and Nick fine-tuned and finalized our various dance setups inside a cramped rehearsal room.

The Delta ramp dancers found our marks on the ground outside for glow wand lighting tests.  (“Delta Wanderland.” See what we did there?)

The camera cranes were adjusted to keep us in frame as we performed our core dance routine.  When everything was lighted and framed just right, the whole dance crew joined us in front of the cameras to get their groove on.

We danced through the night, leaping, marching, spinning, running, and even dodging a speeding camera during the “The Wave” setup.  Thanks to our dance choreographer Nick Drago for these photos!

A mishmash of dancing styles was shoehorned into the various setups, including the Busby Berkeley-style aerial shot and closing Delta widget formation (both included in the final cut).

As with any film or TV shoot, the takes were repeated over and over again from different angles.  At 5 a.m. Wednesday morning, we wrapped for the night and said our goodbyes.

But filming continued on Wednesday night.

Roberto, a Delta employee AND dance instructor, shot some additional footage with Tamarra and Nick on Wednesday night for the “dance generator” bonus feature.

Click on this link and “Make Your Own Dance” with Roberto!

As for myself, I followed up our all-night video shoot with a short nap at the LAX Hilton and a couple of connecting flights back home to Portland.  I arrived in PDX with just enough time to catch our Wednesday night youth meeting and afterwards make a cameo in a "Star Trek" parody film at church.

 “Brace for impact!”

Those four days in L.A. were more than just a welcome change of pace for me.  Making new friends, learning from motivational dance choreographers, and working with a fantastic production crew made this an unforgettable experience for all of us.  

We all are grateful to work for Delta Airlines, appreciate our customers, and are thrilled to have been part of this video project.

Merry Christmas, and have a “wanderful” (cringe) holiday season!!

Coming next week on BlogSpot…

A Hamilton family Christmas

Followed by… 

A high flying weekend of adventure for all of you adrenaline junkies out there!