Perhaps you've wondered just what airline pilots do on layovers? Wild parties with flight attendants perhaps? I'm not sure if that ever went on, but if it did it probably went the way of Pan Am and the 707 years ago.
My friends in the passenger world have never regaled me with wild tales of debauchery, so I can't even live vicariously.
In the freight world of course we don't have flight attendants. I've been trying to teach the chickens in the cargo hold how to mix a martini but I haven't had much success so far. They keep adding too much vermouth.
So stay tuned if you want a peek into the work-a-day world of pilots.
I don't want to sound like I'm complaining. I've had some very memorable layovers. Christmas in Paris, Christmas in Budapest. Long weekends in Munich.
I've stayed at hotels that I could never afford on my own dime. I once got the Presidential Suite at a Paris hotel because it was the only room they had left. I'd rather be lucky than good any day.
Those are the exceptions, however. The norm is quite a bit more mundane.
Flying domestic routes in the 757 we service a lot of second-tier cities, or "the Greats and the Grands" as we like to say. Grand Forks, Great Falls, Grand Rapids, etc. I'll use Stewart/Newburgh (SWF) as an example just because it's a pretty typical second-tier destination.
In case you don't know, Stewart Newburgh is a small airport in the Hudson River Valley, about 80 miles north of New York City. It supports an Air National Guard unit, a relatively small number of regional airline flights, and us cargo haulers.
I'm scheduled in at 6:15 AM. My layover is scheduled for 15 hours and 40 minutes. That means time from block-in to block-out. That doesn't translate to 15+40 in the hotel. We have to do some math here:
Ride from the airport to the hotel: 30 minutes scheduled. We're down to 15+10 now.
Ride from the hotel back to the airport: same 30 minutes. Now we're down to 14+40.
Flight preparation for the outbound leg: 1 hour. We now have 13+40 left.
This all assumes that: we arrive on time, the limo is on time (they usually are) and we don't hit traffic on the way to the hotel.
If our flight is late arriving, it comes out of my time on the layover. Tick tock.
I always like when they pick me up in a Lincoln Town Car, especially a black one. Makes me feel like Tony Soprano. I enjoy the rising sun in my face as we head east on the New York Thruway.
The hotel is across the Hudson in Fishkill, NY. I don't mean to pick on Fishkill but the main industry there seems to be prisons. It sports 3 of them. I figure half the population is locked up and the other half is being paid to watch them.
The hotel is in a typical suburban strip across from a Wal-Mart and surrounded by chain restaurants, fast food and gas stations. It looks exactly like every other suburban strip anywhere in the country. If it wasn't for the hills I might just as well be in Tulsa.
The hotel is from a chain that I don't recognize but it's equivalent to a Drury Inn or Holiday Inn Express. In a bigger city we'd be staying at a Hilton or a Sheraton, but this is probably as good as it gets in Fishkill.
Grab my bags, tip the driver and head on in. The company has contracted our rooms so all I have to do is sign in. I hit the free breakfast (if it's free it's for me) so I'll sleep better and then head to the room. It's probably between 7:30 and 8:00 AM at this point so I quickly go through my "sleeping in the day time" checklist:
1. Drapes fastened shut with clothes pins - check.
2. A/C set to "meat locker" - check.
3. Extra pillows laid in front of door to muffle sound from hallway - check.
4. Ringer on phone turned off - check.
5. Earplugs - check.
6. Sleep mask - check.
Noise - you are the bane of my existence. I never realized the sound of an 18-wheeler going through the gears could travel so far. And you guys with the motorcycles, I know the sound of your finely tuned V-Twin Cruiser or Sport Bike is music to your ears but right now you're just pissing me off. Same goes to you with the 1000-watt stereo shoehorned into the trunk of your Honda Civic. You know who you are. I hate to sound like a grumpy old man, but sleep deprivation will do that to you.
If I'm really lucky I'll sleep for six hours, probably waking up once or twice. More likely in four to five hours I'll wake up like Martin Sheen in the beginning of Apocalypse Now and lay there for a while trying to remember what city I'm in.
Best not to look in the mirror first thing. Last time I did that it was like looking at a portrait of my grandfather.
Food. I need food. It's too late for lunch and too early for dinner. Rummage through my backpack......ah ha! I find the remnants of one of the snack boxes the company gives us on flights. We call them "Scooby Snacks". Let's see what we've got here. "Lentil chips" and hummus - sure, why not. "Turkey Jerky" - not sure but I'm pretty desperate so I'll give it a go. Wash it down with a diet Coke and I'm good until dinner time.
3:00 PM - I'd better get a workout in. I'm not getting any younger and I need to keep passing my physicals. Workout facilities vary, usually the nicer the hotel the nicer the gym. This one is pretty average. I jump on the treadmill. I sometimes find the treadmill to be an apt metaphor for my career.
5:00 PM - I've cleaned up from my workout and now it's my favorite time of day. Dinner! Since the other pilot happens to live nearby, he went home for the day and I'm on my own. Let's see what's around here. Fast food, nope. Chain restaurant, nah. Chinese buffet, ate there the other day, wasn't that good. Diner, now we're talking! I love diners. They're usually locally owned, affordable, and have plenty of options to choose from.
All I have to do is cross the busy six-lane highway to get there. These suburban strips are not very pedestrian friendly. I have to walk quite a ways to find a traffic light to cross at, don't want to take chances. I feel like I'm the only person out here without a car. Finally, made it. The food is better than I expected. Exceptional actually, and I'm pretty jaded these days. I'm definitely coming back here.
6:30 PM - Survived crossing the highway and I'm back in the hotel. I've got just under two hours before I need to show for work. I'll need to call home, of course. Then I can either take a short nap if I'm feeling tired or play around on the computer for a while (like now).
8:00 PM - Show time is in 23 minutes. Time to change into my uniform and pack up. Not that I ever really unpacked. If it doesn't come out of the suitcase, it doesn't have to go back into the suitcase. Make sure to grab the little shampoo bottle from the bathroom. I haven't had to buy shampoo in years (pilots are notoriously cheap).
8:23 PM - There's my ride to the airport. It's dark out and I'm tired, must be time to go to work.