Naturally in the middle of winter it’s going to snow in Chicago. But this storm was forecast to move in an hour or two before our departure time and the snow was to be “moderate to heavy with snowfall rates up to 1″ per hour”. That’s pretty serious and so we were worried we wouldn’t get out!
As our departure time neared the snow began to fall. But we boarded.
Snow began to stick to the windows. Eeek. We pushed and started to taxi out and like a curtain the snow enveloped us. Still we taxiied, then turned and roared down the runway in our A330-300 aircraft. We finally lifted off the ground and headed into the sky through the snowstorm. An A330 glides to cruising altitude and it took us a good 15 minutes of flying through snow to reach 10,000 feet. At 20,000 we broke through the snow and were headed to Madrid. Tonight’s schedule was 7h40m. Superfast!
The service began, first with a starter of bitter greens, grilled scallops, with sliced mango and roasted red pepper.
The starter was lovely! This was followed by the entree – I chose a veal ragout with roasted apples. Not so lovely but okay.
And then finally dessert, which was a trio of ice cream – strawberry, vanilla, and mango with a glass of sherry (the best part!).
And before we knew it were two hours out of Chicago and headed out over the Atlantic.
