Polar Bears Day 1: Who Was the Idiot Who Took Your Bag?

Day 1: Fly into Winnipeg, Overnight Fort Garry Hotel

After dropping off the Bear at school, I headed off to Canada to go see a different kind of bear – polar bears! I flew from LaGuardia, connected in Minneapolis, and landed in Winnipeg. I planned to meet my brother and mom in Winnipeg and once I went through immigration and met our tour company (Natural Habitat), started to look for them.

Me to the Natural Habitat (NH) Guide: Have my brother and mom arrived yet?

NH Guide: Oh, you mean Robert and Remie Quiroz? No, net yet. They are arriving just now.

Me: Oh really? What time did their flight land? (Checking my phone for their itinerary). It says here that they should have arrived on Delta, about a few minutes after I did.

NH Guide: Hmm… No, there’s only one flight. I think they were on your flight. Did you see them?

Me: No, that’s not possible. I didn’t see them – there must be another flight.

NH Guide: There’s only two flights a day from Minneapolis. The other one comes in later tonight.

Me: Well, you must have it wrong because it says right here a different flight number for them. I’m going to check with the Delta agents.

I then start to check with the information agents who confirm what the NH Guide said. I’m about to tell the NH Guide that we need to get a search party out when I spot my mom heading out of the immigration checkpoint.

Me: Mom! There you are! Where’s Rob?!

Mom: He’s still inside. He is with the Delta agent. Someone apparently took my bag.

Me: What? That’s crazy. Who in the world would do such an idiotic thing? Seriously!

Mom: Well, I’m not sure. The bags looked identical, so that’s probably why they were confused.

Me: But come on – couldn’t they look and see the tag? Ugh.

Mom: Well, we’ll figure it out. They are calling the lady to let her know.

5 minutes later we see my brother and the Delta agent.

Delta agent to me: Are you Annalise?

Me: Analiza. I’m Analiza. Why?

Delta agent: Did you take your mom’s bag?

Me: What?! No! I mean – wait. Yikes…

Delta agent: So now here is your bag. You have your mom’s bag. You can ignore the phone message I left you.

Me: Ugh, oops. Sorry L

Oh man – way to start the vacation.

We head to the Fort Garry Hotel – just a few years short of celebrating their centennial birthday. Apparently, it was the big to-do hotel where Frank Sinatra, Margaret Thatcher, etc. stayed. Before dinner, my brother hands us the mega-lenses and we practice taking some night shots.

At dinner, we meet the rest of the group – we’re 16 in total. We’re from New York, California, Florida, Colorado, and England. We also meet our awesome guide, Brad.