Josh Harvey ’22, describes the groups arrival into San Juan, Puerto Rico.
I’m writing this post finally sitting in my hotel room in Puerto Rico. I can hardly believe I was waking up in Greenfield Massachusetts and groggily getting coffee with my buddies just this morning. The bus drive to JFK airport wasn’t bad, it was nice and smooth. Everybody kind of conked out and it was quiet, I think a couple of people are still recovering from the all nighters they pulled during finals week (myself included).
When we pulled up to the airport everyone hopped out. Going through security with 16 people went about as well as you think trying to move through an airport in a super organized fashion with 16 people would go (definitely had some hiccups on the part of the baggage check computers malfunctioning); but, everyone stuck together and was really positive and eager to be traveling with each other. I caught a couple of people on our trip starting to take photos and videos, smiling all the while.
When we were flying closer and closer to Puerto Rico from New York, I could see everyone pulling up their chair screens, that Delta Airlines has, and checking how close the plane was, looking out the windows to see if they could spot land. I looked out my window over and over again as our plane descended into the clouds. We jumped in and out of clouds as rays formed in the moisture of the air, water droplets ripped off of the wings, and contrails formed around our plane. We dropped right below the clouds and that was when I spotted the island. It was a lot bigger than I imagined and the coast stretched much farther than I thought it would. Below the clouds the sunlight formed rays that beamed into the ocean and the waves seemed to push the plane a little too as they crashed into the coast.
Landing, and stepping off the plane, warm air hit my face. I lit up with a smile and I couldn’t help but see the same expression on the faces of those around me.
