Off to Arizona

I'm off today to Arizona for a long weekend at a dude ranch with my two California sons, SFO777Jr-LAX and SFO777Jr-SFO.   A short flight to Phoenix and then a three hour drive north east and then south again thru the Tonto National Forest to a place called Young, Arizona and Cherry Creek Lodge.   Surprisingly, there was no morning rush hour traffic on the 405 and I made the 60 mile drive to the T5 garage at LAX in just 55 minutes.

7:45am on a Friday and little traffic at LAX.

A few more people inside.

And a Terminal 2 concourse that looked pretty busy.

On the mezzanine level is the Delta Sky Club, which is the former Air Canada Maple Leaf Lounge.   Didn't get a chance to stop in today for a photo op as I mistakenly left my Amex Platinum card at home.  Duh.

So off to the gate to wait for boarding.

Strange boarding call today with rows 16-20-something, and 3 minutes later... Diamond Medallion and First Class are welcome to stand in line behind Economy pax and board at their leisure. 

Delta's COVID snack pack was apparently handed out to everyone, First or Economy.

We arrived at Terminal 3 about 30 minutes early.  Since both sons were arriving on Southwest from BUR and OAK... I headed out to Terminal 4 to meet them at their gate... or so I thought. 

It's been at least 10 years since I was last at PHX and that was a simple connection.   But try to arrive at Terminal 3 and meet someone arriving in Terminal 4 and you begin to understand what an insanely stupid airport this is.   PHX Sky Train and Terminal 4 seemed easy enough... until it became apparent that none of this was airside.  In addition, Terminal 4 may as well be in a different time zone it was so far from Terminal 3. 

America's Friendliest Airport??!?  ROTFLMAO.

And of course, my LAX-PHX boarding was not valid at PHX so I sat outside for the BUR and OAK flights to arrive.  Thirty minutes, we were all in PHX and ready to pick up our rental car.   A few years ago, PHX relocated all the rental car companies to an offside facility, which is located 10 minutes away, seemingly closer to downtown Phoenix than the airport.