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Denver International Airport has been one of those things like Congress, the Simpson trial and Bosnia that I have been content to admire from afar.
But through no fault of my own, we had to go there last weekend. Our older daughter, Columbine, hustled us into it.
She spent the 1993-94 school year in Iceland as an exchange student. Among her friends there was one Kristina (Icelanders don't really have last names, so I won't bother with the rest, which I can't spell, anyway), who was an exchange student in Quebec for the 1994-95 school year. Kristina wanted to visit Columbine in Salida before returning to Iceland; thus our trip.
If Colorado had a rational transportation system, such excursions would not be necessary. A visitor could deplane and catch the Royal Gorge Express; we would be at the depot at the end of F Street at the appropriate time; the air would be cleaner and the highways would not be so crowded.
But such a system would not provide sufficient income for the car dealers, insurance vendors, loan officers, petroleum merchants and highway builders who operate our state, and so the law forces us to support these oppressed groups. Someday the freedom-loving Republicans will triumph and remove these leeches from the body politic.
We made it from downtown Denver to a DIA parking garage in less than 40 minutes, without violating any speed laws. This was disappointing.
For months I have consumed a steady diet of horror stories about how you were supposed to pack extra food and water, maybe even a tent, when venturing from Denver to DIA.
Denverites are indeed a whiney bunch. Try living where the nearest airport with scheduled service of any sort -- Gunnison -- is 65 miles and a Continental Divide crossing away. That airport mostly provides winter service to skiers from Dallas, so the closest real airport is 100 miles away -- at least two hours if all goes well -- in Colorado Springs. Reaching either is a travail of twisting two-lane roads prone to blizzards and avalanches.
Yet Denverites complain about a few minutes on divided highways. When they had close-in Stapleton, they complained about jet noise. Someday it might dawn on people that you can have an airport nearby, or you can have a quiet neighborhood, but not both. We already spend plenty on education in this state, but obviously it's not enough.
The third level of the east parking structure at DIA ought to be renamed the Hotel California -- you can check in any time you want, but you can never leave.
We drove in, parked, and ventured into the terminal, ready for about an hour of riding subways and examining artwork until Kristina's flight was to arrive at 8:20 p.m. (The art was important because this trip made me miss the artwalk in Salida, my customary annual dose of culture.)
Of course the flight would be late; the ETA had been adjusted to 10:20 p.m. on account of thunderstorms in Atlanta, which makes me realize the value of the Weather Channel. Before this, I had just presumed that the cable companies carried it so that edgy travelers in motel rooms would have an easy way to fall asleep.
I had a book in the car that might entertain me during the wait, and I also wanted to engage in my homage to multi-culturalism, an adapted Native American tobacco ritual which was apparently permissible in the parking garage.
Find an elevator in the terminal. No problem. Push the button for the third level. No problem. Elevator closes doors and refuses to move.
Deep breaths to avoid panic -- I have this phobia about being imprisoned in an elevator car when I have a pressing need to urinate -- and by the time I open my eyes, the elevator doors are open.
Martha suggests an elevator across the hall. It responds identically. Eventually she notices some fine print which explains that the third level is not accessible from these elevators, and if we want the third level, we should go to the elevators by Door 207.
We never found Door 207, so we got off on the second level and hoofed it to the third level of the parking structure. We moved the car to the fourth level, which was accessible from all the elevators we had encountered.
Now, I'm sure the third level of the parking structure is there for a purpose, more than just holding up the fourth level. My best guess is that it functions as a practical joke -- much of the other large-scale art at the airport is also rather whimsical -- that they play on visiting hayseeds, thereby entertaining the security personnel who must who sit and watch TV monitors all day.
Look at that honyock with the Chaffee County plates.
Bet he parks in level three.
Sure enough. Now he's in the terminal. Can you
imagine the look on that rube's face when he tries to get
back to level three on the elevators?
I'd rather see that hayseed's expression after he
spends an hour looking for Door 207.
They crack up laughing, and I've done my duty as an entertainer. And now, if I could just figure out how to get Delta to pay me the $6 I had to spend in extra parking fees on account of the late plane, I'd figure our trip to DIA was a success. It's a lot more fun than a shopping mall.
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