As Central Florida residents, Joe and I enjoyed watching Terminal C being built at Orlando International Airport for the past few years. It was a big deal in town when the terminal was finally open for business (here’s what the landside looked like on opening day). And from a personal perspective, we were kind of giddy when we finally had a flight on JetBlue on a very recent trip to NYC, so we could finally see the airside.
However when we took that JetBlue flight, we discovered we had THE last gate in the terminal. Here’s a map of the terminal, from MCO’s website, the gates on one side are C230 to C238:
I seriously thought it was the longest terminal ever.
I was wrong.
Exactly a week after we got home from that trip to NYC, we were going up there again (it was for a happy reason – more in another post one of these days, I’m sure). We took JetBlue on the way in (Gate C238 this time! Winning!) but on the way home we took Delta and flew out of JFK. So we were in Terminal 4.
Those of you who have experienced the “joys” of that terminal are probably already nodding your head. If you haven’t had the pleasure yet, welp, here’s Delta’s map of JFK. Terminal 4 is plainly marked. See that arm facing south? You know where I’m going with this, right?
“B53,” we innocently said, with no idea of what Herculean task was soon to be ahead of us.
I swear I saw a moment of pity on her face as she said that gate was quite a hike. She continued that boarding for our 12:10 pm flight was starting at 11:40 am but we should want to leave plenty of time to get to the gate because it was pretty far; a good 20-minute walk.
Now, I’ll tell ya – I’m not in the best of shape and I have asthma on top of it. Even with my inhaler on board, I walk kind of slowly if I’ve got luggage with me. So we started out at 11:10 am.
Y’all, I didn’t think we’d ever get there.
The signs mention gates 20 to 55 were “that way,” so off we went. I swear, I think we went a quarter of a mile, passing 80 bajillion shops and restaurants before we ever even SAW an actual gate.
And then finally, we finally hit the first one – Gate B22! Just 30-something to go!
The walk took forever.
I saw restaurants and snack shops and considered stopping, so I could get provisions.
We went past a massage place and I thought it was well-placed, halfway through this 10k, cuz people were going to need a massage by that point in the walk.
About 2/3 through the end of the hike, Joe mentioned we had just gone past our second Shake Shack.
“That’s because we’ve walked so long, we’re in a whole different city by now!” I replied, maybe sounding a tiny bit curmudgeon-like.
To their credit, JFK does have moving walkways in the terminal, and those helped. Except for the one that was out of order. I may or may not have used some adult language when I saw that.
Finally – FINALLY – after going down two levels, we reached gate B53. I felt like I should’ve gotten a medal or something.
Oh, and total steps from the Centurion Lounge? Just over 6200.
My bad, MCO Terminal C. Getting to Gate C230 at Terminal C is like a walk in the park in comparison to getting to JFK’s gate B53 in Terminal 4.
A very, very long park.
Feature Photo: Courtesy of MCO
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