Stranded In A Desert

I was supposed to be on a plane this morning flying back to India. But as it turns out Mother Nature is pissed and wouldn’t let me. I will now be flying after two days. So I now find myself stranded in Scottsdale, Arizona. I met Al Dean of DEVELOP3D this morning and he told me that he was keeping his room at the Scottsdale Plaza for another week. This place almost feels like a refugee camp for CAD people. At least I found a way out of this by flying the other way around across the Pacific Ocean. But others are not so lucky.

In fact, I must thank Travizon, Autodesk’s travel agency and Autodesk as well for this. Autodesk was kind enough to let me extend my stay in the US and fly me back home from Phoenix after attending COFES 2010 instead of Portland, where they had flown me in to attend the Autodesk Manufacturing Tech Day event. So when Delta Airways canceled my flights passing through Amsterdam, I called Travizon to seek their help. They immediately pushed some buttons and got me tickets via Hong Kong. I mean literally within minutes. Earlier I had tried calling the airline but just could not get through.

Anyways, now that I am stuck here for a couple of days with nothing to do, I decided to wander around the Sonoran desert and check out some cacti. So I booked myself a jeep ride this afternoon and went cacti watching. Here are a couple of pictures of me up to no good.

I couldn’t help fooling around with the accessories of the tour guide

This is one big ass cactus

I am thankful that at least I am not stranded in an airport, like thousands of other unfortunate travelers. I am not sure what I am going to do tomorrow. But I am pretty sure that I will think of something.