Best of Plans Sometimes Do Not Turn Out As Expected

I am on a pilgrimage that I have been planning for a year and a half and am going to try to chronical lessons learned during this journey. 

It began when a friend of mine and I were sitting at her kitchen table musing over our desires to be in Fatima for the 100th Anniversary. She had already looked online and most places were booked over a year in advance. As I pulled out my laptop and began a search, I confidently stated "if the Blessed Mother wants us to be there, then she will find a way....and it will be a way that we could both afford." Through an online search, I came across a home for rent in Fatima, Portugal that was available for the dates we anticipated going and the price was more than reasonable. So over the next few days, we had a list of eight people who wanted to go, including myself and my daughter who lives in Los Angeles, so I rented the home. 

As the date moved closer, our struggles multiplied. One of our pilgrims had heart failure, and was hospitalized following surgery and recovered in time to go. Another pilgrim who was looking forward to going with us, died and his wife's health deterioriated to where she could not go either. Another pilgrim had a series of deaths in the family.  The person who rented the house to me claimed that he had made a mistake and thought we were renting for last October...but this October all of the places in and near Fatima were charging thousands of dollars so he threatened to cancel our reservation unless we paid more just 2 weeks of our departure. He had to be paid immediately or he would cancel and give our reservation to another. Then, PayPal refused to facilitate the transaction, I think it was because the landlord had the name "international" in his business title. Thus I had to go to my bank and wire transfer the funds to his bank.

So after so many plans and struggles, we eagerly boarded the plane on October 4.  After we got boarded and were ready to take off, the interior of the plane began to get hotter and hotter and then the fire alarm shrilled loudly. The stewardess commanded that we leave the plane immediately, leaving our onboard ltems behind. they gathered us on the tarmac and then guided us back to the concourse. Then these incredibly hard working ticket agents began trying to rebook and reroute everyone on out plane. However rerouting a group of seven people is not that easy, especially with connecting flights in place.

And thus our best laid plans took a jagged turn with five of us routed to Chicago, then London, then Paris...and two of our group were placed in a taxi cab directed to Cincinnati for a non-stop flight to Paris. My daughter was flying to meet us in Paris. 

Has this type of thing ever happened to you.......making plans, watching them crumble and then you start again in a new direction?

We are thankful that we were not airbourne when this calamity occurred. So sometimes altered plans really are in our best interest.

Also we are grateful to have all finally arrived after late flights and unknown whereabouts of some luggage. The Lord did say that He makes all crooked paths straight. 

Our holy adventure continues tomorrow as we go to Mass at a different beautiful church each day and learn some about France's Catholic history. We will continue on to Lourdes, Toulouse, Santarem, arrive at Fatima for the 100th Anniversary of the Miracle of the Sun, then explore northern Portugal and ending at Lisbon.

I will pray for all our Catholic365.com authors and readers and ask that you pray for us in this pilgrimage.