Ashley was kind enough to pick me up from the Indianapolis airport yesterday. I was in Phoenix Arizona over the weekend, attending WordCamp Phoenix (see my coverage at WPCandy also). It was a great event, but the story I’m telling here really comes into play on the trip back.

Originally I was supposed to arrive at 4:00pm Monday in Indianapolis. Instead, my connecting flight in Denver, Colorado was delayed by about one and a half hours to de-ice the plane. I wasn’t upset about it, since I enjoy the airplanes I’m in staying airborne. But while we originally thought I would be back in time to make the drive back up to Fort Wayne before the big storm hit, the delay put us kinda sorta right in the middle of it.

Ashley and I made it just outside of Indianapolis proper before the ice really started coming down. The central part of the state was supposed to see the ice, while the northeast (or Fort Wayne) was to see large amounts of snow. By the time we hit Noblesville, about 90 miles from Fort Wayne, we decided it would be best to rest for the night and get moving again early in the morning.

This is the fun part. Just by chance, we pulled off and found a Cambria Suites hotel for an easy $99/night. We hadn’t heard of the chain before, so were a bit weary of trying it out. It turns out the place is awesome.

I later found out that Cambria is a relatively new chain of hotels, only a couple of years old, and has a very modern style. We would definitely stay there again.

The ironic part is that after our safety plan sort of backfired when we slid off the road this morning into snow in the median on 69 south. We were pulled out by a tow truck and made it back to town a couple of hours later than intended. But hey, we’re home now right? Survived another winter experience.