Smooth Flying at John Wayne, Other Southland Airports : Transportation: The busiest travel day of the year turns out to be easy for most. ‘It was a breeze,’ says one O.C. passenger.

On Wednesday, the busiest travel day of the year, the stuff of cold sweats, of wondering whether a turkey dinner at Grandma’s is really worth the hassle, 23-year-old Tracee Yarbrough of Huntington Beach had made a point of getting to John Wayne Airport an hour and a half early.

Once there, she easily found parking and then a clear aisle to the ticket counter. “It’s dead. I thought it would be swamped,” she said, wondering how she would while away the time until her plane left for San Jose.

Debbie Trentacost and her family had braced for a tough freeway drive from their home in Mission Viejo to John Wayne to pick up family from Portland. Instead, she said, “It was a breeze. We left at 5 to get on what we thought would be a mobbed freeway and instead got here in just 15 minutes. Normally it takes 20 minutes.”

A seasoned holiday traveler, Cindy Newman, 28, remarked on how trouble-free her trip had been from Washington to Orange County compared with the last two Thanksgivings, which she described as “hectic.” Newman said the plane on the last leg of her trip from Chicago had been only a third full. “I was amazed,” she said.

Indeed, at airports from John Wayne to Charles Lindbergh, from Los Angeles International to Ontario International, the crush of Thanksgiving holiday travelers proved more lamb than lion.

“I’ve had worse Monday mornings than I had today,” said an American Airlines ticket agent, who asked not to be named. “Thanks to the media’s warnings, everyone was two hours early.”

Becki Backus, 20, of Mission Viejo and Linda Yu, 21, of Irvine, who were having a snack at a McDonald’s stand near the departure gates, said because they are majoring in airline careers at Orange Coast College, they were assigned to work what was expected to be an extra busy holiday shift.

But chaos never developed. Although Delta overbooked its flights, Backus said, no one was disappointed because the no-shows left enough empty seats even for those traveling on standby. “It is going a little too smoothly,” Backus said. “It is kind of eerie.”

In a long-term parking structure next to the airport, Awad Soliman sat in an empty shuttle cart near the terminal at 7 p.m. waiting for passengers.

“So far it is a little slow,” he said.

John Wayne Airport spokeswoman Pat Ware concurred that the day had proven highly manageable. “Everything’s been going at a very brisk pace, but it’s also been very smooth,” she said.

One of the few emergencies among the 25,000 travelers passing through occurred when three passengers panicked after discovering that they had lost their tickets. In each case, airport security officers found the tickets.

Los Angeles International Airport also was surprisingly calm Wednesday.

“You hear the horror stories of traveling through LAX, but when you go out and walk around, it’s just not there,” said airport spokeswoman Diane Scully. “Yes, it’s busy--but the traffic is moving.”

Airport officials said that Wednesday’s shipment of families and baggage to far-flung destinations was relatively trouble-free because travelers generally heeded their advice to leave early and take shuttle vans or public transportation to airports.

That kind of time management coupled with good weather nationwide kept 20,000 airline flights moving smoothly on Thanksgiving eve.

Ironically, parking lots at suburban flyaway shuttle lots filled up early Wednesday, leaving parking spaces available at the airports.

Chicago-bound Mary Pasquini called from her Granada Hills home about 5:15 a.m. Wednesday to check on parking at a Van Nuys park-and-ride lot so she and her family could take the express bus to Los Angeles International. They learned that it was full, so they left their car at home and took a cab to catch their bus.

But at the nation’s third-busiest airport, the 22,000 parking spaces have not been filled to capacity in several years, Scully said. And there probably would be spaces available all weekend for those daring to drive to the airport via gridlocked freeways.

Traffic at Burbank Airport was more manageable than ever, said spokesman Victor Gill, thanks to added parking spaces and widened traffic lanes in front of the terminal. “If anything, we’ve gotten our act firmly refined,” he said.

Air traffic moved smoothly Wednesday, said FAA spokesman Fred O’Donnell. Only in Alaska, where snow slowed operations at Anchorage and Fairbanks airports, was weather a factor.

“What affects operations is weather, and we’ve got excellent weather virtually everywhere,” he said.

So appetites were whetted for a good weekend. Eighteen-year-old Anne Graybeal, a Pomona College student, was preparing to fly from Ontario to mom and dad in Chatham, N.J., for her first home-cooked meal since August. “I’m going to let them pamper me for four days,” she said, smiling.

A few feet away, chomping on a pizza, the college’s dean of students, Ann Quinley, was looking forward to visiting her 86-year-old father in Knoxville, Tenn.--and enjoying a turkey filled with corn bread pecan stuffing.

Sid and Mae Shapiro were waiting for their flight to Sacramento, where their daughter-in-law was going to prepare her first turkey for them.

There were occasional annoyances, though.

Paul and Maryhelen Fisher left Palm Desert for Ontario International in plenty of time to catch their 1 p.m. flight to Reno--only to discover that their flight had been inexplicably changed to 11 a.m. Paul Fisher cooled his heels by thumbing through a book titled “Foreign Investments and International Law” and promised to call the airline president next week.

“Luckily, there’s another flight,” he said. “But I’ve got to wonder, why are we leaving town? We live on a golf course.”

For all the people leaving town, an equal number were arriving in Southern California for the long weekend.

Joe Kailukaitis was in Southern California on business, so he beckoned his wife and two kids from Dallas to join him for skiing at Big Bear. The family figures on eating out tonight.

Richard and Carol Hough arrived at Ontario from Santa Cruz, and loaded their rental car with sports tools for a tennis weekend in Palm Desert. They too will eat out tonight.

And Gene Bloch and his daughter, Vicki, arrived from San Francisco to join his parents for a weekend of boating on Lake Mojave, along the Colorado River north of Laughlin.

Mom’s going to cook? Think again.

“We’ll take our 22-footer downriver 25 miles,” said Nancy Bloch. “We’ve already got reservations at Katherine’s Landing.”

Airport workers who will be at their posts today will still enjoy Thanksgiving feasts.

Jacqueline Taylor, working at a rental car counter at Ontario Airport, has assigned her husband, Michael, to do the cooking while she handles today’s demands for vans and cars.

“And I’m going to have to call him every half an hour to remind him to baste the turkey,” she said. “Otherwise, he’ll just sit there and watch football and forget.”

Contributing to this story were Times staff writers Chip Johnson in Chatsworth, Tony Perry in San Diego, Mark I. Pinsky in Orange County and Times correspondent Tom Ragan in Orange County.