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September 17, 2009 Flying from Virginia to Sydney, Australia

By Melissa Markham on September 19, 2009 3:00 AM | Permalink | Comments (1)

The last two days have been a bit of a blur. We ran into last minute items Thursday morning. Then Mom and Jim came to get us and take us and all of our luggage to the airport. I think they are not sure whether we are crazy or brave and whether we packed too much or not. But when you are packing for five weeks for a family of four and you are going to be in a bunch of different climates, luggage will accumulate.

We managed to get us all in Mom and Jim's big Suburban (thank goodness) and we got to the airport in plenty of time. Just getting our boarding passes and the luggage through security took some patience and work. The weather in Lynchburg was overcast and cloudy, but the weather in Atlanta had been rough. We boarded the plane about 15 minutes after we were supposed to depart Lynchburg. Then we did the dreadful sitting in the plane on the tarmac for 45 minutes or so while we waited for clearance from Atlanta (who was having to shuffle in flights that weren't able to come in earlier). Nothing like spending an extra 45 minutes in a plane when you are already anticipating spending about 22 hours on a plane in the very near future.

We made it to Atlanta with time to spare. Had dinner and somewhere around 7 pm, we headed off for Los Angeles. (BTW, to my friends who live in Atlanta and L.A. - I saw you waving and hope you saw me waving back at you!) When we arrived in L.A., our bodies were saying it was 11:30 pm. We were tired, but it wasn't time to sleep yet. The two hours we were there went by quickly as we used the restrooms, picked up water for the long flight ahead and kept poking one another to keep ourselves awake.

Somewhere between 1:30 and 2:00 am, East Coast time, we left L.A. for a 15 hour flight that I was really dreading. I also was good and tired and figured I would settle in and sleep for several hours.

However, the airline had other ideas...First they passed out the customs forms that we would need 15 hours later and made it sound like we should fill them out right away (they are only going to get to fool me once with this one). So as I searched for the address and phone number of where we would be staying when we reached Sydney, and dug out passport numbers and filled out forms for me and the kids, I was feeling more awake. Had my second wind as it were. Then they served us DINNER! That's right, you heard me, a nice hot dinner at what I felt like was 2:30 a.m. Of course, those coming directly from L.A. felt like it was 11:30, but even so, that's kind of late for dinner! I do have to say, Delta prepares some good food. And they had lots of entertainment (which was all free in the log leg of the flight) to keep us occupied. So we ate, then we passed into the land of nod.

But somewhere in the back of my head , I knew I needed to get up and walk around periodically. So I did wake up about 2 hours later. And then again 2 hours after that. Now, I had only had about 4 hours of sleep at this point in 24 hours. But my body felt like it was 7 am and said...hey, let's wake up some. I kept trying to go to sleep, but it was a no go. I watched a couple of movies. Talked with my neighbors, played solitaire and sudoku and was pleased that the 15 hour flight hadn't been as bad as I was afraid it would be.

We arrived in Sydney at 6:30 a.m. (approximately 4:30 pm back home in Virginia). It took time to get off of the plane. It took about 90 minutes, I think to get through all of the customs and baggage claiming lines. A taxi was quickly available (we had to have one designed for handicapped passengers so we could fit in all of our luggage) and we headed to our hotel: The Swiss Grand Resort and Spa in Bondi Beach.

It is a lovely place here and we have had a nice day, but I am too exhausted to share anymore...that will have to wait until the morning. Night night folks!