Details, details

Here is the long awaited detailed post about my trip over here! I can't say it was uneventful...because it wasn't. There seemed to be something different around each corner and my hairs got raised just a few times. Obviously, it worked out just fine and I made it. This year, I took a small notebook and a pen with me so that I could write down little details as I went along, in addition to recording the different times that I woke up and was bored...lol.

So here is the post...it will be long and full of details so be prepared for a bit of a read!

9am Wednesday morning, March 7th

Woke up feeling pretty good and ready to go. Did a bit of last minute packing, saying goodbye to kitties, and things like that. For the most part, I was pretty well put together and so ready to go. I weighed bags, got dressed, closed the suitcases for the last time, and had a cappuccino from Dunkin' Donuts, courtesy of my wonderful hubby. Apparently my cats didn't want me to leave!

And here's my bags ready to go



















All weighed...






In my fabulous traveling garb ready to leave

10:30am

I say goodbye to the house and the kitties and we leave to go pick mom up. After picking mom up, we head out and down towards Boston. On the way there, Ken got hungry so we pulled out some pretzel sticks and some peanut butter. Because I was bored, I made "holey" peanut butter with the pretzels...

After a while, we made a stop in southern New Hampshire to see Pet in her new home! She is looking amazing and the new owner is doing so well with her. It was so good to see her and despite a little ice in the ring we were able to ride around for a bit...mom and I both rode for a few minutes!

Then we headed down to Woburn, MA to catch the Logan Express bus to the airport. Taking the bus is so much less stressful than trying to weave our way through airport traffic, that's for sure.

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When we arrived at the airport, the line was relatively short for check-in. After being all blonde and not figuring out how to use the kiosk and things like that, I finally managed to start the check-in process properly, only to find out that they had stuck me in seat 34E, which is a middle seat. Originally, I had chosen 39F, a window seat, but then Continental finished it's merger with United Airlines about two days before my flight and suddenly seat choices weren't an option. However, when they alerted me to the change, they said they would honor my preferences and so I figured they'd at least give me a window seat. I was a little stressed because I am pretty awkward around strangers and it's tough when you've got one on either side of you in those close quarters for that long. It's fine if one of the people is someone you know, so if you bump them, lean on them, whatever, then it's ok. And normally that's what happens...people traveling together usually get two out of three seats in a row. I said a rather hasty goodbye to Ken and mom, which I am now sorry for as it hit me later that I won't see them for a month and a half...lol. Then I talked to an United Airlines rep who gave me a few pointers about how I could go about possibly getting a different seat. I decided it wasn't worth it, too awkward, and I'm sure people would rather a nice person like me sit in the middle than have some person really truly ungrateful and grumpy about it. After all, as much as it really is awkward, I can suck it up and wrap my head around it and then I'm fine.

So I got fully checked in, paid for my extra bag (BOO United Airlines for robbing me of my hard earned money...lol) and found my gate. I spent the next two hours plane spotting and it was rather busy at the airport. I saw so many different jets and planes go through there and it was really cool. I took a lot of pictures and videos there, but they're not of much importance to most of you I am sure and those of you on my Facebook will see them all so I will leave them out here. I will however put a pic up of the plane I was supposed to take from Boston to LAX and the gate we were sitting at.

At 5:20, we were supposed to start boarding. Our plane had arrived a bit late, but it had been turned over pretty quickly and was ready to go. However, it was delayed and there seemed to be no reason for it that we knew of. At 5:45, they finally announced that there was a slight mechanical error and they weren't sure what was up with it so they said there would be a bit of a delay. It was a pretty small gate waiting area, so it was really crowded with people standing in the main walkway. Finally, they decided that the error wouldn't be fixed quickly, so they said we would be traveling on another jet, the same size and airline, and it was already at a gate just a few gates over so there was a huge rush to get to that gate. Annnnd that gate had a much smaller waiting area than the gate before it. What madness. We all stood around expecting to board right away as it was getting close to an hour behind schedule. They finally started boarding at 6:07. They seemed to be boarding people about 1 person every 2 minutes. Not good when you have 200 people that need to board. Eventually they boarded everyone in a hurry. When I got to the gate attendant, she checked my stuff and sent me along, and then she called me back. She then said I'd been upgraded to Economy Plus and I had seat 11B. Another middle seat...but Economy Plus...cool. So I made my way on to the plane only to notice that a grumpy Asian-looking dude was sitting in 11B. So I hung out in seat 11D, just across the aisle, waiting for a flight attendant to come and take a look at what was going on. She finally grabbed my stuff and the other guy's stuff and then came back and told the guy that he needed to move to 25E and I was to sit in 11B. As nice as the gesture was, I didn't want to sit between the two men who were in the aisle and window seats, so I offered to take 25E, which was not an economy plus seat, in order to avoid that. A few people around me were shocked and asked me if I really wanted to do that, seeing as how the extra 5 inches of leg room is nice. I simply said yes, I didn't want to make him move, which is partly true because he was grumpy and looked like he was with the other two guys in the row. I'm glad I made that choice, because in row 25 were two gorgeous girls who were small and very nice...so I got to sit between them which was far more preferable than sitting between two guys, BY FAR.

Here is my journal from that flight:

6:20-I finally got boarded.
6:35-Taxiing
6:40-Takeoff...really smooth and it feels good to be up in the air. I'm pretty tired so maybe I will get some sleep. They're saying that flight time will be only 5 hours and 39 minutes, making us on time, since our original flight was supposed to be 6 hours and 40 minutes long.
7:27-Smooth flight so far. The carts are out so people can buy food and whatnot. The seats are so comfortable compared to American Airlines. An inch more width makes a difference, believe it or not. The seats are also well designed and are very comfortable. Hardly feel like I'm sitting in the middle. Listening to music to try to pass the time and hoping they come by with drinks soon because I am so very thirsty.
8:03-Drinks are finally offered. Ice water never tasted better. Cruising at 34 thousand feet with 4.5 hours to go. Have had some pretzels and crackers and am still comfy and ready to try to sleep.
9:10-Seatbelt sign went on and the announcement from the pilot to put seatbelts on startled me awake, especially since the flight was exceptionally smooth and there seemed to be no need for seatbelts. A minute later, I saw lightning and it was amazing! The girl next to me was a bit zonked but had left both window shades open (we sort of had two windows) so I was able to see the storm. We are climbing above the storm and I can see it below us. Wicked cool. Feeling a bit tired and not surprisingly, have a bit of heartburn.
10:05-2.5 hours to go. Slight bumps here and there but past the storm. Tired, but I can't sleep...boo.
10:37-2 hours togo. Got up and stretched which felt really good. I don't normally get up on these flights, but my legs were starting to cramp a bit. Definitely ready to get off this jet. Not long now though.
12:22pm/9:22pm LA time-We begin descent and city lights are everywhere. It's so amazing. Landing in about 15 minutes or so and unfortunately landing on a north runway instead of a south runway so taxiing will be longer. In LA it's 54 degrees with calm air, or so the pilot says. Just as he gets done announcing that, we go through some really rough turbulence. What's that about calm air, pilot?
9:38pm LA time/12:38pm home time-We landed...but taxiing is taking forever! The airport looks cool though, there's lots of stuff you can see going on behind the scenes when you're taxiing.
10:05-We finally deplane and I am on my way to TBI Terminal. Kind of lost...T7 looks nothing like it is supposed to, because there is construction going on. Oh well, I will figure it out.

Here's the view from seat 25E on a 757.

And here I am pretending to look happy.



Upon landing, the captain said that we had to land on a runway that is on the other side of the airport so taxiing would take a while. LAX airport is shaped like a U. On all the sides of the U, there are terminals. On the long sides of the U, there are two runways each. Normally, we would have landed on the side of Terminals 4-8, as United is in Terminal 7. But this time, we had to land where terminals 1-3 were, after which we taxied to the other side of the airport which took about 15 minutes, and then deplaning was pretty slow. When I got off the flight, I somehow made my way through the maze of Terminal 7 under construction at LAX and ended up in Terminal 6 without realizing it, and there I exited and took the sidewalk all the way up to TBIT. Everyone said it was a long walk, but I didn't think anything of it. I didn't want to wait for a bus to take me around. Once inside, I had no problem finding the Qantas desk. I had to get a boarding pass from them since United couldn't print the Qantas one for me at Boston. The lady at the desk who had a very thick accent got a strange look on her face and started talking to me but I really couldn't understand what she was saying. I finally figured out that she was saying there was an issue with my visa. I figured it was the whole birthdate issue...but in fact, it turned out that I forgot to put my middle initial on the visa, so my passport didn't recognize it at all. About 5 minutes later, they fixed it, and I rushed off to find gate 123 where boarding was about to begin. I had no time to pee, no time to get on the net, no time to grab a snack, and only about 2 minutes for a rushed phone call from Chrissy. Boarding began at 10:45pm, which seemed early considering the flight was to take off at 11:30, but since there were so many people and a mostly full flight, having the extra time was good. We all boarded by 11:10 and were taxiing away from the gate shortly after that.

Here's my journal from that flight:

11:14pm/6:14pm Melbourne time-Sitting in seat 77K and very comfy and ready to take on the world. Nice couple is next to me who are obviously Aussie. They keep to themselves and aren't particularly chatty, but they are kind. Feeling ok, just really hungry and I need the loo badly, but not allowed to use it until we're above 10 thousand feet in the air. This plane is so huge compared to the 757. 7,965 miles to go.

Here are a couple of pictures from inside the A380, from seat 77K.

11:50pm/6:50pm-Finally taking off after a long taxi to the runway. Seems they were doing a couple of extra preliminary checks on the wings, which was cool to watch as they extended and raised and lowered the flaps and checked the engines and such.

1:02am/8:02pm-Finally got to use the loo...yay! It'd been at least 10 hours since I'd been able to use one. 13 hours, 5 mins to go, cruising at 32 thousand feet, 7,340 miles left, flying at 561MPH and it's -56F outside the plane. Brrr. Such an awesome flight though. Meal coming soon, although I really need to sleep. Just got handed our menus.

1:48am/8:48pm-Food was so good, like really really good. The chicken was moist and fresh, the tomato sauce that went with it was amazing, and the broccoli and Yukon Gold potatoes that went with it were divine. the roll was really good as well. And the apple crumble cake...YUM!  Just waiting for them to come and clean up, and then I will put my tray back and go to sleep for a while.

3:50am/10:50pm-If you have a weak stomach don't read this and skip down to the next entry! Still have 10.5 hours to go before landing. I was sleeping like a baby when I started to dream, or so I thought, that I was really sick and had bad heartburn. I remember waking up a bit earlier long enough to take some antacids. When I woke up this time, I was really sick...and...throwing up all over myself. And as if that wasn't bad enough, I did it a second time before being able to move and get to the bathroom. Blah. Instinct must have kicked in because it only got on my shirt and my pillow, and the person next to me didn't know what had happened, only that I wasn't feeling well because she asked if I was ok. I told her no and please get a flight attendant...thankfully a flight attendant was right there and was able to assist me to the bathroom. There, she handed me some very sexy first class pajamas so that I could get cleaned up and go back to sleep. Because it'd only gone on my shirt and the pillow, we just stuck my clothes in a bag and got a new pillow and blanket and I was good to go. I can say this much: having a big chest is a good thing in this case because it caught everything...lol. I was so very embarrassed because who wants to sit next to the girl who's upchucking? Well, thankfully the people next to me were Aussie and in true Aussie nature, they were very kind, understanding and hospitable and didn't ask to be moved or anything. The lady next to me kept asking me how I was feeling throughout the rest of the flight and I apologized so much and each time she said "No worries, really, no worries, don't worry about it!" I was surprisingly composed and didn't break down or even really feel that embarrassed...just tired. I feel fine now that whatever it was is out of my system. Must be the food didn't sit well with me even though it was really good. Going to try to sleep now.

7:24am/2:24am-7 hours and 22 minutes to go. Now at 36 thousand feet and they are planning on climbing to 40 thousand feet before we get there. 3,889 miles to go, flying at 564MPH and they've planned to land about 10 minutes early which is cool by me. Still can't believe I got sick, because now I'm feeling great.

9:16am/4:16am-Very tired and wanting to sleep. Guy in front of me smells really bad. He hasn't moved the whole trip. I can smell his morning breath and body odor. It's disgusting and preventing me from being able to sleep. 5 hours, 35 minutes to go. 2,889 miles left (funny, I just noticed that my last blog was 1,000 miles ago exactly), flying at 38 thousand feet and 560mph now, -62F out and and estimated arrival is at 9:52am Melbourne time which is 13 minutes early. Ate some crackers and they stayed down fine. Just want to sleep, but in the meantime, enjoying the purple mood lighting they have, which is very dim, but pretty and comforting. Already missing Ken and the kitties...mostly because it's been a long night and I want a hug.

5:18am (going by Melbourne time now)-Most amazing sight! The sunrise is pretty much behind us and to the left side of the plane a little bit...I am on the right side of the plane, so all I see is the pink, orange, blue, and purple hues behind and to the side of us. Then, in front of the wing, I see an aurora of sorts, a blueish hue, and next to that, the moon! I was so psyched...I tried to get it in pictures but it didn't come out as well as I was hoping. There were no words or pictures that could truly display it as it really was. Still in my "sexy pajamas".

7:13am-Very awake now. Breakfast will be served soon and I am ready for it. Sure is bright up here this time of the morning. 2 hours and 41 minutes to go and passing time by taking pics. Finally got changed into my spare set of clothes so I feel more human now. Actually feeling really good.

8:42am-I see land! Passing Newcastle on the right. Nervous about everything in general, but feeling just fine. Excited! Going to see my best friend soon! Only 1 hour and 11 minutes left! Had breakfast...Special K, fruit salad, yogurt, a wonderful muffin, and some orange juice. I was so hungry that I forgot to take a pic until after I had finished...

8:50am-Passing Sydney on the right. Can even see the Sydney International Airport from the air. Still at 40 thousand feet but going to start the descent soon.

9:06am-48 minutes to go. Just brushed my teeth and boy did that feel good. I feel completely human again! Pretty psyched up! Won't be getting up again until we've landed. Passing over Canberra and there are plenty of clouds. Filled out my immigration card...whoop whoop.

9:26am-30 minutes to go! Passing over what seems to be Lake Eildon and some interesting landscape.

9:49am-8 minutes to go! Now at roughly 6 thousand feet and descending quickly. 26 miles left and going about 315mph. Scheduled landing is for 10:05 but it looks like we're going to land at roughly 9:57am! All freshened up and ready to get off this jet and see my best friend! A little cloudy over Melbourne but not terrible.

9:57am-We landed safe and sound. Bit of a rough landing but overall not bad. Glad the flight is over, hoping the lines aren't too bad but considering how many people there are on this plane, it probably will be. 

And that is all I wrote...so I will fill you in on the rest of what went on. After deplaning, I very quickly found the line for immigration. And oh my gosh was it LONG. The room is huge, but the line was unbelievable. The main issue is that a Singapore Airlines 747 was also deplaning so we had nearly double the amount of people needing to go through immigration. After standing in that for roughly 45 minutes, maybe even an hour, I was hurried through and I found my luggage...well, after finding the right luggage carousel. There are 6 carousels in Melbourne Airport and they told us to go to number 6. So I went to number 3. And so did most of the people from flight 94. Eventually we realized that carousel number 6 was way off to the right and that's where we needed to be. After grabbing my bags came the arduous task of trying to manage all of it. I had two heavy bags, plus my two carry ons, and my bag of dirty clothing from the mishap. One of the heavy bags is on wheels so that is a blessing, but the other was not. I managed to bring a clip with me that allowed me to clip the second big bag to the first one and so I went my merry way. It was SO very heavy. 

When I got down to customs, a guy met me right as I got there, took my customs card and asked me what food I had. Not wanting to declare everything that I'd brought, I just said "Maple syrup" and he said ok, I've put a stamp on this and I don't want you to have to wait in line, so just go to that line right there, show them the card, and you will be all set. So I went to a line that was relatively long but moving quickly and within about 15 minutes I was through and they didn't even want to see the syrup, they let me through. When I walked out the doors, it was slightly different than before...I was used to going through the middle doors and this time I'd gone through the end doors. I knew Chrissy would be closer to the first or middle doors, and I started to walk down the long barricaded off section towards where she would be, but then figured that I'd have to walk alll the way to the other end in order to get around to see her, so I walked to the end that I was at and went around and started searching for a bright green Pooh t-shirt. Well she saw me before I did which was good because she was able to come towards me faster than I could go towards her and after that our friend Paulie took my luggage for me and my arms were relieved. I think it was around 11:30 when I walked out the doors because it was noon before we walked out of the airport. 

It was pretty warm and sunny out and the ride back was fairly event-free for which I was thankful. I didn't feel tired at all and was pretty relaxed...almost like I had been there all along. Normally when you don't see someone for a long time, there's a period of adjusting or readjusting, but it doesn't seem that there's been any of that because everything has fallen into place so well. I've been here for two days now and I'm enjoying the sun and the slight breeze we've had. The temperatures are perfect! 

Today we went to church and I thought I would struggle with it seeing as how I struggled with it so much last year, but I was actually quite relaxed. There was a baby dedication and that was just beautiful. Ironically, the baby had the same name as my sister Hannah...Hannah Ruth. I thought that was cool. Afterwards, there was more music and a bit of a sermon, then there was a light lunch courtesy of the families of the baby. Speaking of babies, there seemed to be so many around at church there. It was beautiful to see. One of them was right in front of us and she is such a gorgeous baby. Just picture perfect, like a little doll, with big expressive eyes. Just beautiful. Yes, I did focus on the message, I promise...it was just so great to see so many young lives. It is a balmy 72 degrees out (21C) and mostly sunny with a slight breeze...it is absolutely beautiful. 

I'll be signing off for now, but I have some videos that I took that I will be posting later once they are uploaded. And if/when we do anything relatively exciting, I will try to post in here about that. Thanks for reading this and hope you enjoyed it!