The Flight to London

Before this trip, I had never been on an international flight before. The longest flight I had ever experinced was to Seattle, and that was a five hour flight. Now, I thought that was a big flight. There were 2 aisles and the chairs were separated by groups of two, then three, then two. But this flight to London was something else. As soon as I boarded, I was amazed. This thing was huge! The outer aisles had rows of three and the inner aisle had a row of six! The plane itself was really long and divided into a couple sections, depending on how much you paid for your ticket. And dividing each section was what looked like a mini-bar where the flight attendants prepared drinks and got the food ready for in-flight service. 

It's inevitable. We have to talk about airplane food. 

Now, let me just set things straight. This was not your stereotypical, bland, TV dinner style airplane food that comedians make lame jokes about being so bad. I was pleasantly surprised at how good the food tasted (and how much it filled me up!) About two hours into the flight, we were given the option between chicken or pasta. I chose the pasta, although the chicken did sound good as well. What I was handed was a 4 course meal, but in travel size! Besides the pasta, this magnificent tray held a salad with dressing, a bread roll, crackers, laughing cow cheese, and a brownie. And it all tasted great! 

I assume in-flight meals have changed in the last 20 years, so maybe those comedians were on to something then, but the next time you get an airplane meal, prepare to be amazed. (Unless, of course, you're a frequent flyer and your reading this laughing at my silly bewilderment of food...)

Next thing on the list that impressed me about this flight was the TV screens on the back of the chairs! You could watch movies or TV shows, play video games, chat with other seats in the plane, and track your progress, altitude, or even temperature of where you were in the flight. I know, pretty impressive. So the first couple of hours, I watched the movie "The Book of Life" on my mini TV, and then thought I could easily fall asleep since I had eaten a big meal, taken Dramamine, and it was now 10:00 at night.

Unfortunately, my body did not react quite the way I had hoped. I tossed and turned in and out of a half-awake state for many hours, always getting comfortable and then minutes later having to switch positions, I wanted to get up and walk around the plane, but the man next to me was sound asleep and I really didn't want to disturb him. So, I toughed it out for the next couple hours, feeling very uncomfortable, knowing I would be exhausted the next day when we landed at 9:00 AM. But eventually, light started to flood the cabin and the rest of the passengers slowly started to wake up. My friend Carly was sitting next to me, and about an hour before we landed, we did our makeup and got our stuff ready to take off the plane. I was definitely ready to stretch my legs. 

Well, the time had come. We got off the plane, went through customs, and finally set foot into our week long adventure. It was so surreal. I was actually in London! Other then the sleeplessness, which had been my own fault, the plane ride wasn't actually all that bad. I will be returning soon with more stories from my wonderful adventure.

As always, happy travels!

Cheerio!

Emily