June 16-17, 2008 - Days 1&2 - SFO > LHR

12:59pm PST - United flight 930 SFO > LHR

I have to admit, I was dreading this flight. I've been on several intercontinental flights, and they are taxing. And that's when I'm flying alone. I wasn't looking forward to the new dimensions of pain to be proffered by the addition of a 7-year-old and two toddlers.

Work travel has made me a Premier in United's eyes, affording me access to luxuries such as special lines at the airports and free upgrades to Economy Plus with its essential (to my 6'4" frame, anyways) extra inches of legroom. Didn't work out as nicely on this trip. Even though we arrived two hours early to the airport, we still only arrived at our gate after boarding had already started, because the Premier line at the check-in counter took 1 hour to navigate. Nerve wracking stuff. That free upgrade to Economy Plus? I can invite one guest to join me there. Four guests, however, not so much. So it was cattle class for us.



You can't win them all, but hey, miles payed for one of the tickets.

Jenna's plan was to sleep deprive the kids so they'd sleep all flight and arrive in England ready for the day. The plan worked for Jenna and Louisa. The rest of up hardly slept at all, taking regular, unproductive trips to the bathroom (less boring than sitting in the seat, I guess).

7:10am GMT - Arrive in London



Our friends had a driver waiting us at the airport to drive us to their house in Cobham. I was extremely tired, but excited to soak in the differentness of being in England - the ancient (by CA standards) house, the cars I'd only seen in foreign car magazines, driving on the left side.

We made a brave effort staying awake, but by afternoon, decided a controlled nap couldn't hurt.

Eurotrip 2008

This is the year we decided to take a big, crazy trip. Our friends the Whiteheads moved to London last year, and we decided to take advantage of the free housing to see a bit of the Old Country. With all three kids. And two strollers.

I went into this trip with no small amount of trepidation. The flight from San Francisco to London takes more than 10 hours, much longer than any flight the girls had ever been on. How would they behave? Would Jenna and I be the targets of stared daggers for hours on end? England's also 8 hours ahead of California. From my previous travels I knew that I could cope, but if we arrived there and the girls decided that 1am was the time to wake up, was I in for two and a half weeks of sleep-deprived misery?

Turns out those fears were unfounded. We had a fabulous time, walked scores of miles (probably destroying the bearings on our strollers), saw two beautiful countries, took almost 1200 photos, visited family and old friends and got to spend LOTS of time together.

It's taken me several weeks to digest all of the raw material to tell this story, and the sheer magnitude of it means I'll be trickling it out little by little. So day by day, here comes the story of our summer vacation.