The Longest Day(s)

When 2 adults, 2 kids, and NINETEEN bags of luggage hit the road, you can be sure there is a story ahead!

Overall, the travel day(s) were uneventful. The flight times were just long enough for Claire to watch lots of movies, and the layovers were just short enough to keep us running from gate to gate as we cleared security (again & again).

In San Diego, we said goodbye to Nana, Papa, Taytee & Rudy. We arrived at the airport in 3 vehicles! The porters there got over their shock pretty quickly and helped us get inside to check in at the American Airlines desk (that’s where this picture is from). 

Then we waited. And waited. And waited some more. I think we were in that line for 1+ hours, so it was good that we were there early. In that time, we found out that one of our porters had lived in Kenya much of his life, working out of the airport in Mombasa. Jojo thought that was a good sign at the start of our journey, and we had to agree. Thankfully Dad & Kirk had been in a few days before to give them the heads up about us, so by the time it was our turn to check in, the wait was less than usual-and the fees for all but one (extra) bag were waived-HUGE blessing! Pre-screen at security got us through pretty fast, but we still ended up being last at the gate thanks to that long line at check-in. They announced that only small personal bags would fit on the full flight, so with a quick shuffle, we checked all our bigger carry-on bags (you know, the ones carrying all the extra snacks that we had so thoughtfully packed-at least we had diapers!), and then…we were off!

Coming into Chicago, I was struck by the amount of trees we could see. We’ve only ever been in the (massive) airport there, but the city itself looked very inviting that afternoon, so green and orderly from the sky. Everyone was in high spirits and the girls loved the tram to the international terminal (toot-toot! yelled Ainsley the whole time!). Some nice Chinese tourists offered Claire their seat, and when they asked her to sit down, she promptly did-on the floor at our feet! Everyone got a laugh out of that. The British Air ticket agent could not comprehend that we had 19 bags to our name (she was counting 2 carseats and our stroller too), but we got it all figured out.

Chicago to Heathrow was uneventful until the end when the bumpiness of the flight (or the food?) caused both Mommy and Ainsley to throw up. A lot. Mommy’s ended up in the airsick bag. Ainlsey’s ended up all over Mommy. We landed in a gloomy-skied London covered in vomit. That kicked off about 12 hours of vomiting on and off for Mommy, so the next flight was queasy as well. In Heathrow, we really noticed an increase in security. We thought of Taytee as we wound through lines and lines of people who were trying to sort through their carry-ons (ours had been checked in San Diego, so that ended up being quite helpful!).  Still, because of all the electronics, we were thoroughly searched at the end anyway. Heathrow airport had a great children’s play area (go Heathrow! Great idea!) that Ainsley took full advantage of. Claire slept the entire time; she’d been determined to watch movies straight through both previous flights, and it finally caught up to her.

We all were able to sleep most of the last flight, thankfully. As they announced our (extremely bumpy) descent into Nairobi (it was raining), Claire piped up with, “I think we’re ready!” “Ready for what?” “Ready for Africa!” Then Ainsley turned and vomited all over Daddy. So we were.