Getting ready for an 18 hour flight

11 December 2023

We’re flying non stop from New York to New Zealand. How is that even possible? Air travel still amazes me. We’ve flown cross the Atlantic to and from England, and I am still in awe each time. But going to the other side of the world? That’s on a whole other level.

The first issue is eating. Airplane food is meh at best, and with my many food allergies, I won’t touch most of it. (because who wants to have an allergic reaction on a plane?!). Mike will fair better, of course. In our bags we will have granola bars, packs of almonds, salads, carrot sticks, kaiser rolls with various fillings (like peanut butter and fluff!), both black and green tea and of course big bar of chocolate. That should get us through the 24 hour total time from airport to airport.

Entertainment, I’m a big fan of the “Map Channel”, noting every minute and mile that passes. Hopefully on the tiny back-of-the-seat screen we’ll find familiar movies to lull us to sleep and interesting new ones to distract us. Of course our kindles are loaded with novels and our phones have music and meditations.

Turbulence: it always makes me nervous. As does take off and landing. To keep calm I knit through it all. I knit wash cloths which I then give to friendly flight attendants or a fellow passenger. Typically I’ll knit one or two during a flight. I have enough to knit 5 on this one!

Sleep: we have booked a sky couch! Somehow this mattress will cover 3 of the seats in our row. Mike and I are small people, so we hope to spoon together for a decent night’s sleep. Of course, we’ve got Advil and/or Benadryl to help us relax if it comes to that.

Stretching: we’ve heard that’s key. And as fairly active people, staying still for 18 hours won’t be easy. Those trips to the little restroom will be helpful in more ways than one.

Health: We’ll be masking as much as possible because, after all this planning, we don’t want to catch anything that will prevent us from doing any of it!

Question: How have YOU prepared for a long plane flight? Do you have any advice for us?