22.5 Hours Later

We've arrived. It was a long, long day, but we made it safely without any problems and our luggage arrived too which is even better. You just never know sometimes.

Thursday morning started at my usual time of waking up at 5:00 a.m. I figured I would pack last minute supplies and try to clear one more show off the DVR before leaving. I was successful on both counts. I was also successful in placing my bag of garbage in the neighbor's bin because I didn't want it sitting in my bin for a week or two.

My dad and Justin arrived about 7:30 a.m. to pick me up. Justin was having some packing issues in that he had two rather small suitcases and an odd assortment of toiletry items. Bless his heart, the guy hasn't flown in a plane since before 9/11 so he didn't know he couldn't bring a 32 ounce shampoo and conditioner along with him, or two full size shaving creams, or three full sized colognes. Long story short, I gave him a large duffel bag to pack all of his things in and some Ziploc bags for the toiletry items he was taking with him and we convinced him to leave his jumbo shampoo and conditioner at home.

We finally hit the road to Nashville close to 8:00 a.m. and stopped to have one last Southern meal along the way, breakfast at Waffle House. We made it to the airport and got checked in and through security with an hour to spare. Our first flight was to Detroit and lasted a little over an hour. The layover in Detroit was only 50 minutes. So, by the time we made a pit stop and walked to the next terminal, it was time to board the plane.

The flight from Detroit to Seattle was about four and a half hours long. We had TVs on this flight, only mine didn't work; but, Justin and Daddy were able to watch the basketball tournament and CNN and I just listened to music and perused the latest issue of Southern Living. When we landed in Seattle we only had about 30 minutes to catch our flight to Honolulu. By the grace of God, or luck or something, our flight came in two gates over from where we needed to be to get on the next flight. So, again, we had time for a pit stop and Justin and Daddy grabbed themselves a cheeseburger as well.

The last flight of the day was six hours long. Thankfully Delta gave us our choice of free movies on this flight. I watched Frozen (yes, again) because it's really good and then watched Gravity which wasn't as great as all the critics made it out to be, at least in my opinion. I started watching Thor, but was dozing off so I stopped it and watched an hour long Michael Buble special instead and it was really good. My dad watched The Secret Life of Walter Mitty and The Book Thief which he said was great and I hope to watch on the flight home. I'm honestly not sure which movies Justin chose.

We arrived in Honolulu at 8:40 p.m. local time, which was 1:40 a.m. at home. We were exhausted and worn out. We retrieved our luggage, picked up our rental car and made our way to the hotel. We were all in bed by 10:30 p.m. local time which put me awake for 22.5 hours. It was a long day, y'all!

I slept okay but not great, but am very thankful for the rest I did receive. At the hotel we are at, we have three beds and mine is in a separate room so I can shut out all the snoring for a little while. We are all in the process of getting ready to start our day. Today, we are headed to the Polynesian Cultural Center where we will go to a Luau. I'm betting at some point today Justin will dance with a Hawaiian woman. You'll have to stop back in tomorrow to find out.

A scary selfie by Justin 

Flying over the Rockies

We saw about 17 hours of sunlight yesterday.

 Finally, it sets over the Pacific.