DAY 01 - T-minus Zero...and we have lift-off (well nearly)

Today started with us busily finalising packing and departing for Sydney at around 0800h. Scott-the-Cat was delivered to his temporary new parents last night (thanks Bree) and the neighbours came over last night for instructions on what needs to be done whilst we are away (thanks Todd and Tash). The drive to Sydney was uneventful (as you would expect in the fully-sick Captiva) with a brief stop for breakfast at McDonalds, Goulburn. 

On arrival into Sydney, Maureen, Schuyler and Joshua were dropped off at Sydney's Kingsford Smith International Terminal, whilst Kyle and I drove to Victoria Barracks (an inner Sydney Army base) to drop off the car for long-term parking. Once sorted we were picked up and taken to the airport in a very funky yellow Renault Clio (thanks Pop). 

Check-in was relatively smooth though the queue was pretty long. Customs and Security was like clock-work, leaving us here sitting in the Qantas Club with the family asking me to hurry up so they can get some duty free shopping underway.


Our Aircraft today will be a Qantas A380-800 (VH-QOD) with boarding scheduled to commence at 1440h.

DAY - T minus 5 Days

Welcome to our 2014 USA holiday blog. The last I wrote seemed to be pretty popular, so I thought I'd have another crack.

Firstly, where are we going? The map below pretty well lays out our plan which is essentially a two-part journey. Firstly, a south-eastern circuit starting in Dallas, and covering major cities such as, San Antonio, Houston, Baton Rouge, New Orleans, Pensacola, Nashville, Charlotte, Atlanta, Memphis, St Louis, Kansas City, Oklahoma and back to Dallas. This is followed by a flight to Los Angeles (a few days there), then flying to Seattle before driving down the west coast via Portland, San Francisco, possibly Yosemite National Park, then back to Los Angeles. (Planning for the west coast is not yet concrete). Overall, we will be in the US for just short of six weeks.

Link to Map

We will be departing this Friday 12 Dec 14. Flying on Qantas Flight QF07 on the Airbus A380. This is currently the longest flight in the world (by distance), which is 13800km and takes around 15 hours.

Qantas A380 used on world's longest flight

The whole family is going except for Scott the Cat who is being baby-sat (or cat-sat back here in Canberra. :( 

I hope you enjoy reading about our adventures.