Rosemarie Howard
28 June 2010 | Seattle Airport
After an early start Saturday, the next ten hours of the journey to China were spent waiting for the flight out of Seattle to Beijing. The Seattle Airport is a pleasant place, as airports go. Part of the time was spent figuring out that because there were more than six hours between our arrival time in Seattle and our 9 p.m. departure time, we needed to claim our baggage and check in again.
It took me a few minutes to figure out that I needed to go claim my baggage! But after that, things went smoothly. Russ and I had a chance to review the shot list and think about how best to allocate time while in China. Wireless internet is available throughout the Seattle airport, so it was possible to check e-mail and do other computer/internet oriented activities.
At 9 p.m. we were on the Delta airplane taking off for an almost 12 hour flight to Beijing. Amazing that we can actually go that far that fast!! It was a LONG flight. We flew into the sun, eastward, flying into a dawn and then watching the sunset and nightfall. After crossing the international dateline, we arrived safely at the Beijing Airport around 11:40 p.m. Sunday evening.
Long lines of tired passengers waited for customs officials to check our passports and visas. The process went quite quickly and smoothly. Other crew members had already arrived and were soon at the curbside ready to take us to the Garden Airport Hotel–just a short drive from the airport.
After a year of waiting and planning we had all safely arrived in China!