How to Survive Traveling Across the World

Traveling to Sydney, Australia meant 2 very long plane rides and 3 very different time zones.  Somehow I made it here in one fully awake piece.  Here is how:

1.  Don't sweat the small stuff.  This is the advice Boyfriend gave me that I didn't really listen to at first.  Our first flight left JFK for LAX at 6:30am.  We got to the airport in enough time which is really important to me because I hate rushing.  We were flying Qantas so naturally we head to that terminal.  Turns out that the Qantas staff doesn't show up at the airport that early.  WTF?!  I immediately go into panic mode.  We find out that we have to go to the American Airlines terminal.  That would have been nice to know.  It all worked out and we checked our bags, got through security, and to the gate in enough time.  The 30 minutes until it worked out were filled with me cursing all airport staff under my breath.  All that stress for nothing.

2.  You must sleep!  On both flights we slept a good portion of the time.  It is so key.  If we hadn't of slept on the first flight we would have been zombies all day in L.A.  If we hadn't slept on the second flight we would have been bored for one thing, and fucking comatose our first day in Sydney.  Because we slept we were able to have a great time hanging out in Manhattan Beach in L.A. and we had enough energy to spend our first day in Sydney exploring - not sleeping. 

3.  Pack a light carry-on.  I knew this would be important because I had to lug that thing around L.A. all day.  Also, we got to Sydney a few hours before our hotel room was ready so I had to carry it around when we first started checking out the sites.  It was still heavier than I would have liked but considering I usually treat my purse like it was a Mary Poppins hand-me-down I think I did ok.

4.  Fly Qantas.  I started out hating them because they weren't at the stupid terminal when we started out trip but I got over that.  The plane, the crew, everything is awesome.  Trust me.  On a flight that long in economy it makes a big difference.  If I were on American Airlines I probably would have shot myself.

All-in-all the trip to Sydney was a lot better than I thought it would be.  The hardiest thing was figuring out what time I should be taking my birth control since the time zones were all over the place.  Getting accidently pregnant is not something I want to happen on this trip.