My family has not been to Germany since last autumn, so when my wife Heidi had a little break, we decided to pull the kids out from school to take a late spring break trip across the Atlantic. Our journey will feature a couple of interesting flights on JetBlue and SAS.
Spring Break In Germany On JetBlue + SAS
The itinerary starts with a redeye to New York followed by a daytime flight to London on JetBlue. It will be my first time taking a daytime transatlantic flight…we will see if that positively (or negatively) impacts jetlag. London Heathrow arrival time is 8:45 pm, so we’ll eat a late supper and then go directly to bed.
I chose JetBlue because we had a return ticket from our Paris trip last autumn and because JetBlue is about as comfortable as gets in economy class, with extra legroom standard, delicious fresh meals, and free high-speed Wi-Fi.
We’ll stay at my sister-in-law’s house in London…a tradition I look forward to when starting my transatlantic trips. She lives in Bermondsey, which is a fun neighborhood in southeast London.
Next will come a British Airways flight to Basel, then a week in Germany.
Both my son Augustine and I are SAS EuroBonus Million Milers so I’m trying to fly SAS as much as possible. Our return is Zurich – Copenhagen – Los Angeles in SAS Plus. While I’d love to fly in business class (it’s only 10K extra miles, if available), I’ve reviewed the SAS A350 business class a couple times so this will be something new to review and should be sufficient for a daytime flight.
It won’t be a break for me…I’ll be working each day…but I greatly prefer working from the Central European Time Zone versus Pacific Daylight Time Zone. In Europe, my day is halfway over by the time most people are waking up and I find I’m even more productive in Germany with both my blogging and professional work than in the USA.
But I’ll still get to enjoy the strawberries, white asparagus, and beautiful spring weather…
My wife works so hard and this is an important break for her in which she can fully unplug from work, see her life-long friends, spend time with her family, and enjoy the country she misses so much. My kids will get to work on their German and I look forward to coffee, ice cream, and long walks with my wife at night.
I’m so far behind on my trip reports that there are two European trips in the queue ahead of this one, but I’ll offer first impressions as the trip progresses.
Enjoy the time away with the kids. Precious family memories outweigh a couple of days in school, especially at these ages. I absolutely love the daytime flight to London with the kids – have done it with them a couple of times and it works incredibly well. Although have not done it after getting off a red eye from the west coast! Hope you find a decent cup of coffee in T5 while connecting…
So what and how may different things do you do for work anyway? I know you are a blogger and award expert, but is that all?? (emphasis on all 😉
That ain’t the half of it!
I really shouldn’t say this but Matthew is also a secret agent, 00176. The high number is nothing to be ashamed of. It’s the same honor as 007.
As far as the daytime transatlantic flight, the experience will be muted because he took a red eye to JFK. The real beauty of daytime JFK-LHR is if one leaves New York or, alternatively Chicago or Washington connecting in NY. My feeling is that a daytime JFK-LHR in economy class is superior to a red eye business class flight.
Yep, I’ll take a daytime flight to London in economy any day over business redeye. I wish they had them to more cities than just London!
So what is the new gig? You said it takes you to PIT a lot, eh?
It’s a full-time position.
What do you mean this is your first daytime transatlantic flight? You’ve never crossed the Atlantic flying West on a flight departing before sunset????
Eastbound.
I have say this is the first time in a long time I’ve seen someone actually correctly refer to the time zone as Pacific Daylight Time during actual daylight time (or standard time). I’m impressed!
And also jealous of the idea working from CEST!
Daytime flights are the biggest travel hack imaginable for those of us who don’t tolerate jetlag or exhaustion well. In your case, I think you’re going to be spoiling its positive effects by flying a transcon redeye right beforehand…