The day started at 6:30am on Saturday morning in Decatur…
From there we headed to the airport for our first leg to JFK.
To reduce flight time and cost, we opted to buy tickets from JFK to AMD which meant we flew a domestic leg from ATL to JFK.
That said we had to check in for our international flight at JFK – requiring us to collect our bags and check them back in.
We figured it would be fairly quick but…Our 4 hour layover in New York gave us just enough time to grab our bags, recheck them for our flight, before heading through security and grabbing food to go. We thought we’d have to figure out how to burn our time… thanks(?) TSA for solving that problem.
The 13 hour flight to Abu Dhabi was uneventful and the kids slept for a decent portion of it (as did we). The one notable exception was when the crew decided to serve bags of popcorn in the middle of the night while half the plane was sleeping. We had to endure 20 mins of bags crackling loudly… if it was a practical joke, then it was brilliant.
We had another 3 hours in Abu Dhabi where we ate and visited the toy store for a few items. The fatigue was starting to set in at this point but the kids were still being really good (the toy store definitely helped).
Our last leg was to Ahmedabad India – a [relatively] short 2.5 hour hop from Abu Dhabi!
Immigration was quick (thank goodness). Bags took forever. Then customs was a breeze. Mom and dad were waiting for us just outside the doors of customs. Fun fact, you can pay $2 to come inside the airport building. If you choose not to pay, you get to wait outside the building on the sidewalk. My parents were the only ones inside waiting.
Being able to simply come inside of an airport to see someone off or meet someone is definitely one of those things that is easy to take for granted.
Finally, our drivers drove us the 2 hours from Ahmedabad to Anand. Along the way the boys spotted cows (in the road), dogs (in the road), motorbikes with 1-5 people on them (on the road), rickshas (honking obsessively at everything near, on and by the road) and one camel (next to the road). All in all it was highly amusing.
After nearly 24 hours we pulled in to my parents condo.
11:30 pm Sunday. Arrived!