The Flight Home

I was ready to come home. Our trip was fabulous and we had a ton of fun, but it’s very different traveling with a toddler than it is as adults. We didn’t anticipate certain things and we over thought other things. It’s not really a vacation that we had; more like an adventure in living in a foreign country with a toddler and no set structure to our days.

Flights out of Israel leave in the middle of the night. You are traveling backwards across time zones, depending on where you are going, so it makes some sense. Our flight left at 12:40 AM and arrived at 6 AM in JFK. We choose to fly internationally from JFK and do a domestic flight within the states. This meant going through customs and immigration in New York and then basically starting over with our domestic flight.

Four years ago when we traveled, El Al, changed the time of our out going flight and we missed our domestic flight home from JFK. This time we decided with a toddler to giver her the ability to run around, get food, and nap would be a better choice than rushing to get on another flight home in the AM and risk missing that flight. We also thought a direct flight would be better so we didn’t have to schlep off and on a plane again.

We were through customs and had checked our bags in at customs by 8 AM or earlier. The problem we encountered was that you cannot get to anything in a terminal at Delta in JFK without a boarding pass. Of which w we could not check into our flight until 10:10:45 AM. That gave us almost 3 hours to sit in the reservations area! My cranky husband was having none of this. I had to ask him to let me handle it so that we could possible get through with some help instead of waiting three hours.

I explained the issue we had with a agent and she took our passports and gave us special security only clearance to get through. Secrurity ended up being a hassle and my hungry sleep deprived husband almost got us in trouble. He kept beeping the making and he said he’d taken of everything and he was pissed. I had the baby, tons of carry-on, and they wanted to figure out why he was still beeping. Well, it turned out that he had forgotten to take out the cell phone battery and that was causing the beep!!

Our daughter is born to travel and is a fantastic traveler. She fell asleep in the car to the airport in Israel at 8:30 and slept pretty much through until just before take-off. We had a fabulous experience in the airport. Sailed through security and checking in our luggage. When we got to the gate, Yiftach asked the agent about checking in our stroller at the gate, since we had a sleeping child. It turns out that we’ve learned on international flights, you are not allowed to take any water on even if it’s been purchased in the airport. I had mine dumped on the way out. Well, it seems that on international flights they no longer do gate check for strollers on either end. Getting out in Israel H had to walk all the way to baggage… on the way back they take the stroller at the boarding pass gate.

This agent escorted us, in zone 1, all the way to the gate, waited and helped while we transferred H to my arms, and then he hand carried the stroller bag back to the front to check it in for us. We were amazed! We were also given bulkhead seats which were amazing. Not only could we actually see the screen, but H had a place to stand, play, and sleep! She wanted to go nigh –nigh and she she actually lay down on t a blanket, with a pillow and we covered her and she slept for 6 hours!! It was great for us too.

Then in NY she ran and played and we found some other kids to ;ay with and that was a bll! She fell asleep on Israel time at 1 PM in NY and will not wake up until we get home at 8 PM CA time. This is her nighttime!! We ended up with a seat in between us and she slept for most of the sgliht home. It’s our first night home that we are going to be in trouble because she is going to want to stay up all night because she’ll think it’s day and we are going to want to sleep.