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One of my favorite things to tell people who are younger is that before I was 30 I could sleep sideways in a chair for 4 hours and pop up the next day refreshed and ready to rock and roll. Once I broke 30 I could sleep 8 hours in pure Egyptian cotton sheets and wake up with pains I did not have before I went to bed.
Now that I am nearly into my early 60’s my priorities, especially when it comes to travel, have become completely focused on one overriding priority and that is when I arrive at my destination and the impact it has on me quickly resetting my body clock. Allow me to illustrate my recent flights to join the Norwegian Viva in Lisbon and the Norwegian Spirit in Auckland as well as the flights home.
With much of my family in Sweden I have been back and forth to Europe countless times in my lifetime. The flight times from the US to Europe are always too darn short for a good body clock reset. Almost every visit I end up napping the day of arrival and then it takes days and days to set myself on Swedish time – just hate it so much.
I have come to love flying west to go east and a 10+ hour flight, with evening departure, is ideal. With a full flat seat you have time to eat dinner, watch a movie and then get a solid night’s sleep (most times skipping breakfast onboard). Then you can grab a bite in the lounge before your next flight and arrive at your port city near dinner or bed time and rather than fight sleep you can drift off a bit early and be ready to go the next day. Perfect. Here is another example.
On our way to New Zealand to join the Norwegian Spirit for a 12 day cruise (review up later on) we departed South Bend at the perfect time a 5PM with a layover in Dallas. We had a small bite in the AA Flagship lounge and then stayed awake having a very late dinner just after midnight Dallas time. After dinner and a movie it was near 3AM so very ready for sleep and we still had some 12 hours of flight time remaining. We slept for a solid 8+ hours and had time to wake up and have breakfast and landing at 9AM let us reset almost instantly to Auckland time. The only struggle we had was going to bed a little bit early the first two nights and sleeping about 10 hours both nights. Last example the flights home.
Our Qantas flight departed around dinnertime and was yet another long flight. We had a wonderful dinner (after our late departure due to 2 passengers being kicked off the flight from business class) and then slept well for around 7 hours. Breakfast reset our bodies for our lunchtime landing in LAX. We did go to sleep a bit early the day of arrival and I did have a few nights where I woke up in the middle of the night and had to read for an hour or two but my wife had no such issues and reset perfectly.
I have another grand trip in the works and it will be very interesting to see if this body reset works as it will include sleeping a “daylight” day-stay in a hotel and being awake all night during the trip to reset to where we are going. I think it will be perfect but time will tell.
Bottom line is it really is all about the seat, the arrival time and resetting along the way. I wish I had been able to do this for years but now this is the only way I fly. You? – René
Advertiser Disclosure: Eye of the Flyer, a division of Chatterbox Entertainment, Inc., is part of an affiliate sales network and and may earn compensation when a customer clicks on a link, when an application is approved, or when an account is opened. This relationship may impact how and where links appear on this site. This site does not include all financial companies or all available financial offers. Opinions, reviews, analyses & recommendations are the author’s alone, and have not been reviewed, endorsed, or approved by any of these entities. Some links on this page are affiliate or referral links. We may receive a commission or referral bonus for purchases or successful applications made during shopping sessions or signups initiated from clicking those links.
