We knew the flight was at 6.00am. That makes for a fairly ugly travel day, no matter what comes next. But every detail we found out about what came next made it even more harrowing:
- be at the airport at 4.00am
- that probably means leaving your house at about 3.30am, so you’ll probably be waking up around 3.00am
- it’s a flight to Los Angeles, which on a normal day is one of the longest flights you can possibly do
- this is not a normal day: there’s a stopover in Auckland
- Auckland is a bit of a detour, no matter what scale map you draw it on
- we’re flying on to Milwaukee when we get to LA, which requires clearing customs and immigration, then walking to the other terminal and checking in for the next flight (note: LAX is the worst airport for this sort of thing)
- when we get to Milwaukee, there’s still one and a half hours in a bus to deal with.
You thought that four hour documentary about Tom Petty and the Heartbreakers on the plane was pretty long? Well you have time to watch that five times today if you feel like it.
Next: the first gig. And thank god, we don’t have to fly or drive anywhere for a whole day.