14 hours of flying? No problem!

Seriously. 14 hours sounds like a long time but the blessing of sitting together, a great entertainment system, excellent Qantas service, and, um, a great entertainment system made it... fly by!

Speaking of entertainment systems, this 747-400 was decked with movies on demand and games. No worries about mom having to lose hair over what was being shown on a big screen to the entire cabin! Nope! We could watch what we wanted when we wanted. Sleep? No way! It's time for another episode of Hoodwinked!

Favorite movie for Barrett and me: Nacho Libre. Maybe it was the lack of sleep at this point but that movie made us laugh out loud (each time we watched it!). Please vote for whether Barrett or I look most like Jack Black. You can click on the pic to get a better resolution shot of our fantastico wrestling physiques!

Truthfully, the flight did feel like a long time but the question of whether or not the kids could deal with it was not really an issue. Considering Zachary doesn't like to sit still for 14 minutes let alone 14 hours, this was yet another massive answer to prayer.

After passing over the International Date Line, we fast forwarded into Friday and eventually arrived in Sydney around 8:45pm. The kids learned that "Customs" is a word which means "wait in long lines".

Once getting the Australia stamp on our passports, we gathered luggage and headed to the Tourist bureau to get a room. We didn't have a reservation because we had thought we'd be coming in on a later flight, then heading directly to Perth. It was now too late for such a flight and, in reality, our airplane seat weary rears were ready to conform to a bed of any size.

Getting a room was more difficult than we thought because of the Australian Football finals going on. We assumed that meant soccer but we assumed incorrectly. It's a rather whacky game from an American perspective. It seems one part football (as we know it), and three parts rugby. The country is obssessed with the sport and filled up nearly every hotel in town to watch such gripping matches as the Fremantle Dockers vs. Sydney Swans. Once we arrived at the Novotel Brighton Beach (around 10:30pm), we turned on the game and found it difficult to turn off! It truly is a fun game!

Lights went out around 11:15pm or so and they'll need to go on around 5:45am. This was an exciting day of great memories and answered prayers that we'll not soon forget.