USA here we come!

I know I've been a blog slacker lately. I don't blame you if you're not even checking this under weeks after we've posted it. I'm going to blame it on pregnancy. Yeah, that's what I'll do. Can't we girls blame a lot of things on that?

Let me begin by posting about our flight to Utah. We tried to get out on the Patriot Express which goes from Okinawa to Yakota (mainland Japan) and then on to Seattle. Then I would have taken a Southwest flight from Seattle to Salt Lake City. Well, we didn't get on that flight which is rather unheard of this time of year. This is supposed to be the "slow" season, but it wasn't that week! For those of you not familiar with Space A travel, you don't actually "book" a flight and get on it. You show up to the Air Force airport and hope to get on a plane. They only release schedules 2 days in advance and those change at the last minute for every reason from the plane needing maintenance to the mission changing.

For the next two days we tried to get on about 5 flights with no success. We finally caught a flight to Hickam Air Base in Hawaii on Friday night. It was strange because we left Friday night at 7pm Japan time and arrived at 9am Friday Hawaii time. It was a LOUD plane (a C-17 I think???) and we literally had to shout into the ear of the person you were trying to communicate with. The seats were just cargo netting and pretty uncomfortable, but my kids will tell you otherwise. They slept on blow-up mattresses that I brought. AND, they slept from takeoff to landing. I couldn't ask for more! 9 hours straight. Here are some pics from our strange plane.




Back of the plane (no cargo except our checked luggage)

Front of the plane. I think we may have been transporting some donated blood.

So we got in Hawaii Friday morning and just missed a flight to Travis Air Base outside of Sacramento. I noticed there was a flight to Hill Air Base just north of Salt Lake that was leaving Sunday morning. What should I do? I decided to just chill and spend Friday and Saturday in Hawaii. We could get over some jet lag and enjoy the tropical paradise. I also happen to have some mission friends who live nearby and were willing to play host to us.

We tried to catch a shuttle to the base hotel, but they wouldn't let us on with all our luggage. So a nice man helped us walk to the hotel which was only about a 1/2 mile away. Within 100 meters another guy with a big car asked if we wanted a lift somewhere. After checking in, this same guy and his wife drove us to our gigantic room. Everyone was so helpful!

I was pretty tired at this point. Although the kids slept the whole 9 hours, I was lucky to have 1 hour worth of sleep. I took a brief nap in the hotel and then we went out to dinner with my MTC roommate, Rachel Niapali. It was so refreshing and fun to head to a food court in a mall! We ate at Panda Express...yes it was Asian food, but it was "American" Asian food. So yummy! I got to see Honolulu and just get out.

The next day I had to change hotel rooms which was a pain, but at least I had another place to stay Saturday night. Another mission friend, Mernette Cardejon, lives close by and picked me up, with all my luggage, and drove us for another fun filled day down to the PCC (Polynesian Culture Center). It's kinda like Disneyland, according to one of my kids. They have different "lands" like Epcot Center with the different islands of Polynesia represented. It was very cool and we had a great time hanging out with my friends. They were both so hospitable and made my extended stay in Hawaii extremely enjoyable. My kids keep talking about seeing the Hawaii temple. Sorry, Mernette, for Ben getting car sick on the ride down! We had a great time. She even knew the spots where they film LOST and Jurassic Park. Too cool. Rachel's kids were darling and we just had so much fun.

We got home late and ordered in pizza for dinner. I won't go into detail about how the kids had the worst night ever of going to bed for me. They were holy terrors. I think they feel asleep around 1am and we had to get up at 3:45 to make our Hill Air Base flight. Thankfully that flight went off (2 hours later than scheduled, but at least it went!) This time the plane was a C-5 which is the largest plane the Air Force has. I walked into the plane and there were 6 giant trucks INSIDE the plane. We walked upstairs where we had regular plane seats....only backwards. So we flew backwards the whole way. We had about 4 rows to ourselves and slept the first 2 hours. The remaining 5 hours or so were spent watching movies and playing with toys. We finally arrived in Utah in the early evening on Sunday. Grandma and Grandpa Kiser were there waiting for us. Not only was this whole experience more direct than I imagined, but it saved us $$$ because we didn't have to take a commercial flight from Seattle to SLC. Overall, I'd do it again. However, you certainly have to have an attitude of adventure and BE FLEXIBLE. Some pics of our time in Hawaii:





We were planning on taking the Patriot Express back to Oki, but now we're thinking we may try to hop back through Hawaii and spend another few days. Rob is meeting me out here in a week and flying back with me. What a help that will be! I mean life is always better with him around, but 2 adult sets of hands are always nicer. He also got an extension with his leave so we won't be heading back until later in the first week of April.

There you have it...my travel adventures. Next post....what I've been doing in this wonderful land of plenty and choice.