We are off to Kazakhstan

At 8:00pm this evening we boarded a Northwest flight out of Boston for the approximately 7500 mile journey to Petropavlovsk in northern Kazakhstan. Our flight to Amsterdam was uneventful although my daughter Samantha was a pretty restless sleeper so we as a result didn’t get much sleep either.

It has been a long time since I flew international in coach (the benefit of racking up miles as a consultant) and I had forgotten how bloody uncomfortable the seats are. My back is going to take a few days to recover from all this abuse. Plus despite beating on Northwest I couldn’t get us all into the premier seating zone. I will be so glad when Delta and Northwest finally merge so my status on Delta will carry over correctly.

Also when I booked the flights Northwest couldn’t seem to decide whether the plane configuration had three seats across on the middle or four seats across in the second to last row which is where we ended up – the problem with booking at the last minute. It turns out they booked it as if there were four seats but there were really only three. So we got the entire row and someone else ended up in the front of the plane after we sorted out the fact that the seat they had assigned her didn’t actually exist (luckily as it was overbooked). So airline disaster #1 averted.

Once we got to Amsterdam we snagged some breakfast and then tried to figure out what to do with the rest of our ten hour layover (ugh!). Luckily we were in the Amsterdam airport which has a Yotel pod hotel. So we snagged a pod for eight hours and all of us promptly fell asleep. It was expensive but well worth it. Plus you can book online which is something to remember for the next trip through Amsterdam.

The bed folded down automatically which initially caused Samantha some concern but she got the hang of it and promptly turned it into a temporary playroom. She did seem frustrated through when everything on the TV was in Dutch.

After six hours of sleep and a quick shower we checked out of our “pod” and went hunting for coffee. Unfortunately the Starbucks in the airport is outside of the passport controlled area so I couldn’t get my fix. I had to settle for a decent cup of coffee at a coffee bar down towards the playground. That was perhaps the best part about the airport – they have a full sized playground inside. So Sam spent nearly an hour sliding and climbing which helped to tire her out for the next leg of the trip.