July 4th, Happy Independence Day.. Time to Roll

We woke up early before the kiddos got up to get everything arranged and all the packing completed.

We prepaid all of our bills and stopped our mail delivery.  And then we proceeded to review our checklists for packed items like medicines, snacks for the plane, money, passports and papers.

We knew that the Korean Air counter opened at 10:30am so we left the house at 9:00am or so.

When we arrived at the airport, we obtained a porter.   Our bags completely filled the cart up.   Incredible!   Too much luggage.

We were in Section C of Dulles Airport.  I sent the family to eat breakfast at Harry's Tap Room while I watched the bags.

We ended in 10th place in line.  At 10:30am the counter opened so I rushed everyone over which in-turn made them grumpy.   It was the right thing to do since they had so many windows opened at once.

I memorized our ticket locator which made it easier.  Unfortunately, I doscovered why we could not check in online.  The connecting flight from Korea to Bali was no longer valid.  They moved back the flight time and there was no way we could make it to the plane in time from our gate.  Korean Air Lines (KAL) wanted to rebook us on the flight tomorrow.  I told them that we could not because we had no way back to the airport (think massive pile of luggage).

We decided to go ahead forward to Seoul.  The supervisor told us that KAL would help us find a hotel for the night either free or at a discount.   We agreed that this was a workable plan so we obtained the tickets.

We were very concerned because my wife neglected to obtain seating assignments for us and all I could think of was that we would be separated across the Boeing 777.  This was a silly thought.  KAL saw that there were 5 tickets with the same ticket locator and they assigned us 5 seats in a row.

We checked in 8 bags plus a car seat.   We had 8-9 carry ons including the stroller, baby bag, back packs and other essentials.

I always advocate to pack additional clothing just in case of the unknown.  I packed 1 extra set of clothes for myself, my son Chris, caried all of his clothes with him and my wife had clothes for the girls.

Onward to security.   The line was short and uneventful.   The TSA folks seem to have the drill down pat and as long as you know the rules, there's never a hitch.

After getting through security, we went quickly through immigration and then headed to the gate.

KAL issued us zone 2 tickets but they have a policy that allows families with small children to board first along with the wheel chairs and the elderly.  

We found our seats and settled in for the 14 hour flight to Seoul.   There was no shortage of overhead space.  

Our seats were located several rows behind prestige class.   Each seat has an individual entertainment center with games, movies, etc.  and provides a USB port for charging devices.  

Off to a promising start.