Making the way back...

I am writing this entry as I sit in Charles de Gaulle Airport in Paris. It’s currently 1:45 in the afternoon here, but barely quarter of 8 in the morning in New England. And where I started this morning, it’s 4:45 in the afternoon.

Needless to say, it’s been a long day. My first flight left Sochi at 2 a.m. and made its way to Moscow, arriving before 5 a.m. I then had a long wait in the Moscow airport, as my flight to Paris didn’t leave until almost 11 a.m. And here I sit, waiting once again.

But, I have to admit, the process has been pretty seamless so far, despite the long waits in terminals across Europe. Security in Sochi was relatively simple and again in Moscow, there were volunteers there to greet us when we got off the plane and lead us from the domestic terminal to the international terminal, where again, security wasn’t too bad.

Getting off the plane in Paris was a little sketchy for me, since I didn’t have a boarding pass for my next flight, as the ticket agent in Sochi could only book me on my first two flights, not the third.

However, I got off the plane, found the flight board and figured out where my flight was leaving from. I then followed the signs and there was an Air France desk right along the way. The woman at the desk got me my boarding pass and told me to hop on the train and go one stop to reach my gate.

Soon enough, here I was, sitting in the terminal, surrounded by a bunch of French kids who I am guessing are going to America. The sun is shining in the window and although it’s a little chilly outside, there’s no telling that from here.

I slept a little on the flight from Sochi to Moscow and again on the flight to Paris, but I am operating on little sleep and it’s pretty obvious that my eyes are getting heavy. Thankfully I have a seven-plus hour flight across the Atlantic to maybe catch some shut eye.

Between my trip to LA for the Survivor event a week before I left for Russia and this trip, I think I’ve had more airplane food in the last month than I did in my entire life before that. Every single one of my flights on this trip so far has featured a meal of some sort, though I don’t eat a lot of it, since it often features some sort of sushi or something like that, which I am not touching, even when I’m not on a plane.

The flight from Sochi was jam-packed, but the flight from Moscow had plenty of room, room enough that there was nobody in the middle seat between me at the window and the guy in the aisle seat. It was the same way coming over, with the flight between Paris and Moscow having the most space.

Of course, I expect the plane to Boston to be the biggest plane, so there’s no telling how many people I’ll be riding along with.

Whatever the case may be, if you’re reading this, it means I did make it back to the United States. And that was the objective when I started out early this morning.