Today feels like yesterday. That’s because we didn’t sleep last night with all the last minute preparations. After a smooth ride to the airport in John’s new Grand Cherokee (sweet ride!), and a 2 minute flight to O’Hare (measured by minutes spent awake on the plane), we were greeted at the gate in Chicago by Kelly & Jason who are joining us on the 12+ hour flight to Tokyo for the first leg of our trip!

Here’s our 777 waiting for us to board. Looks clean and in good working condition to me (although I must say our MD-80 from AUS was probably the most worn looking plane we’ve been on in a while)

And here are Kelly and Jason just minutes before boarding:

See you on the flip side.