April 24, 2012 — Zabine and I are in flight –Asiana Airlines– somewhere between Seattle and Seoul. We’ve travewled 1550 of our 5210-mile total;our altitude is 36,000 feet, ground speed 532 miles per hour, and current outside air temperature — a balmy minus-70 degrees F. (Guess if I get too hot, I can always go perch on the wing!)

Sense of time, utterly mixed up. Between Knoxville, my home, and Hanoi, our ultimate destination, the time difference is 12 hours. (But does Daylight Saving Time factor in, and how?) Twixt Seattle and Hanoi, 15 hours –at least that’s what the web site said. What I don’t know is what time zone we’re in right now, or where the international date line is, or what time it is now, locally. (Is there even such a thing as local time when you’re 36,000 feet high?) My iPad clock reads 6:05 p.m., but that’s just what the time WOULD be if we hadn’t left Seattle and lost Internet access.

This I know: Asiana is one classy airline. Boarding was a breeze, despite the hugeness of the crowd getting onto the packed plane. Accommodations are comfortable and spacious; the flight crew, uniformly friendly, briskly efficient and genuinely caring. I wish domestic air travel were as easy as this, but it just isn’t.
Continue reading →