A very merry mid-western Christmas

[AisleSeat]

For our first international flights as a family of four we’re headed to my in-laws for Christmas in Cleveland, OH. They were incredibly generous and paid our airfare.

As luck would have it, we booked during the QF double status credits promo in February, (I registered everyone) so this trip will see Mrs AS re-qualify for PS and our daughter qualify for PS. And me? Do I finally break out of NB and bask in some PS? Nope. We return after my anniversary date.

We’re flying our usual route, MEL-SYD-DFW-CLE and we got lucky a second time for this trip, being reseated from row 81 to 51 on the SYD-DFW leg.

Cleveland, Columbus and OH in general hasn’t been covered anywhere in AFF TRs that I can see, so hopefully I can share some photos/reviews of places that haven’t yet been visited.

We’re excited for a big family Christmas and for the kids to play in snow for the first time.

 

[Dr Ralph]

Enjoy your trip.

Make some time to visit here:

Welcome to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

I was there in 2017. Planned to spend 2 hours. Ended up leaving 8 hours later.

 

[kermatu]

I'm onboard.

 

[tgh]

Best wishes for a great trip

 

[AisleSeat]

Enjoy your trip.

Make some time to visit here:

Welcome to the Rock & Roll Hall of Fame

I was there in 2017. Planned to spend 2 hours. Ended up leaving 8 hours later.

Went there in 2015. And yes, I spent hours there!

 

[VPS]

I'm having a White Christmas one year so I'll just tag along for now

 

[Major]

Enjoy your cooler than normal Christmas

 

[LadyC]

Enjoy your Christmas break - look forward to reading more.

 

[AisleSeat]

MEL-SYD-DFW-CLE

MEL-SYD

Standard flight, both kids were fine. A good start.

SYD-DFW

We boarded, and as I sat in the aisle seat (naturally), I leaned left, peering around the bulkhead through the galley into F.

I wondered how many passengers were there for this flight. I spied a couple, then guessed all seats were probably full. The many AFF threads came to mind. I wondered how many were on a paid, upgrade or award flight?

I smirked, and realised how much how I've picked from AFF in the last two years.

I figured since my son did well on the MEL-SYD flight takeoff, the SYD-DFW takeoff would be similar.

We hurtled down the runway and into the air.

And thats when the screaming started.

He screamed, bawled, writhed and tried to claw his way from me to Mrs AS. We tried to soothe him, singing him his songs but to no avail. We were trapped in our seats. Was it his ears? Do A380s climb quicker than a 737?

As I held him, I looked at Mrs AS and started laughing, there was nothing else I could do.

The rest of the flight went OK, apart a nappy blowout resulting in a rather primitive aircraft toilet "hospital bed bath".

The kids finally went to sleep, so Mrs AS and I got a mini bottle of Shiraz each and had a quiet moment of bliss and reflection.

The silver lining of this very mixed bag flight was that a flight attendant arranged for us to go up to the flight deck after we landed at DFW. I sat in the co-pilots seat while the pilot explained a couple of things and played with the joystick. He mentioned that there's talk of the A380 going from SYD-JNB (I think thats been mentioned on AFF already).

By the time we boarded DFW-CLE, everyone was pretty much over it. The flight is 2.5 hours, my son cried and bawled for one of them.

32 hours on the go would hit anyone hard, most of all little kids, and I now have a new found empathy for parents travelling with small kids who cry and scream on planes. We were THOSE parents this time round.


For the return flights well be packing cabin bags differently and replanning. What worked for our daughter when she was a baby didn't work for our son.

 

[JohnK]

Enjoy your trip.

We've had some fun with our daughter on flights. People must think we're bad parents. Daughter is 2y 3m now and she's getting close to 100 flights.

 

[AisleSeat]

For the last couple of days, Mrs AS and I have been out of action. We came down with a virus or something, headaches, sore stomachs, felt like we were going to throw up.

No idea what it was, but we figured it must've been something that we ate in transit, maybe from the plane, maybe on layovers, who knows.

Our first outing was to the Childrens Museum Cleveland. Set in an old mansion, this place was great for our kids and is appropriate for ages 1+.


These tubes are blowing air. You shove coloured fabric into them and watch them shoot around before being blown out into the room.

The water play room was the highlight though.


Upstairs was the doll house exhibit. Very detailed houses of various designs.

 

[AisleSeat]

Today I went on a pub crawl with my father in-law.

First up was Masthead Brewing, a huge 300 seat venue. Nice, but not my style. Their beer list was long and very appealing. I had a New England IPA which was pretty good.





Next was Noble Beast Brewing. Great venue, very cosy. So cosy in fact that it looked like Santa himself dropped in for a lunchtime beer.



I had a pomegranate grisette, which hit the spot just right.



Our third stop was Saucy Brew Works. The venue was a bit soulless, and none of their beers were appealing so I had a Sierra Nevada Resilience IPA, which was brewed to support everyone affected by the Camp Fire (100% of proceeds go to that cause).



A fun day out.

 

[AisleSeat]

Since the kids have been born, as any parent would know, you get next to no time to yourselves. So while we have grandparents around this holiday, we're taking a weekend to ourselves, leaving the kids with them.

First stop was our friend's coffee shop and roastery, duck rabbit coffee. Very, very good.





Then on to downtown Cleveland, where we'd booked two nights at the Hyatt Regency. Pretty standard hotel room.

You come out of the elevator to The Arcade, which is impressive. Someone was having their wedding there in the evening.



We wanted some snacks so headed to a supermarket, which it turns out was in an old bank. We then discovered that up on the second floor was this. Yes, a self-serve wine dispenser.



Bottles ranged $20-70. You could get a taster, half or full glass. Prices ranged according to bottle price.
You load up a card with cash and off you go. So much for RSA right?



Then on to dinner. We went to Lola on E. 4th St.
I had the duck, which quite honestly was one of the greatest things I've tasted. Melt in your mouth, so good. Mrs AS had the scallops, which were big, a little sweet but had that fresh out the sea, salty taste. We paired these off with a sangiovese.



Dessert was a creme brulee, and again, just so good.



We had some time before seeing a band, so we went to the Marble Room. A restaurant and bar in an old bank. The wine list was huge. I almost forgot to take a photo.



Then on to the House of Blues to see the Ohio City Singers, who are a Christmas band. They played a bunch of original Christmas songs and everyone knew the words. So much fun.

 

[ellen10]

Sounds like a bit of a tough start. I remember flying from Syd to Brisbane 30 years ago for my grandfather's funeral with my 6 month old who screamed all the way. A very stressful flight with lots of people offering ideas. None of which worked.
Enjoying your photos and looking forward to more of your trip report.

 

[AisleSeat]

After that big night out we took it easy the next day, and after a lazy morning, we visited the Christmas Story house and museum.







Then we checked out the West Side Market. So much good smelling food. Meat, cheese and bread seemed to be the main types of food there.





The Christmas lights in the city square were nice. There's an ice rink there too.





It did snow out in the suburbs, so our kids got to play and build their first snowman with their grandpa. There's no more snow forecasted so I guess we were lucky!

 

[AisleSeat]

A belated Merry Christmas!

The last few days have been hectic; seeing various relatives; eating TONS; and drinking copious amounts of everything. There were some good bottles of red going around, but I forgot to take label pics. They were Californian, that's all I know.

It's warming up a little this week, so before that happened we hit the toboggan chutes.

It's a 700ft refrigerated ice run, with a 70ft vertical drop. I swear we reached 60mph. $6 a ride or $12 all day. We got two rides in, waiting about 20 minutes per ride (it was quite busy too).



As you can see from the riders on the toboggan at the back it gets up close and personal.

 

[Straubs]

Sounds like a lovely Xmas so far ... and great to have time to yourselves too (would have been top of many parents' Xmas wish list!)

 

[AisleSeat]

And so our holiday comes to an end.

We spent the last few days catching up with friends we haven’t seen yet and doing lots of shopping. It’s a good thing we brought an extra bag, as we filled it up.

I also met up with a friend I haven’t seen in 12 years, who just happened to move to Cleveland in recent months with her husband. Turns out they met on a flight during a “mid-air incident”. They were in Y in the bulkhead row and were sitting next an older lady. She’d got up to go to the toilet and then they heard this thud against the wall. She’d fallen. They, with a crew member, took the door off and she helped her get cleaned up. Not exactly the mid-air romantic story from a movie!

The flights back were OK. QF8 was not full so we bagged a row of 3 behind our row so our daughter could lie down and sleep.

All beer and bourbon made it back in one piece, with the expected TSA notice in the suitcase.


CLE-DFW
I’ve never been on a MD-80 before. The interior was very tired looking.



QF8. What horrors lie behind this door.


I’ll end this TR with a review of a couple of things I’ve used on this trip.


Caribee Skymaster 40

I’ve had this for around a year, purchasing it based on recommendations from a few AFFers and all the positive reviews online. So far I’ve taken it camping, weekend road trips and a domestic break up to Port Douglas, but not on a long-haul trip.

It performed great, as it has done for the last year. Getting things in and out of the bag without taking it down from the overhead bin was easy. I wore it as a backpack the whole time and it was comfortable to wear for extended periods while transiting between terminals both at DFW and SYD.

Bamboo cushion

After seeing @theblank post about the cushion they used on a USA trip, I got one and have been using it at home, work and driving, with the intention that I’d bring it on our USA trip too.

The difference in comfort when sitting in Y with and without the cushion is very noticeable. Mrs AS and I took turns with it and she agreed. Just before boarding QF7 I noticed someone carrying one too!

A bonus was that it also fits in the Skymaster bag, between the zipped compartments, although I put it in a tote bag for quicker access.

 

[ellen10]

@AisleSeat is the cushion a Memory Foam Bamboo cushion? retail $29.95?

 

[AisleSeat]

@AisleSeat is the cushion a Memory Foam Bamboo cushion? retail $29.95?

Yes, but I got mine for $20.