Morning flight, east coast (DC) to London
 

Those of you that have taken the morning transatlantic flights from the east coast, how has that worked for you? The thought of not missing a night of sleep while on the plane sounds very appealing, even if it means we have to be out the door before 5am to catch the flight.
Thanks-

I prefer morning flights. Less problems with jet lag for me.

I've never had one, but I've always thought it would work better for me.

I liked the flight a lot. Got into London late, took a long walk, returned to the hotel and slept.

Next morning, we felt great and were off and running.

We plan on doing it again next visit.

CW

Hi K,

A downside to taking a morning plane is that you lose a day in your destination city, although you pay for a hotel for the night.

((I))

If you are like me and cannot sleep on planes, this is the way to go. I've taken these am flights from Boston and found it much easier to adapt to the new time zone...my problem usually is not the jet lag but the sleep deprivation from the flight, and the am flight takes care of that.

Another fan of the morning flight. Greatly diminished jetlag for us the next day. I agree, a downside is using a full day to travel, but if I can afford the day, I'll do it every time.

I love the day flight. I get sleep the night before, and while you might "lose" part of your trip flying, you gain in being well rested.

Thanks so much! I have always found the first day (or sometimes 2 or 3) hard to deal with because of the lack of sleep and jet lag. I have never fallen sleep on a plane, unfortunatly.
Since I will have to get up so early to get to the airport I hope I am tired enough to get to sleep at a decent time in London! Has this been the case for anyone, or do you still lay in bed staring at the ceiling?
Not to worried about losing the day to travel. We don't have a hotel to pay for and my zombie like state on the first day or two don't make then very useful anyway.

We did the afternoon chicago to Heathrow in January, as part of a round the world trip. By far this was among the hardest to cope with. We arrived around 6.30am, with our room not available until 2pm. A complete waste of a day. Zombie like state describes it well.

Although originating on the west coast makes the day flights somewhat inconvenient (in essence 2 days in transit) we much prefer them over the redeyes, especially given it's an 8- or 9-hour time change if one does it in one night, v. a 3 + 5 change if one stops on the east coast en route. We like BOS-LHR because we usually get the Hyatt at Logan on Priceline (and then another PL bed near LHR) so 2 beds and two day flights = much more alert and un-lagged on day 3, at reasonable cost.

It's the best!

Would do it again; no jet lag, no worries to get to sleep on a plane; delightful!

katie,

I also wondered if I would have a problem sleeping "earlier" upon arrival, and found that the fear was unfounded.

Given that the day before I leave is busy, and late, and we have to get up early, I had no problem falling asleep at 11:30 London time.

cw

I have done it twice. Once I volunteered to be bumped (for a big voucher, 2 meals, hotel & taxi) & still arrived the same day but just in the evening instead of early AM.

I liked it so much I paid extra to spend more time in Boston the next trip & combined it with my usual UK trip so was able to have another day flight. Otherwise, it's impossible for me. I find the first day is wasted anyway for me since I can never sleep on a plane.

My wife and I have no appreciable problems with jetlag so we take the evening flights from Boston. We did use the AM flight once with the grandchildren (10 & 15) to London. The following year it was the evening flight to Paris with a change at Heathrow. We and the kids felt we wasted daylight hours that would have been better spent at the destination when we used the morning flight.

Please - don't tell me we could have gone a day earlier.

OK-we will certainly do it. I may even see if we can spend the night in Dulles. I found its cheaper to get a room than park the car! Someone could easily drop us off the night before, but I couldn't even ask family to get us to the airport by dawn on a Sunday!
-Katie