It's 4:30 in the morning and we drag ourselves out of bed. We're totally packed - two 50 lb. suitcases and two carry-ons - and by 5:00 AM when our airport shuttle arrives, we are ready to go! Tired, excited, ready to go!

Our United Airlines flight takes us to San Francisco (3 hrs. 59 min.), and from San Francisco (4 hr. lay-over) we board another UA flight (14 hrs. 30 min.) to Hong Kong. ETA-HK is 6:45 PM (with time differences - the following day!).

For our South America cruise in 2007, we flew overnight to Buenos Aires. I think I prefer to spend 8 hours of a 14.5 hour flight sleeping. There's only so much reading, conversing, working, watching movies that one can do in (almost) 15 hours; the rest of the time one is trying to doze, or eating, or drinking. A long daytime flight seems to me much tougher on the body than a long night-time flight. What do you think?

We were, nevertheless, as comfortable as one could possibly be on a 14.5 hour flight, because I 'carried on' all the little comforts - eyepatches, blow-up back pillows and neck supports, earplugs, earphones, blankets. We were even equipped with our own miniature necklace air-purifiers!

So...14.5 hours later - 6:45 PM - we arrive in Hong Kong!

What an airport! Talk about 'people-friendly!'

Well, here we are packing for what will be close to a six week journey to the Far East, starting with 8 days in Hong Kong (where Paul has a speaking engagement at HKU) - our first trip back to our first home as a married couple in 40 years! From there we'll fly to Bangkok where we board Princess Cruise Line's Diamond Princess for a 16 day South East Asia cruise .

I've been in "preparation" mode for a good month: researching; making lists; buying necessities; practising my elementary Mandarin (East Asian Studies at University of Toronto); simplifying.

Our Princess cruise will take us to Bangkok, Singapore, Vietnam, back to Hong Kong, Taiwan, Okinawa, Shanghai, and Beijing. We'll spend 5 days in Beijing, where Paul has speaking engagements at the China Conservatory of Music and at the Central Conservatory of Music, and then fly back to the USA (San Francisco). We'll be in California for 5 days and then head home.

So...what do you pack for a six week trip that takes you from anywhere from 40 - 90 degrees F? Last time we did that was in 2007 for our South American cruise (around Cape Horn!) on Celebrity's magnificent Infinity!

Paul says we took too much stuff on the SA cruise! Well - we used every single bit of what we took! And all that luggage wasn't a hardship because we didn't have to cart it around ourselves at any stage. I knew, however, that "hardship" might be an issue on this trip. We were not, you see, going directly to the ship from the plane. We were going to a Hong Kong University campus residence for visiting scholars at "mid-levels" (read "1/2 way up the mountain") on Victoria Island (Hong Kong)...by taxi - HK-sized taxi!

So...one big 50 lb. suitcase and a carry-on - that's what we decided to take. Have you any idea how "little" a 50 lb. suitcase can be when you're trying to pack for 4 seasons??? And how very nearly two 50 lb. suitcases and 2 carry-ons do NOT fit into a HK sized taxicab? Oooooh boy!

Video Gem: http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=Y-HXVMFC0F0