Deirdre Saoirse Moen

Sounds Like Weird

A Time Zone Experiment

29 August 2014

Rick and I returned from Ireland on Tuesday, and my flight to Frankfurt is on Monday.
Given that one of the hardest parts of jet lag is adjusting to the time zone, I thought I should try to stay on Europe time. Normally, it takes a day to adjust per hour of time difference, and it just seemed fundamentally worse to try to do that in this particular circumstance.
Last night, I went to bed at 5 in the afternoon (1 am, Irish time) and woke up at 3:30 in the morning (11:30 am, Irish time). It was so strange. When I see it’s 7 and it’s light out, I’m not sure if it’s 7 pm or 7 am.
I’ve tried adjusting to time zones before trips before, with limited success (insofar as I always have difficulty changing time). We’ll see how this one holds up.
I usually have a sense of what time it is within fifteen minutes. Right now, that’s not true.
Last year, when I flew this route, starting in San Francisco and heading west:
[gcmap path=’sfo-akl-wlg-mel-bkk-jnb-cpt-jnb-lhr-sfo’ bgcolor=bluemarble pathcolor=blue dottag=city]
…I was fine until I reached South Africa. At that point, my sense of what time it was just broke. I didn’t regain it until after I got home.
So, even though I’m all confused about time right now, I’m hoping this experiment is a good one for me.
My little trip, once I wind up in Frankfurt:

  1. Train to Vienna.
  2. Day trip to Bratislava. (New country! #92)
  3. Day trip to Salzburg. Apart from Salzburg itself, the train is supposed to be some of the most beautiful scenery in Austria.
  4. Fly to Lisbon via Zurich. (New country! #93) At this point, I join Rick and my mom as we explore Portugal.
  5. Sail to Gibraltar. (New country/territory! #94)
  6. Sail to Puerto Banus, Spain.
  7. Sail to Malaga, Spain. Alhambra!
  8. Sail to Cartagena, Spain.
  9. Sail to Ibiza, Balearic Islands. (New country/territory! #95)
  10. Sail to Mahón, Menorca.
  11. Sail to Alghero, Sardinia. (New country/territory! #96)
  12. Sail to Bonifacio, Corsica. (New country/territory! #97)
  13. Sail to Porto Vecchio, Corsica.
  14. Sail to Civitavecchia, Italy, aka the cruise port closest to Rome.
  15. Visit the Vatican! (New country! #98)

We fly home from Rome a couple of days later.
[gcmap path=’fra-vie-bts-vie-szg-vie-zrh-lis-gib-agp-mjv-ibz-mah-aho-fsc-fco’ bgcolor=bluemarble pathcolor=blue dottag=city]
As always, I’m using the Travelers Century Club list of countries and territories.
What I like most: my revised itinerary is that I’ll again get to see some of the territory I found so beautiful in 1992 when we drove south from Munich to Venice via Innsbruck.

Ganz Wien

I can’t think about this trip without hearing the Falco song.


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