June 29, 2025: Dover to London to Salt Lake to HOME!

We woke up before 5am to get going on time. It was honestly a very uneventful day. Dover was covered in a blanket of fog, and it was beautiful. Disembarking was a piece of cake, and they even had Michael's blacksmithing tools ready for us to collect once we were off the ship. We had a short walk from the boat to meet our driver, loaded our bags, and we were on our way back to London. This was by far the easiest disembarkation we've ever had. 

Port of Dover

Port of Dover

Heading to the Heathrow Airport

When we originally booked our flights to and from Europe, we booked round trip tickets to and from Amsterdam, and our flight home from Amsterdam was the day after disembarkation. However, by March, I was having a difficult time trying to figure out the best way to get our family from Dover to Amsterdam. I looked into a ferry across the channel and then taking the Eurostar. I looked at flying to Amsterdam from an airport in London. I looked into taking the Eurostar from London to Amsterdam. All these options were really expensive, and we would have to stay another night in Amsterdam. While I was excited to see more things in Amsterdam, all our transportation options would get us there way too late in the evening to be able to do anything there. So, when I was explaining to Brian my logistical struggle, we decided to look into flights out of Heathrow. Amazingly, there was a direct flight from London Heathrow to Salt Lake late morning on the 29th of June, the day we would disembark, and it was less expensive than our Amsterdam flight, got us home a day earlier, and solved our logistical problems. (We've been home three months today, and this still feels like a major victory for our trip). 

We originally booked transportation from the cruise port in Dover to Heathrow, but we knew that our timeline that morning would be tight, so we arranged for private transportation, which ended up being much cheaper, left earlier than Carnival's service, and was just all around more amazing. 

We got to Heathrow, unloaded our bags, checked most of our luggage (which felt SO amazing!) We expected that I would get flagged for a pat down, like usual, during the security check, but somehow, I escaped further screening, and the kids had to have additional screening. 

Waiting for Michael's shoes to clear security

We grabbed some food, and then I did some last minute shopping for our neighbors who helped us out while we were gone while we waited to find out what gate we were supposed to go to. Soon, they announced our gate, and on our way to it, we ran into missionaries at the airport, and we asked them where they had been serving. They said they were on their way home after serving in the Scotland/Ireland Mission, which is where Ella is serving. We asked if they knew Sister Lybbert, and they said they had just been serving with her! They had so many amazing things to say about her, and it was fun that they were on our flight back to Salt Lake. 

A senior couple from Ella's mission, on their way home

Michael was feeling better, though he complained about his legs aching. By the middle of the flight though, he seemed to be back to normal and even had some candy (in addition to real food).

We loved this message on our screens once we boarded: "You Made It." Delta, you have no idea. 

Flying home

The flight was uneventful, but very long, and we were exhausted. I can't remember who slept and who didn't, but we didn't put any pressure on anyone to sleep. We figured we would eventually catch up. 

We were so excited when we finally saw things we recognized. We were so beyond ready to be home! 

So excited to see familiar landmarks again

A few months before our trip, Brian found an app that would get us through customs faster, and he decided to try it out. At some point on our flight, he pulled it out and filled out the information. Once we landed, we got off the plane, used the facilities, ran into our neighbors who were on our flight as well, got our luggage, and by passed the long line of people trying to make it through customs, waited for maybe two people in front of us, and then had a quick check-in with a customs official. Two minutes later, we were heading to meet Lea, who kindly picked us up in our van. Our neighbors, who had got into the regular customs line way before we had all our bags together, watched us leave so quickly and texted us to find out how we got out of their so fast. All thanks to Brian. 

By this point, I was feeling terribly. I chalked it up to my heart not being happy about the whole early morning, long flight ordeal, but we think Michael had a bug that he passed to me. Our goal was to stay awake until bedtime, but I was feeling so terribly that I had to go lie down before bedtime. Lea took Brian to his dad's final June Concert in the Park down in Provo after feeding everyone dinner (I had groceries delivered to our house the day before, and my neighbor put them away for us.) 

It was so fun watching our kids find joy in the everyday things of our life here in Utah. They were so excited to see our van, our house, their room, and especially Gracie, whom Chelsea had dropped off at our house earlier that afternoon). They were all so happy to have space, to be in the U.S. and oh so many other things. We had an incredible trip, but there really is no place quite like home.