The flight has landed. The hours of transit has come to an end - or has it? No not quite. This is JFK airport and we are entering the almighty U.S of A. Our flight was a A380 plane holding almost 400. Another flight had arrived before us and a woefully small number of immigration officers are handling the influx.

We wait in line for more than 3 hours. Inching slowly closer we start to get concerned about our next flight. We have been in transit for 30 hours and standing in a queue slowly moving our luggage and ourselves forward in a cattle race is a totally unnecessary extra pain. Breaking ranks I showed a line control officer our onward flight and we were pulled in front, but how fair is that? The queue members behind us are further delayed. USA are by far the worst in our extensive experience, with UK next. 

Finally it is our turn. We have the correct ESTA visa. We have been in and out of USA many times but this makes no difference to the procedure of being photographed, fingerprinted and "grilled" regarding dates and purpose.  

Finally we are through and running to catch our flight to Fort Lauderdale for a couple of nights rest before the cruise adventure.