Emily Scarratt's blog as England Women fly to Atlanta for World Rugby Women’s Sevens Series

It was an early start this morning, travel days are always the worst! We meet at our training base in Guildford before heading off to the airport for the fourth leg on our World Rugby HSBC Women’s Sevens Series, this time in Atlanta.

Travelling as part of a national team is not like any other travel; you generally have no idea what time you actually fly, which terminal you are flying out of, or indeed even which airport. The logistics are all handled, all you have to do is pack…

My two housemates (Natasha 'Mo' Hunt and Katy McLean) and I have been involved within England squads for on average about eight years; so you would think this would mean we are well versed at the obligatory packing process. But if you had entered any of our three rooms last night you would have thought we had either been burgled or someone had played a practical joke and removed all our clothes and scattered them on the bed.

Katy went for the mini pile approach, and spent over an hour arranging her things into bitesize collections and then proceeded to place them into numerous mini bags within her big bag.

Mo organised her toiletries in a military size descending line across her chest of drawers for absolutely no purpose whatsoever. She is also hopeless at making any form of decision for herself and so would appear at your doorway every five minutes and slope in to see how much of everything you have packed… She's 27!!

I, however was in the biggest predicament, and gathered the others for a house decision… which trainers should I take with me?

Arriving at the airport is where the real fun starts. Firstly we travel with an unreal amount of additional bags; kit, medical stuff, cameras, food, and what seems like the kitchen sink! There's always a few that have over packed and try and sneak a few of their personal things into the team bags, fair game unless our manager catches you! Check-in this trip was a good one…

Claire Allan, team joker and normally one of the most organised had had a mare [see pic]! To travel into America you have to apply for an ESTA, essentially a Visa that approves your travel. So we had been given weeks to either update our existing one or apply for one, and Claire decided so leave it until last night!

This is normally no trouble at all, unless you put all of your details (including your card) into a fake ESTA site. Former police officer Claire and our manager Zoe Eaton were then holding up the check-in queue, finding the correct website, cancelling cards and actually getting a legitimate ESTA. Needless to say we cut her loose at check in, for rugby players breakfast and food often out prioritise all else!

Walking through the airport and onto the plane is always quite amusing. When we board, most people are sat down and they cannot help but gawp and whisper to one another as we're all in matching kit slowly making our way to our seats at the back. You can tell that people want to ask, but often wait to pick us off when we're alone stretching at the back, waiting for the toilet or some will just lean right into your seat and ask 'so what team are you then?'.

There begins the conversation; where we're playing, who we're playing, will we win, etc, etc. The length of the conversation is often dictated by which member of the squad has been asked and how much sleep they've had.

As I finish writing this the team is spread about the plane watching films, doing analysis, stretching or trying to avoid our physio and catch a quick nap. A subdued travel mood currently but one that will build all week through training and hopefully hit the ground running come Friday and our first game against current series leaders Australia.