Yeah, it leaves around 2pm and arrives in Europe the following day at 10am, hoping I can sleep for 5 hours.
- I prefer a place next to a window. I can put my head on the wall.
- I try not to drink too much. Definitely no coffee or alcohol. Not having to pee will make me sleep longer. Going to a toilet in a plane is difficult.
- Before I go to sleep I read for 1 to 2 hours. I try to avoid something that is exiting to do (playing video games, doing intense difficult programming, ...)
- I take somewhere between 0.5 and 3 mg of melatonine one hour before I want to go to sleep. This helps me getting tired in areas where you have a lot of light.
- I wear earplugs during sleeping.
- I cover myself with as many blankets as possible. It can be cold in airplanes, and getting too cold will wake me up.
Good luck!
I think personally I'd want to finish eating and start to sleep at 8:00pm or so origin time, and hope to get 3-4 hours in. This is basically what I do in flights from the east coast to europe, give or take a couple hours.
For me, I am too big to even consider really sleeping in economy and I try for business class if it's affordable or premium economy for overnight flights. I do drink alcohol, because I think it puts me to sleep faster, and while normally it disrupts my sleep, if I'm only sleeping a few hours me sleep is disrupted anyway so might as well enjoy myself and get to sleep a bit.
That all said, I wish I had a system and the discipline of the parent commentor to be able to deal well with it, I am always exhausted the next day
Going to try the tips above for sure