I very rarely like the look. In pps's first pic, the drapes are hanging from the ceiling, and no way related to the window. It looks odd to me. I love what she did in the bedroom, where she's given the casing some space, but still kept the curtain rod within the orbit of the window. In jeannine's picture, I can't see the rest of the room, but it looks like the window goes right to the ceiling. I think that's the intent when they cover the wall above the window. But rather than making the room feel taller, it looks like the ceiling is lower. Unless your ceilings are a 12' high and not in portion to the rest of the room, why would you want to make the ceiling look lower? I do like it in Annie's kitchen, though. There are enough other architectural details going on that it's clearly not a low ceiling. And by having the light colour all the way up, instead of a band of orange paint visible, the window actually looks taller.

You want the rods even all around, so wherever you mount the rod above the windows, you want the rod above the door at the same place. Might be easier to measure down so you get them in the same place.

A photo from further back would help but you would need two length of curtain, a fixed set to hang under the bulkhead, then the balance sized to fit up by the ceiling (hospital track?) The will never stack back all the way to the wall as the section under the bulkhead would be decorative only

I have a bank of windows that is 38' feet long. We used conduit pipe and conduit connectors to span the distance. Ours is 1/2" diameter. (Don't remember if that's inside or outside diameter.) Also used curtain rod brackets at each connection joint, plus more, spaced as needed. Combined with "C" rings, so the drapes can clear the brackets. Electrical conduit is available in several sizes in 10' and 20' lengths Clean thoroughly, spray with a bonding primer, and then with Rustoleum in your preferred finish.