Wednesday, 13 February 2008
77 Day: Saturday 8th December: Kings Canyon - Uluru
Once again original record lost and will have to be rewritten later.
76 Day: Friday 7th December: Alice Springs - Kings Canyon
We were changing buses today for one which hopefully has air con that works. After unloading everything onto the grass we set of into Alice. Had to buy our seventh camera simcard and found a photography shop quite easily but gasped at the price, £20 for a 2gb Sandisk. This is £14 more than at 7dayshop.com. Oz is not cheap. Bought yet another hat putting me in brother-in-law John’s class. I now have my Arab headset/ scarf from Istanbul, Afghanistan hat from Bilal in Pakistan, Tibetan from the refuge in Darjeeling India, an Australian baseball and now a white, straw fedora.
To be continued.
To be continued.
75 Day: Thursday 6th December: Daly Water - Alice Springs
The air con in the backpacker room was a complete failure and I regained consciousness in a pool of my own juices. The heat and humidity were unbearable. Much more so than anywhere else we've been to.
The journey to Alice started at 7.30am and it was already causing me to meltdown. Also learned my first important lesson on survival. Went to the loo and as I turned and flushed it a two to three inch long jet black beetle crawled out and fell into the bowl. No problem but it could quite easily have been a Redback. From now on I always lift the toilet seat before sitting.
Within 30 minutes of driving south the scenery changed from tall trees and quite lush terraine to shrubby bushes and arid, semi desert. Hopefully the,however, the humidity levels will fall.
Had a picnic lunch at Mary Ann Dam on route. All went for a swim but the water was smelled of earth like a
Alice was a surprise to me, I expected a cross road with a bar and general store, horses and big rough looking, always fighting, comic book residents. In reality it's a town of 22,000 with modern shops and bars etc. We were camping 20 minutes outside the centre of town on the Stuart Caravan Park, so named because of its' proximity to the Stuart Highway the single road stretching from Darwin to Adelaide some 3800 kilometres . Once again the choice was between swags or small tents. Anne decided to go for the tent and avoid insects round her face. I would have gone for the swag, if I snore half as loud as she says no selfrespecting fly would come near me. We arrived latish and got the tent up in no time, had a power shower (pushed me against the tiles) and set off to tonight’s eating place Bojangles. If it is half as good as Daly Waters we’re in for another treat.
When the bus pulled up outside the bar two monsters held the, saloon type, swing doors open and welcomed us in. The inside carried on with the western theme with long benches, beams and a big wood bar selling stock Oz booze: VB (Victoria Bitter), Carlton Bitter, Castlemmaine XXXX and a light premium beer for drivers. I know Australia is upside down but it really does turn things on its head. For instance a premium light is only just over 2% when a premium in the UK would be a strong beer and money gets smaller according to its value e.g. $2 is the smallest coin, $1 is twice as big and a 50 cents is a big clumsy looking coin something like our 50p. As we sat down a dark bold ugly looking bloke came over and explained the situation. He was going away for a few minutes and then coming back to take the order and all the dishes on the menu were $14. The menu was interesting including Kangaroo, Fish & Chips and Lamb Shank, which was my choice. True to his word he was back in a couple of minutes and asked us all to follow him to a counter where he took the orders, gave us a table buzzer which would sound when the order was ready and asked for the money. When Lucinda, usually one of the first in the queue, said we weren't paying he got really shirty and made his way round the counter to throw all 27 of us out singlehandedly. It was left to me to explain that our leader was paying. This seemed to infuriate him even more and he demanded we brought Leighton to the counter. The food which was ready and waiting, as the buzzer started to vibrate on the wooden table, was better than the night before. My lamb shank was served with well mashed and seasoned potatoes, rich gravy and a salad. Those that had the kangaroo were also impressed. As I started the meal I encountered my first run in with a real Sheila. Anne and myself decided, because the lamb was delicious, to have a glass of Oz Shiraz with it. and as I leaned over the bar to make my order the owner of the three full half pint barrel glasses in front of me and containing something resembling gin or at least clear alcoholic judging by her appearance said 'that's my place'. I should have just moved but instead I explained the situation. My accent immediately provoked a drunken 'where ya from'. My answer didn't help. 'Ya obviously not Australian or ya'd be a gentleman and help me find the green bean I've dropped by the bar'. I was now confronted by a major dilemma. I could play along with her game of taking the piss out of a pomme and letting my tasty lamb go cold or tell her to piss off and cause an ashes type confrontation which I couldn't win. I tried to explain about the food and received another insult about my nationality. I took my head torch from my pocket and shone it at the floor and drew her down 'saying whereabouts did it fall'? Just as she was about to take it one level further the ugly no nonsense barman said to her 'what ya doing?.’ When she explained he said 'piss off back to ya table'. As she walked away carrying the glasses of booz she gave him an I'll get you back for spoiling my fun look, turned to me and said 'thanks for fucking trying'. I rushed back to my lamb feeling I'd been let off lightly thanks to Mr Nononsense man.
Later I went to the toilet. As I pushed the door handle to enter the doot opened from the otherside as some one came out. Once inside the tap in front of me turned the tap on in the next bowl and the hand dryer started the one next to it. I was beginning to see where Sheila was coming from if the ladies were the same. We decided to leave with the coach and finished the night off drinking wine and whiskey on the campsite with Anne and Noreen. All in all, a good day.
The journey to Alice started at 7.30am and it was already causing me to meltdown. Also learned my first important lesson on survival. Went to the loo and as I turned and flushed it a two to three inch long jet black beetle crawled out and fell into the bowl. No problem but it could quite easily have been a Redback. From now on I always lift the toilet seat before sitting.
Within 30 minutes of driving south the scenery changed from tall trees and quite lush terraine to shrubby bushes and arid, semi desert. Hopefully the,however, the humidity levels will fall.
Had a picnic lunch at Mary Ann Dam on route. All went for a swim but the water was smelled of earth like a
Alice was a surprise to me, I expected a cross road with a bar and general store, horses and big rough looking, always fighting, comic book residents. In reality it's a town of 22,000 with modern shops and bars etc. We were camping 20 minutes outside the centre of town on the Stuart Caravan Park, so named because of its' proximity to the Stuart Highway the single road stretching from Darwin to Adelaide some 3800 kilometres . Once again the choice was between swags or small tents. Anne decided to go for the tent and avoid insects round her face. I would have gone for the swag, if I snore half as loud as she says no selfrespecting fly would come near me. We arrived latish and got the tent up in no time, had a power shower (pushed me against the tiles) and set off to tonight’s eating place Bojangles. If it is half as good as Daly Waters we’re in for another treat.
When the bus pulled up outside the bar two monsters held the, saloon type, swing doors open and welcomed us in. The inside carried on with the western theme with long benches, beams and a big wood bar selling stock Oz booze: VB (Victoria Bitter), Carlton Bitter, Castlemmaine XXXX and a light premium beer for drivers. I know Australia is upside down but it really does turn things on its head. For instance a premium light is only just over 2% when a premium in the UK would be a strong beer and money gets smaller according to its value e.g. $2 is the smallest coin, $1 is twice as big and a 50 cents is a big clumsy looking coin something like our 50p. As we sat down a dark bold ugly looking bloke came over and explained the situation. He was going away for a few minutes and then coming back to take the order and all the dishes on the menu were $14. The menu was interesting including Kangaroo, Fish & Chips and Lamb Shank, which was my choice. True to his word he was back in a couple of minutes and asked us all to follow him to a counter where he took the orders, gave us a table buzzer which would sound when the order was ready and asked for the money. When Lucinda, usually one of the first in the queue, said we weren't paying he got really shirty and made his way round the counter to throw all 27 of us out singlehandedly. It was left to me to explain that our leader was paying. This seemed to infuriate him even more and he demanded we brought Leighton to the counter. The food which was ready and waiting, as the buzzer started to vibrate on the wooden table, was better than the night before. My lamb shank was served with well mashed and seasoned potatoes, rich gravy and a salad. Those that had the kangaroo were also impressed. As I started the meal I encountered my first run in with a real Sheila. Anne and myself decided, because the lamb was delicious, to have a glass of Oz Shiraz with it. and as I leaned over the bar to make my order the owner of the three full half pint barrel glasses in front of me and containing something resembling gin or at least clear alcoholic judging by her appearance said 'that's my place'. I should have just moved but instead I explained the situation. My accent immediately provoked a drunken 'where ya from'. My answer didn't help. 'Ya obviously not Australian or ya'd be a gentleman and help me find the green bean I've dropped by the bar'. I was now confronted by a major dilemma. I could play along with her game of taking the piss out of a pomme and letting my tasty lamb go cold or tell her to piss off and cause an ashes type confrontation which I couldn't win. I tried to explain about the food and received another insult about my nationality. I took my head torch from my pocket and shone it at the floor and drew her down 'saying whereabouts did it fall'? Just as she was about to take it one level further the ugly no nonsense barman said to her 'what ya doing?.’ When she explained he said 'piss off back to ya table'. As she walked away carrying the glasses of booz she gave him an I'll get you back for spoiling my fun look, turned to me and said 'thanks for fucking trying'. I rushed back to my lamb feeling I'd been let off lightly thanks to Mr Nononsense man.
Later I went to the toilet. As I pushed the door handle to enter the doot opened from the otherside as some one came out. Once inside the tap in front of me turned the tap on in the next bowl and the hand dryer started the one next to it. I was beginning to see where Sheila was coming from if the ladies were the same. We decided to leave with the coach and finished the night off drinking wine and whiskey on the campsite with Anne and Noreen. All in all, a good day.
74 Day: Wednesday 5th December: Catherine - Daly Waters
we started out early and went canoeing up the Catherine Gorge for three hours with John as my partner. Had a very pleasant relaxing time just paddling up the river until we came to a point in the river where we would have to carry the canoe to continue the next gorge. After a very pleasant hour just swimming in the beautiful clear water we decided to just take our time and head back down at a leisurely pace. Later found out that the river does have freshwater crocodiles. At one point when we were swimming and fooling about Lauren got out of the water saying she had seen a long object swimming not too far away from us and it was obvious she was serious. I have no doubt we had been swimming with crocodiles, all be it, harmless freshwater ones.
Anne, Noreen and Viv went on a helicopter ride up the gorge but were very disssapointed by it. The pilot kept well away from the gorge and too high to see it or us and take any decent photos. A waist of money.
Lunch in Catherine at Subway
Carried on moving south and called in at a spring which was dugout by soldiers as a makeshift swimming pool and, of course, it was then commandeered by the officers for their own use. The pool offered us the first cool water and everyone, plus another group heading from Alice to Darwin, took the opportunity to swim even though there was a warning sign about crocs.
Arrived at 6.30pm at tonight’s stop the Daly Waters pub. The bus slowed down and came to a stop as it approached a set of traffic lights on red. It then turned onto the ground behind the pub and parked. I later found out the traffic lights are always on red, everyone has to stop at Daly Waters. We were camping using swagger bags. The camp area was right behind the pub and after spending a good 30 minutes trying to set our Mosquito net up between a tree and a makeshift pole we retreated to the pub for a meal. The air around here was filled with various flying insects some big enough to be picked up on a radar screen. A flying beetle the size of a piece of anthracite tried to go through my body and both of us finished up on the floor trying to work out what had hit us. It happily crawled off into the scrub while I beat a quick retreat back to the bar.
This was the first pub since leaving England that I would be happy to call my local. The barman was a young man from Bolton who’d been traveling around Australia for 3 months mainly in the west around Perth, which he loved. He did admit that he was missing his mates back home and the dozen or so inhabitants of Daly Waters, although great, hardly made the place a cosmopolitan town like Bol.. don’t be stupid. If the rest of the town’s folk were anything like the ones in the bar then this place could give any large town in the UK a good run for its money. A group playing pool and dressed like cowboys eventually left the bar, as they do every night according to the landlord, to fight. The landlord’s wife just took the opportunity to commandeer the pool table for a winner-takes-all competition which I just happened to win because everyone else who entered were pissed. We were also provided with fancy dress hats and gear to make the competition even more ridiculous and the pool table was by now covered in what I thought were lace flies: an insect with long lace wings which turned out to be termites. The air, the toilets, the showers, indeed everywhere in and around the pub was covered with these harmless but very annoying creatures.
The pub itself beggared belief consisting of a combination of corrugated sheds encircling a central main bar and garden area. The walls and ceilings were covered with various artifacts left by travellers. These consisted of women’s knickers, a thong tree (flip flops), foreign currency, photographs of individuals and groups all pulling faces. The place was a veritable museum of disused machinery and equipment such as saddles sitting astride a pole and boxes of old military communications equipment etc etc etc.
By the time it got to bedtime we decided against sleeping in swag bags, covered with mosquito nets or not. There was just too much animal life about and the kind barman from Bolton put us in one of their backpack rooms outside. I doubt whether I could have found my way the short distance back to the camp.
Anne, Noreen and Viv went on a helicopter ride up the gorge but were very disssapointed by it. The pilot kept well away from the gorge and too high to see it or us and take any decent photos. A waist of money.
Lunch in Catherine at Subway
Carried on moving south and called in at a spring which was dugout by soldiers as a makeshift swimming pool and, of course, it was then commandeered by the officers for their own use. The pool offered us the first cool water and everyone, plus another group heading from Alice to Darwin, took the opportunity to swim even though there was a warning sign about crocs.
Arrived at 6.30pm at tonight’s stop the Daly Waters pub. The bus slowed down and came to a stop as it approached a set of traffic lights on red. It then turned onto the ground behind the pub and parked. I later found out the traffic lights are always on red, everyone has to stop at Daly Waters. We were camping using swagger bags. The camp area was right behind the pub and after spending a good 30 minutes trying to set our Mosquito net up between a tree and a makeshift pole we retreated to the pub for a meal. The air around here was filled with various flying insects some big enough to be picked up on a radar screen. A flying beetle the size of a piece of anthracite tried to go through my body and both of us finished up on the floor trying to work out what had hit us. It happily crawled off into the scrub while I beat a quick retreat back to the bar.
This was the first pub since leaving England that I would be happy to call my local. The barman was a young man from Bolton who’d been traveling around Australia for 3 months mainly in the west around Perth, which he loved. He did admit that he was missing his mates back home and the dozen or so inhabitants of Daly Waters, although great, hardly made the place a cosmopolitan town like Bol.. don’t be stupid. If the rest of the town’s folk were anything like the ones in the bar then this place could give any large town in the UK a good run for its money. A group playing pool and dressed like cowboys eventually left the bar, as they do every night according to the landlord, to fight. The landlord’s wife just took the opportunity to commandeer the pool table for a winner-takes-all competition which I just happened to win because everyone else who entered were pissed. We were also provided with fancy dress hats and gear to make the competition even more ridiculous and the pool table was by now covered in what I thought were lace flies: an insect with long lace wings which turned out to be termites. The air, the toilets, the showers, indeed everywhere in and around the pub was covered with these harmless but very annoying creatures.
The pub itself beggared belief consisting of a combination of corrugated sheds encircling a central main bar and garden area. The walls and ceilings were covered with various artifacts left by travellers. These consisted of women’s knickers, a thong tree (flip flops), foreign currency, photographs of individuals and groups all pulling faces. The place was a veritable museum of disused machinery and equipment such as saddles sitting astride a pole and boxes of old military communications equipment etc etc etc.
By the time it got to bedtime we decided against sleeping in swag bags, covered with mosquito nets or not. There was just too much animal life about and the kind barman from Bolton put us in one of their backpack rooms outside. I doubt whether I could have found my way the short distance back to the camp.
73 Day: Tuesday 4th December: Kakadu Nature Reserve
Unfortunately this record has been lost and I will have to rewrite it when I have time to check out what we did
Saturday, 2 February 2008
72 Day: Monday 3rd December: Darwin -Kakadu Nature Reserve
Not so much a new day but the continuation of the night before. Made a perfect landing at Darwin at 1.30am fulfilling a forty year ambition. At last I was about to know whether my decission not to emmigrate in 1967 for the love of the UK folk scene was good or bad one. As I walked up the tunnel to customs a female airport worker coming down looked up at me and said 'g'day'. The perfect welcome to Oz.
We had heard so many bad stories about trying to get into Oz so even as we stood waiting to be processed we weren't sure of actually being allowed in. As the customs officer looked at both of our passports and the screen she leaned over to the officer next to her and said 'why does it keep saying this?' For a split second I was convinced that Visas4Oz had botched our ETAs. The other officer looked over and said 'it's ok'. We were in!
The Youth Shack Hostel was closed and in darkness when we arrived and as we stood waiting for someone to come and open up the humidity engulfed everything and within a few minutes my body had gone into meltdown. The temperature was a cool 30 degrees and I later found out it was the second hottest night in over thirty years. The humidity which is the real killer was a staggering 89%. Things only got worse when we entered the hostel and our room. I was sharing with three others and no one had thought to switch the air con on. The room must have been in the 100s. Lucky for me the others allocated me the top bunk just under the air con unit which blasted out cold air for the few remaining hours in Darwin.
Out the four of us one went and slept outside by the pool, one lay reading by the light of his torch and John and myself slept and missed breakfast which we were assured by Anne was one of the best ever. Before boarding the bus went with John to get new simcards for our phones and had my first experience of Oz sarcasm. While setting up the account Craig made polite conversation.
'Where ya from mate?'
'England'
'Pity about the cricket team'
I replied 'The gov'ts not much better'.
'Better than the one which sent convicts out to the sand and sun'.
I should have replied pity about your rugby team or words to that effect and given him a run for his money but he caught me off guard, melting still and tired. A g'day and a dig at the English within a couple of hours of landing. I could get to like this place if it ever cools down to just boiling.
When we arrived back at the hostel our new bus with driver and guide Rick was waiting. Although he didn't start having a go at the English he had the same indifference and sense of humour as Craig. Within twenty minutes he'd given us the itinerary for the next couple of days and did it in a way that convinced everyone it would happen. No bullshit! His presentation ended to general applause and I think he was surprised by it.
Within an hour or so we were fulfilling the first event watching crocodiles jumping for food. No sooner had the boat left the river quay than the first croc made for it. As the lump of meat dangled over its head it carefully and slowly positioned itself and then lifted a good third of its body out of the water snapping at the bait. After a couple more attempts he was allowed to grab the meat and our attention was drawn to croc two on the other side of the boat.
Our attention was being drawn to each new croc by the none stop Ben Elton type talking captain.
'Who they're mean ladies and gentlemen.
Pure killing machine ladies and gentlemen'.
And they'll eat you ladies and gentlemen if you given em the chance.
'And when it's hot and sticky like today and your by a welcoming cool looking pool of water you'll given em the chance'.
'There everywhere ladies .... and so on and so on'.
Intermindled with all this showmanship blurb he also gave us the statistics how crocs were hunted to extinction, before being protected for the past 30 years. They will only eat something smaller than its' own body size and are only now again reaching the size of mankillers. Every year more people are being attacked and this will increase as the crocs getter bigger. They live a similar age to humans and grow at the same rate. Most of the specimens we encountered were, according to the voice, about 3 metres long and would kill given the chance when hungry. Much of his comments were intended as a serious warning to people not to swim if the sign says not to.
'Whoo and you will ladies ...' and so on etc. Why would anyone be stupid enough to swim with crocodiles?
After the hour feeding the crocs we were entertained by two beautiful three to four foot long water pythons who didn't seem to mind being wrapped round people's necks etc. We were told to go and wash our hands, arms etc if we had sun tan lotion on.
We had heard so many bad stories about trying to get into Oz so even as we stood waiting to be processed we weren't sure of actually being allowed in. As the customs officer looked at both of our passports and the screen she leaned over to the officer next to her and said 'why does it keep saying this?' For a split second I was convinced that Visas4Oz had botched our ETAs. The other officer looked over and said 'it's ok'. We were in!
The Youth Shack Hostel was closed and in darkness when we arrived and as we stood waiting for someone to come and open up the humidity engulfed everything and within a few minutes my body had gone into meltdown. The temperature was a cool 30 degrees and I later found out it was the second hottest night in over thirty years. The humidity which is the real killer was a staggering 89%. Things only got worse when we entered the hostel and our room. I was sharing with three others and no one had thought to switch the air con on. The room must have been in the 100s. Lucky for me the others allocated me the top bunk just under the air con unit which blasted out cold air for the few remaining hours in Darwin.
Out the four of us one went and slept outside by the pool, one lay reading by the light of his torch and John and myself slept and missed breakfast which we were assured by Anne was one of the best ever. Before boarding the bus went with John to get new simcards for our phones and had my first experience of Oz sarcasm. While setting up the account Craig made polite conversation.
'Where ya from mate?'
'England'
'Pity about the cricket team'
I replied 'The gov'ts not much better'.
'Better than the one which sent convicts out to the sand and sun'.
I should have replied pity about your rugby team or words to that effect and given him a run for his money but he caught me off guard, melting still and tired. A g'day and a dig at the English within a couple of hours of landing. I could get to like this place if it ever cools down to just boiling.
When we arrived back at the hostel our new bus with driver and guide Rick was waiting. Although he didn't start having a go at the English he had the same indifference and sense of humour as Craig. Within twenty minutes he'd given us the itinerary for the next couple of days and did it in a way that convinced everyone it would happen. No bullshit! His presentation ended to general applause and I think he was surprised by it.
Within an hour or so we were fulfilling the first event watching crocodiles jumping for food. No sooner had the boat left the river quay than the first croc made for it. As the lump of meat dangled over its head it carefully and slowly positioned itself and then lifted a good third of its body out of the water snapping at the bait. After a couple more attempts he was allowed to grab the meat and our attention was drawn to croc two on the other side of the boat.
Our attention was being drawn to each new croc by the none stop Ben Elton type talking captain.
'Who they're mean ladies and gentlemen.
Pure killing machine ladies and gentlemen'.
And they'll eat you ladies and gentlemen if you given em the chance.
'And when it's hot and sticky like today and your by a welcoming cool looking pool of water you'll given em the chance'.
'There everywhere ladies .... and so on and so on'.
Intermindled with all this showmanship blurb he also gave us the statistics how crocs were hunted to extinction, before being protected for the past 30 years. They will only eat something smaller than its' own body size and are only now again reaching the size of mankillers. Every year more people are being attacked and this will increase as the crocs getter bigger. They live a similar age to humans and grow at the same rate. Most of the specimens we encountered were, according to the voice, about 3 metres long and would kill given the chance when hungry. Much of his comments were intended as a serious warning to people not to swim if the sign says not to.
'Whoo and you will ladies ...' and so on etc. Why would anyone be stupid enough to swim with crocodiles?
After the hour feeding the crocs we were entertained by two beautiful three to four foot long water pythons who didn't seem to mind being wrapped round people's necks etc. We were told to go and wash our hands, arms etc if we had sun tan lotion on.
71 Day: Sunday 2nd December: Bali - Darwin and the final country Australia.
Went for breakfast but settled for a couple of pieces of fruit and a cold cup of tea. We considered hiring a car to go and see the paddy fields but had no idea of where to go and we had a deadline to meet of 6.15pm to leave for the plane. The tourist information offices (on every corner) didn't even have maps of the area we were staying in and just tried to sell trips which all started in the early morning (which we'd missed being in bed) and mainly included fishing, boat trips out to sea and a zoo that Lonely Planet calls disgraceful because of the condition of the animals.
I finished up spending two and half hours in an internet café whilst Anne packed for Australia. A complete waist of valuable time. We were dragged to Bali in the dark after a wonderful time on Mt Bromo and the time, we'd supposedly made up by flying, (Calcutta) was once again cut down. The original itinerary had us flying from East Timor and God only knows when we'd had got there.
Most people were assmbled at the hotel reception when we got there having decided also to give the day up to travelling. The journey to the airport went smoothly and we arrived to miss what looked like a spectacular sunset. I was very pleased and relieved to find out we were flying with Quantas and not Garuda. Mark told me Garuda have been banned from Europe for failing safety checks and neglecting maintance. It took Quantas an hour to check us in and slid into a bit of farce. The security was OTT, had my bags checked three times before we got to check in. We were then frisked again before boarding over twenty minutes late. Our plain was very new with leather seats and neck supports that could be moulded around your neck but was considerablely smaller than the Garuda Boeing standing by its' side and as much as I looked I couldn't find the familiar Quantas symbol. Instead it said Air North which I later found out is Quantas' short haul company. As I sat down I heard Alex telling Barry that one of the cabin staff had told him we were flying through a storm even though Noreen had seen the weather only the day before online and confirmed good conditions. I found out later they were winding me up, the bastards. The actual flight was brilliant and even though 9.30 Bali time became 11.30pm once on the plane we were served food and drinks. We were offered a choice of chicken, beef or veg pies, cheese and biscuits washed down with Jacobs Creek and the very kind air hostess gave me a second bottle. This was a good way to leave the Orient.
I finished up spending two and half hours in an internet café whilst Anne packed for Australia. A complete waist of valuable time. We were dragged to Bali in the dark after a wonderful time on Mt Bromo and the time, we'd supposedly made up by flying, (Calcutta) was once again cut down. The original itinerary had us flying from East Timor and God only knows when we'd had got there.
Most people were assmbled at the hotel reception when we got there having decided also to give the day up to travelling. The journey to the airport went smoothly and we arrived to miss what looked like a spectacular sunset. I was very pleased and relieved to find out we were flying with Quantas and not Garuda. Mark told me Garuda have been banned from Europe for failing safety checks and neglecting maintance. It took Quantas an hour to check us in and slid into a bit of farce. The security was OTT, had my bags checked three times before we got to check in. We were then frisked again before boarding over twenty minutes late. Our plain was very new with leather seats and neck supports that could be moulded around your neck but was considerablely smaller than the Garuda Boeing standing by its' side and as much as I looked I couldn't find the familiar Quantas symbol. Instead it said Air North which I later found out is Quantas' short haul company. As I sat down I heard Alex telling Barry that one of the cabin staff had told him we were flying through a storm even though Noreen had seen the weather only the day before online and confirmed good conditions. I found out later they were winding me up, the bastards. The actual flight was brilliant and even though 9.30 Bali time became 11.30pm once on the plane we were served food and drinks. We were offered a choice of chicken, beef or veg pies, cheese and biscuits washed down with Jacobs Creek and the very kind air hostess gave me a second bottle. This was a good way to leave the Orient.
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