Day 1 - The Long Flight

The day started with early anticipation of a new adventure. I first woke up at 4:00 AM to make that obligatory trip to the washroom that has become common as more time passes me by. The alarm was set for 6:00 AM, so it was an unwelcomed interruption. Laureen got up at her usual 5:30 AM without missing a beat, jumped in the shower and readied for the day's travel activities. I followed at 6:00 AM where I lingered a little knowing that it would be my last shower at home for 6 weeks.  If you are wondering why I'm noting this, you need to go back to the previous blog post. 

I had brought the suitcases up the night before and placed them in the front room, ready to be loaded in Tim's vehicle for the trip to the airport. I had also brought down my backpack which had been packed the day before and set it with the other items.  As I came down to perform my regular routine, I realized I had not put my mac into the backpack yet, so I grabbed it and dropped it in it's padded location. Crisis one averted and I wasn't even dressed yet. Hopped into my travel clothes and made sure to pack the hearing aid charger which was the one other thing that needed to wait until morning.  Without it, it would be a much quieter trip. 

Tim arrived a little ahead of schedule and loaded the bags into the back of his SUV.  I turned off the water and made sure that all the garbage's were picked up and placed in the big bin in the garage. The last thing one would want upon returning hoe would be to hear the words, "What's that smell?". 

And with that, we were on our way.

It was an uneventful trip out to the airport, except for one small thing.  I had turned off the heated seat rather early, but over the course of the drive, continued to feel like things were heating up a little.  We were about two thirds of the way there when I finally reached for the heater control and noted that it had been set to slightly more than 30 degrees C!  No wonder there were tiny beads of sweat beginning to form on my forehead.  My favorite third daughter-in-law likes it toasty in the vehicle.  Downright tropical is the way I would describe it.  I turned it down to a more manageable 20, and the A/C came on to cool the cabin down.  She'll just have to adjust it back the next time she rides in it.

Tim dropped us off at the Air Canada section of the airport on the newly re-opened departures level. It is not all that different that it was before the closure.  They have blocked off areas close to the terminal with lighted bollards to seemingly protect the building from vehicles.  Other than that, it looks pretty close to the way I remember it. We said our goodbyes and headed for the check-in kiosk to grab our baggage tags and the drop them on the conveyor belt.  Said a short prayer that they would follow us the entire way. Samsung and Apple air tags will help see if that is the case.  I'm writing this first part from the San Francisco airport and they seem to be in the vicinity. Fingers crossed. 

A quick trip through the NEXUS line made light work of making it through security. I wish all the legs were that easy, but I know that there will be locations where I am holding up my pants as I make my way through the scanner/metal detectors. There just has to be a better way in the 21st century. Breakfast was a Chillies and was not only quick, but rather tasty.  I usually shy away from having coffee (decaf) at these places because most of the time it's not worthy of dumping down the floor drain or watering a nearby plant.  Laureen calls me a coffee snob. I say it's just that I know what a good cup of coffee should taste like and what it entails to get one.  I'm really not the Walter White of coffee - I promise. However, I attempted one here and it was…passable. We jumped on the flight and in a short hour and 20 minutes, found ourselves in Vancouver. I think I napped a little.

Edmonton Internaltional Airport

It was a shorter layover, so we just made our way to the gate and found a place to sit until it was our turn to board.  For both the Edmonton to Vancouver and Vancouver to San Francisco flights, we sat in the same spots - 12A and 12C.  And in both instances, we had the middle seat empty.  That was kinda nice.  I've had my share of sitting beside a chatty Kathy or some other reason that delays me from putting in my Jabra earbuds (or the Bose Headphones) and drowning out the noise of flight. 

Travelling to San Francisco

For this leg, the goal was to sleep as much as possible on the two and a half hour flight.  Given how the flights were organized, it was not really possible for us to try and start converting to the 18 hour time difference that we are going to experience when we land in Sydney. So, the compromise is to nap on the San Francisco leg, and then stay up as late as possible while on the 15 hour flight to Australia. We'll probably try and stay awake until about 4 or 5 AM our local time, and then sleep for 6 or 7 hours on the plane.  This should have us awake a few hours before landing, which is scheduled for about 9:30 AM on Thursday.  We are going to skip over Wednesday all together! We both managed to get some sleep on the flight, so this may just workout.  

Upon arrival at SFO, we found a food court and had lunch.  Then there was the long jaunt to the gate where our flight would be departing.  Yes, it was on the complete other side of the airport. Though, the walk did us some good as we will be sitting for quite a while on this next leg of the journey. The layover here is slightly more than 8 hours, and our original plan was to get out of the airport and see some stuff.  Maybe breath a little fresh air. But we decided not to do that and just relax in the airport.  These places are getting to be more like shopping malls as opposed to airports.  I'm not complaining, just making an observation. 

Laureen is sending notes to the grandkids as we travel.  She has brought along a "mommy" that the kids both play a lot with when their at our house.  The Travel Adventures of Mommy.  We noted that mommy must have opened the hand sanitizer during the last flight… so we have no more hand sanitizer, but mommy smells very good and she's very clean.

I downloaded the first 6 episodes of the new Netflix Series "Zero Day", to keep me occupied for the awake hours of the next flight.  I've heard it was good.  I hope what I heard was correct. Laureen brought along a cross stitch that she started on the first leg of the journey today.  I'm not sure if the goal is for it to be done by the time we get home or not, but every time she starts it, she says to me, "Almost done!".

So, now we wait.  The 'fun' part of travelling.  Hopefully the next leg of the journey is as uneventful as the first part.  We want the excitement to start once we get there!

The Torture Waiting Chairs

The picture above is the spot where we parked ourselves for the 8 hour-ish layover in San Francisco. In the later stages of the wait, there was a flight from SFO to Hong Kong which was right beside gate G10 where we were waiting. A very friendly Asian lady noted that we were "still here" as she went by.  Seems she was from Calgary on he way to Hong Kong. Saw pictures of her grandson's piano recital (I wonder what makes people over share with people they don’t even know) and when she went by the second time, she gave us a package of mints that she bought from the Hudson's just down the way in the airport. Like just gave them to us. I guess we just look friendly. And we ARE from Edmonton - so - friendly. 

We boarded our plane and taxied down runways for what seemed like half of an hour before getting that big bird (777) into the sky, just before mid-night SFO time. The flight, which took us from San Francisco, over Hawaii and then a straight shot down to Sydney, contained a few instances of turbulence. One of the instances was enough to have me hanging on to both of the handrails. But what sticks in my mind most about that flight is it's length. I think this was the longest flight we have been on to date - 15.5 hours cramped in a coach seat.  Thankfully, the flight was only half full, so Laureen and I had the 4 seats in our row, all to ourselves. That still isn't really enough room for big people like us. 

Boarded for Sydney, Australia

The goal was to stay up as long as we could in an attempt to "transition" to the Australia time.  I managed to make it to 4:30 AM Pacific time by binging the Netflix series "Zero Day", before the struggle to keep my eyes open began to win out. So I attempted to sleep, but I have never been good at sleeping sitting upright, never mind it being in one of those tight coach seats. So, sleep did come, but it was slight. I would say I got roughly 5 or 6 hours of sleep in total. I'm pretty sure I coveted those "lay-down" seats in the front of the plane a few times.  Laureen tried laying down on the three seats beside us, but that didn't work very well. She also got sleep in a few bursts through the whole 15.5 hour trek. I would write out a few more things about the plane ride, but my brain has already tried to forget it.

We circled a few times before coming in for a landing just due to the large amount of air traffic in the area at the time. We de-planed and made our way through customs.  The Aussies use a electronic method as part of their boarder services. Unfortunately Laureen had issues with the camera portion as it just wouldn't recognize her. Maybe she got less sleep than I did.  I whistled through the e-line and just made my way to the carousel while Laureen had to take a detour through the manual lineup.

Both bags arrived.  This is cause for celebration on it's own!

We also had to be re-routed through the "something to declare" lineup because I had checked off that we had nuts, which were in the trail mix that I had brought along as a snack. The guy at the front of the line looked at our declaration card and asked, "How much do you have?". We replied, "a cup and a half".  He handed us our papers and with a heavy sigh said, "Just exit". Better safe than sorry - especially with customs. 

Stepping out of the airport we could instantly feel the heat.  It was about 25 C - but when you come from winter to this, it seems to feel much warmer, especially with the humidity. We ordered a Uber, and were waved down a special queue that is specifically for Uber pickups. Sort of like the Taxi lineup's back home.  Our Uber driver was quiet most of the way; but that's OK because I think Laureen and I may have fallen asleep for a few minutes as we made our way to the Amora on Jamison downtown. The room we had booked was not quite ready (it was only 10:00 AM), but they offered us an upgrade to a higher floor, larger room and one that WAS ready - which we decided to take.

The Sydney Accomodations

The Sydney Bathroom

The Sydney View (in the direction of the Quay)

We jumped in our swimsuits and headed for the pool to cool off and relax a little.  We made it!  

After the swim, it was back to the room for a quick shower and change into something for warmer weather before heading out to the Sydney Harbour area.  Quite the view.

The Quay With a Cruise Ship Docked

The Harbour Bridge

The Famous Sydney Opera House

After walking around and seeing where some of the places we need to be for a couple of the tours we are taking over the net few days, we first stopped for some frozen yogurt and then went over to the opera house to get a closer look and a few more pictures. We were planning to book a tour of the Sydney Opera House in advance, but we had no idea what shape we would be in when we arrived, so we decided to just wing it.  Turns out there were no available tickets until after we were going to leave Sydney and stay with Margarett and Steve. We'll see if they want to come back in town to do the tour with us. On our way back to the hotel, we scoped out a few potential restaurants for tonight's dinner. Would be cool to eat in view of the opera house and bridge. 

We decided on a nice little Italian place that had a patio out by the harbour and we both had seafood (fish and chips and Calamari). The sun set behind the building and the temperature came down as we finished our meal. Took a quick picture of The Harbour Bridge as we walked back to the hotel for an early turn-in. I'm pretty sure sleep will not be hard to find.

Harbour Bridge at Dusk

Curt & Laureen in Sydney, Australia

PS - Laureen wanted to do something for the grandkids while on this trip. So, we brought a Mommy figure that they both play with at our house and would recognize. Mommy is travelling with us, and we will take photo's of her along the way and then share them in a private chat with our kids to show the grandkids. Here are a few examples: