Sunday - Getting there

Like our European trip blog, this is as much an aide de memoir as a blog for family & friends.  I only re-read our European trip notes the other night & was surprised at how much I had forgotten.

We knew we had to be up at 4:30 am to catch our plane, so of course woke at 4.  It was going to be a long day!  The trip to Sydney was uneventful, though I started reading Steve Waugh’s latest book, The meaning of luck – given to me by my boys for Father’s Day.  The first few chapters are about Steve’s wife Lynette’s stroke & near death while he was out of town on a book signing tour & then the story of her recovery.  I ended up in tears – not what I’d expected from the book.  But it is truly worth reading.  I will get back to reading it, but if it stays this intense it will be read in small doses.

(What has compelled me to do this blog thing again is partly how much the notes from Europe reminded me of things I had forgotten, but also Steve Waugh’s book quotes a Chinese proverb saying “The faintest ink is more powerful than the strongest memory”.  i.e. Things written at the time of the event – no matter how brief, are more accurate than recall of events much later, no matter how good we think our memory is.)

We knew we had a few hours stop over in Sydney, so arranged to catch up with Lainie & Glen for brunch, which was great.  We had a lovely couple of hours over brunch talking about all things Sydney before they had to go off to a Father’s Day event with Glen’s family.  And I got another book to read as a present from Lainie & Glen – the latest Reacher novel – only out on Thursday & a Grand Designs DVD – so good.

Our plane was delayed by an hour – no big deal.  It was also oversold, so every seat was occupied.  And they were clear about keeping families together, so couples like us were lucky if we got to sit together.  And wow – were there kids – young kids & seemingly they were 50% of the passengers.  The plane was a very old 747 & was stuffy & hot for the entire flight.  But no big deal – its only about a 4 hour flight.  I spent most of it ploughing through my new Reacher novel.

We’d arranged a hotel transfer, so ended up on a bus in the dark on our way to the Sofitel.  We checked in & got to our room, but had no sense of our surroundings, so had to wait til the morning.  We ordered room service & fell into bed at 10pm local time (7:30 home time!) & slept til morning – right through until 10am – missing breakfast – no big deal.