2004/02 Prom and the Wedding - Outward trip |
|||||
|
|||||
Dear All
Some of these paragraphs and pictures are only available via the family's userids and passwords |
This is the story of over 50 days on the road, about 20 national parks, 30-odd camp sites, thousands of miles, thousands of pictures, and a great trip. It’s also taken nearly 20000 words to tell the story. There isn’t a hope of Microsoft Word coping with anything that large with embedded pictures, so I’m splitting it into three parts:
Part 1 Wilson’s Promenade and Phil and Lynda’s Wedding
Monday Feb 2nd
This year’s big trip to Australia begins with a different twist, as this Monday was the first day of my retirement. Somehow, the Minnesota weather seemed to know this, as the morning of my last day at work on Friday was in the -20s, Fahrenheit. By the Sunday it had warmed up a little but the snow started in late afternoon and by the time we left for the airport there were six inches on the ground with the promise of another foot to come. Christina left in a hurry before we did, more worried about being late for an early morning jazz practice than she was about driving through the snow.
We drove to the airport on back roads, with Michael taking the truck back home, anxious to do some real four-wheel driving through the snow. We found out later that he’d gone off the road twice into the ditch, but had managed to drive out again. The airport was still operating OK but they had to periodically shut the runways so they could plough them clear. Our plane was first de-iced with gallons of orange gunk, and then sprayed with green anti-icing fluid. Then we taxied to the runway just in time for it to be closed for ploughing. If the ploughs couldn’t keep ahead of the snow, then they’d close the runway until later in the day. To everyone’s relief, we were able to take off, just over an hour late.
We were flying on America West, as that’s the cheapest way to get to Los Angeles, but the downside is that nearly all their flights require a plane change in Phoenix, their hub. We grabbed our carryons and sprinted across to the other side of the airport to catch our connecting flight, only to find that it was also stuck somewhere in the great snowstorm back in the Midwest. So we joined the large band of unhappy travelers looking for a plane. Unlike some people who were desperate to get to LA as soon as possible, we still had hours to spare so we didn’t make a fuss, and were given first class seats on a flight about three hours later. So we had lunch in Phoenix, and dinner in LA, and got on the United Airlines flight to Australia just before midnight.
Tuesday February 3rd
This day didn’t really happen at all, as we crossed the Date Line and were suddenly one day further on. I say “suddenly” but the flight over the Pacific is about 14 hours, like crossing the Atlantic twice.
Wednesday February 4th
I think we had about four sets of differing instructions on what we had to do in Sydney, but in the end we just got off the plane, walked through to another terminal with our carryons, and got back onto the same plane to continue to Melbourne. We went through customs and immigration in Melbourne.