The Quirks of Travel

Rain Rain go away. It's raining yet again as we
leave the YMCA. I've discovered that even though
we have new packs, I can't everything in it. At
least not so I won't fall over backwards while trying
to put it on my back. I hate this part...schlepping
all my stuff out of the car, standing in line and then
having this "matter-of-fact" Air New Zealand person
tell us that we would only be able to take 1 bag each
of only 20 kg. Not good since we have a third bag with
all of our winter clothes for Europe. Luckily a pleasant
guardian angel checked us in and not only was she pleasant,
didn't charge us for the extra bag weight. Yea! After
Lynn discovered she left her Antarctic sweatshirt in the
terminal (she got it back) we were goined by Cindy who we
wintered with and NSF Erick who doesn't know us so we
didn't chat. I was sandwiched by a couple with 3 small
children who couldn't have behaved better. Hooray! We
last visited Sydney's airport in 2003 and I really don't
remember anything about it. We had some great unon noodles
breakfast/lunch and took photos of Bruno with some
boomerangs. We boarded our flight for Bangkok and Thai
Air is the best airline in the world. In shades of Fuscia,
Violet and Sunflower, the interior was very cool, lots of
room fantastic flight attendants plus a movie system that
lets you rewind and pause. We arrived in Bankok and I was
really surprised by the amount of English used in the
airport and in the city in general. Written Thai is
impossible for the average westerner to decipher. Very
polite people and Sawadee Krop and Swadee Kah (sp?) are
the norm. No problems getting our bags but wer almost
immediately hit by men wanting to take us away in a taxi.
Of course my first lesson in getting gouged happended when
we spent way too much getting to our hotel. After what
seemed like a frantic ride in a Volvo, we made it to the
"Grand In Come" hotel. I had the feeling it was once a
very busy hotel but no longer...hmmm. They gave us some
kind of orange drink in champagne glasses when we arrived
and lots of Sawaddes. Som strange drop-off leading into
the bathroom greeted us but after hours of traveling, we
were in bed at 8:00.