s07e01 - 'In the Beginning'

Finally, after what seems like an etrnity, Im away. Not entirely away just yet, but 1500kms away from home is a pretty solid start.

My flight to Sydney wasnt a half bad one actually. It was the first one Ive had where Ive flown directly rather than stopping off in Dubbo on the way. It was also made a little easier when I was sat next to pretty like minded fellow who enjoyed talking gadgets and tech stuff almost as much as I do. Although he was kinda the polar opposite to me as he loved his apple products and Sony gameing consoles ... but no matter, the conversation, as captive as can be inside a small flying shell was none the less engageing.

It was a pleasent change to the day actually, and while I wont say that the first half of my day was disagreable or anything, but when youve only had 4 hours sleep and have a reasonably large event happening later in the afternoon, the last thing you need is to be tricked into attending a full Sunday church service, which just so happens to be the first I have ever been to ... and with just a little luck, my last.

It was my mates daughters christening, so I wasnt about to miss it, but the experience was .... well, not exactly for me. Thats as nice as I can put it without making it sound like I was banashed to a place of "much weeping and gnashing of teeth".

Organised religeions wierd me out .... and I guess they wierded Tom, who was sitting next to me out too as after a while he just zoned out and to pass the time started substituting the words "almighty" for "the force" and "satan" for "Darth Vader". Yeah, it was a little creepy, but then again, not as creepy as the choir!

Anyway, moving on to later in the day and Ive finally planted myself in my hotel down here at Darling Harbor about 100m away from the monorail and with easy access to everything that is downtown Sydney, something that I plan to check out on my day off between leaving home and flying abroad.

Not an overly interesting start to the vacation, thats for sure, but nothing is ever going to beat the last one (for those that came late, it included stomach cramps on the plane, a flat laptop battery and an ATM card that wouldnt work ... all in a space of about 2 hours in LA)

Next post will probably come in from the other side of the world ... when that'll be is a bit of a mystery as I still have a 13 and a half hour direct flight ahead of me and then probably a 45 minute taxi ride to my hotel after that, not to mention whatever is left over from today and tomorrow before my flight.

Prologue 1: 10 days to go

Where are the days going?

I'd like to say that I am super excited about my upcoming vacation to the other side of the world, but at the moment, I'm more gripped with fear than anything. Not because I'm worried about being so far away from home or anything, Ive been and done this almost a million times already (slight exaggeration but not too far off the mark) but in the next ten days I have to gather my stuff and be ready to jump on that plane on Sunday week with everything I need to survive out there till mid January.

There are a few dozen printouts that need to be made, winter clothes need to be dredged out, my Passport needs to be located, adapters need to be packed .... it really shouldn't be too tough, but then you look at next weeks schedule, which is kinda terrifying.
I won't go into it fully, but there's a chance I'll be packed and ready to go by Thursday next week because there won't be enough time to scratch on the weekend before I fly out.

The AUD is a constant worry at the minute too. I know there isn't a single thing I can do about it, but I can't help but check it every couple of hours. I gotta stop doing that 'cause all it's doing is adding to the stress levels (currently 1USD = 0.6887AUD)

As for this page .... I decided to jump off mySpace for this trip and try something completely different, although I will try and upload some gear back to it later, all the fresh stuff will end up here (as long as I can remember the username and password for this one ... I forgot the last blogspot one)

The itinerary will be up soon ..... watch this space ....