Forty Two Years!!

Not sure what to say about today! For our 42nd wedding anniversary many things did not go too well!

We went off to get breakfast, then returned to the hotel to finish packing. We had booked a shuttle van to the airport and it picked us up right on time, that was the end of the good vibes for a while.

When we arrived at Sydney Airport I discovered that all that was left of my FitBit was the strap…. the electronics element had disappeared. A quick call to the hotel set the search process in motion but unfortunately nothing was found. I have since discovered how it happened. When putting the backpack on the strap rubs against my left wrist and rotates the FitBit bracelet allowing the element to pop out.

We checked in for the flight and hit the lounge for an hour or so, then headed off to the gate. At boarding time a whole slew of people came through the gate from the wrong direction; our plane had only just arrived. The ground crew must have been on their toes as I think they had the aircraft turned around in less than 20 minutes. On board we found that there were 3 children under the age of  3 in the business class cabin of 12 seats. Luckily they quietened down as time progressed.

Just as we thought QANTAS had done a great job of mitigating the delay there was an announcement that one of the passengers had decided not fly, this meant all the bags had to be taken off and the offending passengers bags retrieved. We finally got airborne about 1 hour late. For a flight of just over 1 hour a meal service was provided throughout the aircraft, none of this Buy on Board stuff that Air Canada offers on flights over 3 hours. Very impressive!

We arrived in a very warm (30C  / 85F) Brisbane. We picked up our rental car and started to set up the GPS we had brought with us. We plugged in the address and the GPS politely informed us it couldn’t find it. Double and treble checked the address but the GPS wouldn’t play. A quick check of the car revealed it too had a GPS, unfortunately it would only tell us our LAT/LON and how many satellites it was receiving. Finally tried the phone, no problem, we were on our way.

We found our  apartment and decided our luck had changed, it was excellent! The owners had left the fridge stocked with goodies for breakfast as well as coffee and milk. Not only that, they had left us a bottle of wine for our wedding anniversary!

Once we had settled in Lyn switched her notebook on, nothing! We thought the battery had run too low so plugged in the charger. Still no life. Tried many things but no effect, it seemed as though no power was getting to the notebook, but without a voltmeter it was hard to tell In desperation I tried the well tested tongue across the power wires trick, no power. Now to try and find a replacement power supply.

We have no real plans for Brisbane, the main reason we stopped here for a couple of nights was because I hooked up with a cousin from the UK who now lives here. When I contacted him he seemed pleased with the idea of meeting up, but despite a number of e-Mails I heard no more from him.

That’s enough first world  doom and gloom for today, it’s time for dinner.