Saturday, March 24th, 2012: Melbourne Airport
Bob: Suddenly it was Saturday and we were arriving at Melbourne airport around 11 a.m. We were both fagged out after our flying marathon, but stayed coherent as we dragged through immigration and customs. That is particularly important when answering even such simple questions as "Why are you visiting Australia?". Under normal conditions I can easily explain about our friends in Australia and places we want to see next. But when utterly exhausted, I have to repress flippant rejoinders such as, "Not sure, mate, but it seemed like a good idea at the time!" I know by experience that immigration officers do not generally have a sense of humor and it behooves me to keep any levity under control.. We stumbled out of the terminal into the bright sunlight, blinking like owls awakened during the day. We turned left to try to walk to our hotel on the airport access road as I was not up to driving at all, and especially not in a strange rental car on the wrong side of the road! Fortunately, my memory for the layout of Melbourne airport had been correct and we could just pull our wheelies from the Terminal entrance along a sidewalk to the same Formule 1 hotel we had used at the tail end of Wanderung 22. The hotel had a felicitous location as a McDonald's was just around the corner, so we could have a quick snack there and then stretch out for a nap. After a day cramped in economy-class seats, it was SUCH a luxury to just be able to stretch out flat on my back and take a nap! |
Monika: After 15 hours of flight we finally arrived in Sydney where we had to get off the plane, walk over to a different gate and get back onto the plane. Unfortunately, between the two gates was a security checkpoint and there they wanted to check my purse. Now for this trip, I had bought a small suitcase as carry-on luggage and a large purse to go with it. This purse contained books, crocheting yarn and needle, my toiletry bag, and in four or five little pockets sundry other things. The nice security officer was definitely looking for something specific while he was going through everything. He finally told me that he was looking for scissors. Now I had checked carefully on the web, that in the US scissors under 4 inches were quite legal and so I had brought a small pair of scissors. However, in Australia, not even these little scissors were allowed. After sending the half empty purse again through the scanner, he finally found the scissors in one of the little pockets and confiscated them. Sigh. The flight from Sydney to Melbourne was only an hour. It was the same plane that had taken us across the Pacific and we enjoyed again having all that leg room. But finally we landed in Melbourne after about 30 hours of travel of which 22 hours were in the air. It was now suddenly about noon on Saturday --- and what happened to poor old Friday??? We had decided to spend the first day quietly recuperating at the airport. I had made reservations at the Formule 1 hotel, where we had stayed on our last trip when we had left from Melbourne. The hotel was only a 5 to 10 minute walk from the terminal along a nice pedestrian walk with traffic lights for crossing streets. The Formule 1 chain is a no-nonsense cheap chain. The rooms are small but the bed was comfortable and it had a nice hot shower. I made use of the latter immediately since I could not stand myself. But after a shower and a change of clothes, we decided to find some food before settling for a nap. McDonalds was just around the corner and there was also a place for sandwiches. We each had a ham and cheese sandwich, then came back to the hotel for the highly anticipated nap. |
Bob: Waking up three and a half hours later was, however, quite difficult as my body clearly wanted to just keep on napping. But that's no way to reset your internal clock, so we both dragged ourselves back out of bed and walked back to the terminal to find some decent dinner options. We had a bottle of Coke with our dinner and I brought back the empty bottle to our room. I had brought with a juice bottle top from our trip to Belize and a "Bottle Bandit"; O-ring and carabiner from the USA, and I was hoping that I could combine them both with the Australian Coke bottle to make a water bottle for our trip. The gods of Industrial Standardization were with me, because all the pieces from three different continents fit together perfectly! |
Monika: I woke up after 2 hours and started reading. After 3 1/2 hours Bob opened one eye. I decided, I better keep him awake, since by now it was after 5PM, to help re-adjust our body clocks. So we walked over to the terminal for some dinner. Upstairs past the departure area they had an assortment of stores and food. On the floor at one point was a beautiful mosaic with what looked like aboriginal depiction of sea creatures. But it was amazing how many different food places there were, from American staples like Subway and Burger King, to others we had never heard of. We settled at a place called Healthy Bite were we had a small roll with egg salad. Very yummy and just the right amount. |
Bob: After dinner, we continued walking along the Terminal access road as it curled around, and we ultimately found we could make a complete circle back to our hotel. It was nice, although strange, to be back in Australia. As we noted during Wanderungs 20 and 22, the trees are different, the birds are different, the traffic is different, and the folks speak an Australian version of English rather than the American version of English we are used to. So despite being an English culture and having many things in common with both the US and Great Britain, Australia feels like a very distinct and exotic place to us. Our brief walk was refreshing and we kept awake a while longer reading, but collapsed again around 8:30. Although on the whole we had a good, long night's sleep, as typically happens when we cross many time zones, we each awakened at odd times of the night. I was awake from 4 a.m. to 5 a.m. as I recall, but then slept in again until 8 a.m. or so. |
Monika: No longer hungry, we decided to take the long way back to the hotel, since the pedestrian walkway makes a loop from the terminal around the parking garage past the Holiday Inn and the Formule 1 hotel. Back in our hotel we read a little bit more, but then decided to get a good night’s sleep. |
| 3Prolog |
| Next Day4 |
| Index |
| Prolog | Map of Drive in Australia | Map of Transpacific Cruise | Epilog |
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