Cape Town to Darwin

We've been back for a month already from our trip to Australia (which was a present from my super generous parents) ... although it feels like much longer ago ... funny how that is.  You spend months looking forward to it and planning, and then suddenly you are there and time is going so fast and then you are back and it feels like it was all just a dream.

Luckily I have about 5000 pictures to remember my trip by.*

Nit-nit was our mascot for our trip - since Conan** is to big to bring

The drama started early into our trip - with so much trouble checking in to our flight.  Flying is uncomfortable enough, but not being able to secure my window seat was not making me happy.  If there is one thing that I know - being able to put your head against the window to sleep is the best way to get through a long flight. Luckily, when we got to Johannesburg, we found out that I did have a window seat, and we had 3 seats to ourselves for the flight (yay- stretching out).

We met up with a friend of Anton's for drinks at Johannesburg Airport - a friend he hadn't seen in a long time.  We were told that we had to clear passport control by 5pm, however, at 16h55, the friend insisted on "just one more drink" - eventually we convinced him to let us go, only to reach passport control and find the longest queue ever.  They should really think about making an extra queue for people who are running late - an express queue. 

The notorious meeting at Johannesburg Airport

I do love the window seat

So there we are, standing in this long queue, watching the minutes tick by, the queue next to us seeming to move so much faster, stressing about the plane leaving without us. "We're not late until they call our names over the intercom," I insisted, although we could barely hear the intercom where we were anyway.  We were both wondering what the procedure was if you missed your flight ... when would the next flight be, how much would it cost us, what would my parents say ... it was the longest and most stressful queue I have ever been in.

Eventually we made it to the front of the queue and the gentleman let us through after what seemed like an eternity of studying my passport.  

Ofcourse, this is Johannesburg Airport, and the boarding gates are about 10 - 20 minutes walk from passport control.  We rushed as fast as we could, me checking my watch every 30 seconds, Anton urging me to keep up, both of us stressed every time we heard the intercom.

In the end, we reached our gate just as they were making the final boarding call - so we weren't THAT late after all.  

And then we commenced our 12-hour flight to Sydney, which was probably one of the most uncomfortable flights I have ever been on.  No matter how I tried to stretch out, I couldn't get comfortable, the air was so hot and stuffy that I kept convincing myself we were out of fresh air, and the sleeping tablets I took only made me feel tired, not sleepy.  

Nit-nit with his adventure pack from Qantas and his Ebola safety card

We did finally make it in one piece, and we were lucky enough to get passes to the Qantas lounge (also courtesy of my parents) so I at least got to have a hot shower while we waited for our next flight.

At the Qantas lounge

We still had one more flight to make, but I think both of us were so over travelling at this point ... 5 more hours on a plane felt like a lifetime.  I managed to get some sleep on this flight at least, even after we landed while taxiing the runway, I slept like a baby.  Luckily Anton was there to wake me up or I might have been left on the plane.

And then finally we were there, in Darwin, with my parents...

Arriving at Darwin Airport

At Darwin Airport

*Remember a time before digital cameras, when you had to be so selective about how many pictures you could take - only 24 per film, and then you had to develop them and hope that they all came out nicely.

** If you need a reminder of who Conan is ... click here