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Published: February 27th 2011
HE SAID...
The alarm went off as usual at 6am, but this was no ordinary day. We breakfasted on the deck with Oscar and Jasper (our corgi/beagle and kelpie respectively) as the sun rose, and the red dawn sky was as beautiful as it was calming. We had packed and prepared the day before, so the morning went like clockwork, although the time we spent playing with Oscar and Jasper set us back a little. Still, it wasn’t too much of a rush and friends picked us up at 8am and drove us to the airport. We arrived with time to spare - this was a perfect (and very relaxed) start to the long day ahead.
The flight to Melbourne was uneventful until landing, when I accidently knocked an old man’s walking stick out of the overhead locker and it landed on the guy’s head in the seat behind me. We walked to international departures, checked in (great seats) and then met Eva and Roy (Ren’s parents) for lunch. We headed through Customs around 2pm, tried a few perfumes in the duty free section and settled down in the gate lounge to wait for the flight. With a nine hour flight ahead, we couldn’t have managed a more stress-free start to the holiday. We love travelling (or more to the point, we live to travel).
The seats were comfortable, the food was ordinary, the two Thai films we watched were bizarrely entertaining and the wine was plentiful - I love plane travel. The flight was one of the easiest medium hauls we’ve done.
We arrived at the hotel at 10pm (2am our time) after a 40 minute drive from the airport. We’d been up since 6am and travelling since 8am. We were tired and thirsty and ready to crash. It had been a long but great day. We were in Thailand!
SHE SAID...
Regarding the blog heading - I mean ‘Mad’ as in fantastic - not as in angry or nutty (well no nuttier than usual anyway). The domestic component of the flight from Hobart was uneventful and it was really nice to see mum and dad for lunch before we set off on the international leg of the journey. I have immersed myself in music since we left Melbourne’s Tullamarine Airport, and of the very large musical catalogue on board, I surprised myself by picking ‘The Very Best of A-Ha’ to fall asleep to. Before you go judging me though, I have to say that it was very soothing! No I haven’t been drinking...for some reason alcohol at high altitudes messes with my naps. 😊
As well as exploring questionable 80’s music, I’ve been reflecting on our upcoming travels. This being our third Intrepid Travel trip, I think we have established that we like small group travel. Andrew and I were both fully fledged independent travellers before our Intrepid trip in Vietnam in 2009, but when we realised how much we got out of that trip compared to if we had gone it solo - we decided to give it another go on our Italian travels in 2010 and now Thailand too. When we only have limited time to travel, every minute is precious, and while public transport and accommodation is not hard to organise in most countries, organising it efficiently and effectively can be a challenge…we prefer to spend that time and effort deciphering a menu at a local café or perusing a market for goodies. 😉
We have also realised that when travelling in areas where there is a language barrier, we can travel into more remote areas than we may venture into on our own. However my most favourite reason to travel this way is that it eases the burden of constantly being ‘alert’ and enables us to relax and take our surrounds in at a gentler pace. However I am only speaking for small group travel; we are well aware of too-big tour groups and too-loud tourist restaurants where no effort is made to experience or even respect the locality or the locals… and of course even with a maximum group size of 12 people, you get the odd ball or two in the group (apart from us that is). The travel group is usually an amplified microcosm of human behaviour... my favourite types of travellers are the ‘happy-go-lucky’ traveller, the ‘good-for-a-giggle’ traveller, and the ‘eat-drink-up-for-anything’ traveller. I’m not so fond of the ‘too-cool-for-school’ traveller (who coincidently also seems to have footwear issues), and the ‘conservative/obnoxious/insular’ traveller who really should just stay home because apparently nothing ever compares to their own country!
I’ve also been reflecting on how much I enjoy this whole travel blog writing process. Not being too fastidious about writing style (well maybe a little), it’s delightful to just sit with
nemo the netbook and spend time writing about our travel day. It is such a fulfilling and strangely liberating experience. I started the blog for the most part as a reminder of our travel experiences because over time I knew our memories would distort and diminish (read: we have shocking short term memories), and the places we have visited will definitely change too. However we’ve realised that the blog is also serving to keep our family and friends entertained...bonus!
Anyway, I should stop carrying on... I'm all strapped in for my third and possibly final nap for the flight. Andrew has been very attentively making sure I have a juice and a snack handy for in between the naps. I love napping on planes! It has been a dream flight so far, and we would highly recommend the direct Thai Airways flight from Melbourne - even though the food is more average than it used to be and the cabin crew not as friendly. As Andrew mentioned, we’ve taken to watching Thai films lately - if you are interested in unusual storytelling and dramatics that would make Mrs Bucket blush, check out some contemporary Thai cinema if you can. See you in Bangkok people!
P.S in spite of Andrew’s tut-tutting and head-shaking, I’m writing animal themed simile blog headings! But I’m not sure how wide my repertoire in this department is, so please email or comment if you have a better/funnier alliterative-animal-simile heading. 😊
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anonymous
non-member comment
like the heading...corny but funny
Fantastic writing REn. Keep them coming. And what's wrong with A-ha??