I’m currently in the Sydney business lounge, which isn’t super unusual for this blog, but what makes it strange is that I’m here after my flight (and I don’t have an ongoing connection). I’m here for the FPS finals, and domestic FPS travel generally doesn’t warrant a blog post. However, I had a new experience today so I thought I’d commemorate it here.
No issues at the airport, straight though security, lounge coffee etc. I boarded my flight and was pleased with the extra leg room seat (18C) I managed to get on the new A321. I got connected to the inflight wifi and was watching JAG. The people sitting next to me arrived and I continued watching. The captain came on and said air traffic control has given us a 9.30 departure slot (delayed by 30 mins). The guy next to me said he needed the toilet and disappeared. He was gone for quite a while and the lady with him kept looking behind her. By this time I’m watching NCIS as the connection to my server was a bit slow and JAG was lagging. The the customer service manager came to me and asked if I could bring my iPad and come up the front to talk to him, he wanted me to bring my bag too…
I was a bit confused and had no idea what was happening. We got to the front and he asked me to step off the plane onto the air bridge. There were two or three other flight attendants with him. He explained that the person next to me was concerned about what I was looking at on my iPad because they had seen a picture of fuselage and a bomb. He asked if I could explain and I said that I was watching a TV show, NCIS. He asked if I could rewind and show him the part in question. At this point a manager of some sort from Perth Airport arrived and the qantas person filled him in.
The internet was very good so we went back to the terminal which didn’t help much. I finally managed to hotspot to my phone after I took it out of my pocket and put it on the counter. I showed them the explosion scene from NCIS but that wasn’t it, apparently there was a bomb scene. I then remembered that there was a bomb in JAG so I brought that up – it was a digram of a submarine with a scene showing bomb armed. After they viewed that it was fine. They apologised but said they hoped I understood that they had to take security threats seriously and presumably I would want the same to happen. I agreed but I was still feeling a bit uneasy and confused.
As we walked back to the plane the CSM said they had a spare seat and they might move me there so I wouldn’t be hassled by the people who ‘reported’ me. I commented that I was in 18C which was extra leg room but he said that this seat was at the front of economy and I’d be very happy with it. I said I was happy to sit wherever he wanted me. I ended up in 6D which is a good seat! I didn’t have my larger carry on case but the attendant said she’d move it once the flight was underway.
Unfortunately, the saga didn’t end there. By this point it was after the allocated departure time (I think I caused that delay!) and they announced the doors were closed and it was time to turn your devices to flight mode. I reacted for my phone, but it wasn’t there. Then I remember, I took it out of my pocket to get better signal to show them the video. It was still in the terminal. I rang the call bell and frantically waved and got the attention of flight attendants. They made some calls, but then there was the announcement to arm the doors and we took off.
I can’t remember if it was just before we took off, or after but the CSM came and told be they couldn’t get my phone, there wasn’t time if we would be able to make our take off slot. He said the captain was talking to Perth and he’d give me updates. He spoke to me a couple more time and after expressing my need for my phone he ensured they would help me in Sydney. He told me I should move my bigger case from above 18C and he would help me find space if needed. He said he would get off the plane with me to take me to someone who could help out. The rest of the flight was fine, but I only had a bout 3 mouthfuls of food and didn’t really get any work done as I was still a bit frazzled and put off. The in flight wifi wasn’t great today, it was fairly patchy.
When the flight landed I got off and the CSM introduced me to a guy at the end of the airbridge who said he would look after me. He explained that my phone was on the next flight to Sydney and would be here about 6.30. Did I want to wait for it or did I want me to try and get it to me. He said that I was welcome to wait in the lounge. I said that would be good, but I would need to call the car rental company to let them know I would be late. This guy said that would be fine and then waved over a supervisor, Danielle and handed me off to her. He asked her to take me to the business lounge (yay – I thought I would end up in the Qantas club). Het met us there and they waved me in, then Danielle let me use her phone to call the car rental company. She gave me her phone number (not much use) but said the desk staff could call her if I needed anything.
So the flight lands in about 20 minutes and then in theory I can go and collect my phone from baggage services. Not ideal or a fun experience but in the end Qantas did take pretty good care of me. The coffee, champagne and panini bar helped a lot.
I’m now at the tail end of my flight to Melbourne, breakfast is about to be served and we are set to land in 1 hr 45 mins. It looks to be a quick flight (relatively) It was scheduled to land 6.45 and we’re currently looking at 5.50. Should give me time to get my duty free and hopefully some coffee in the Qantas Club before boarding for Perth. Anywho, picking up Sunday morning. After not enough sleep I woke up, transferred my washing to the dryer got ready and headed over to the Closing Ceremony i was running a bit late, but I forgot that there’s always the 15 min pre ceremony video so it was fine.
The ceremony was a bit shorter than usual which was good, it always takes a while to get through all of the results. Australia had some good results in the top 10 of many competitions. After that it was driving bak to housing pack up say goodbye and get ready to go. It took me a bit longer this time but I wasn’t ready to leave until right on 1 (when we had to be out). This wasn’t a big deal as I couldn’t get into my accommodation until 4 and it was less than a 2 hour drive.
After saying farewell and see you next year I headed back to target to stock up on some tanning oil/sunscreen products that they just don’t seem to have in Australia 😞 Then I visited the Starbucks at Target and got one of my pretty standard orders – Iced latte and pumpkin loaf. I worked out a route that took me a bit past my accommodation but landed me at Walmart and near another Starbucks! At Walmart I was looking for more tanning oil/sunscreen products as Target didn’t have what I wanted. I had slightly more luck at Walmart although not exactly what I was after. Then I went to Starbucks and this time got one of my other favourite orders – Strawberry Açai Refresher with Lemonade. Then across to Turkey Run State Park arriving at my accommodation about 15 mins after checking opened 😉
You may recall that I visited there last year although I was only there for an hour or two and I wanted to spend more time. I even posted some pictures from last year if you look back through my posts. This is where I was staying and few shots of my room.
The planning of my US holidays is always a little bit challenging. I want to make the most of my time, but IC also takes some time to recover from. It’s a tricky balance knowing what to do after IC as I want to do touristy stuff but I also want to rest and sleep! At any rate I decided to try and make the most of my time so I picked a couple of the shorter hikes to do and headed off. It had rained a lot recently and as a lot of the trails are old stream beds it was very muddy & wet, but still very beautiful. My next post will include some photos. Even though the weather was fairly mild at 25 degrees you can still work up a pretty good sweat. According to my apple watch tracking I did 1.85km and gained 61m of altitude on that hike.
I got back to my room, showered and headed down to have dinner at the on site restaurant. I arrived just before 7, knowing they closed at 8, but apparently being a Sunday they closed early. I couldn’t get what I wanted but I managed to get take away soup and salad bar which wasn’t to bad and I ate in my room. I wasted way to much time trying to get my devices to talk to the TV and in the end gave up and watched Chicago Fire on my iPad! Then it was a fairly early night as I was still pretty tired.
I’m currently on my flight to LA (yes that is strange, you’ll have to keep reading to learn more about that later). I’ve just finished the two previous posts and I have 1 hour 20 mins til we land so I figure I’ll try and bust out one more entry now. Saturday morning I woke up feeling relatively refreshed and a lot better health wise. I showered and went down for breakfast (the one and only time, but I think that’s once more than last year!) I did have food in my room so I had been eating other food. I procrastinated a bit but by 9 am decided I had to start on my last packet. I think it was 7 booklets? I thought I could bust them out pretty fast and as they were MAGICs I was getting through them at around 25mins a booklet which is a pretty good pace.
As I was getting close to the end Suz, Simon and I started messaging to see if we could organise catching up for lunch. They were both free and I had almost finished so we decided that I would pick up Suz and drive downtown where Simon was and have lunch there. That worked well and we found a place to eat. After that Simon and I went off together to explore more of the markets. I hadn’t planned on buying gifts but upon seeing a sauce shop I couldn’t pass it buy. I brought three bottles of bum scorcher (the hottest variety of hot sauce) for two of my friends and a bottle of bum warmer (mid range) sauce for me. We also stopped in at a sweat shop and samples sum very yummy albeit expensive chocolates.
Back to campus and then got a lift to the Community Projects (former CmPS) showcase. We didn’t have long before it shut, but we did manage to get around to all the Australian Teams, get a photo and hear a bit about their projects. The Suz when off to her special person dinner and Simon and I walked round to the dining hall to get dinner and I only got slightly wet from the rain. Walking back to the accommodation after dinner was a different story – we got very wet! We decided we didn’t have time for the rain to stop so just went through it and then changed when we got back.
A quick shower and change and then we headed off the variety show. As always it was very enjoyable although I don’t think there were any stand out acts. There were a couple of performances by Australians. I think there was more dancing than singing this year. I usually prefer the latter, but that’s ok. After that it was off to the dance. The glowsticks were a big hit but I think the music choice wasn’t as good this year and the DJ didn’t want to take request and didn’t really look at the list Paige and I added requests to.
It was back to housing and final night party time. There was a good group of us and we have fun, drinks and good discussion. I put a load of washing on and was in bed by about 2.30am. Well that’s Saturday night and almost the end of IC – always sad. I’ll finish this post here as we may as well do all of Sunday all together. As I said’s it’s a shorter trip so with two flights to go I might even finish the blog account before I land in Perth.
Still no pictures, but there are some coming in future posts I promise.
