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lindsaystravelblogs · 2 years

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Tuesday

Covid Crisis

Heather had been feeling a bit ‘fluey’ for a couple of days and yesterday morning, she did a RAT test. Disaster! She was positive! All our plans are in jeopardy. Numerous emails back and forth with our fabulous travel agent, Bev Edwards, and our not-particularly-helpful insurer, NIB, resulted in us continuing on, but exploring what options we had if she was still positive when we needed to board the ship - we would not be allowed on!

Today, I also tested positive (surprise, surprise, locked together all day in a car, what else could we expect if I didn’t already have it). More disarray!

Our insurer said we had to get a formal certificate that we really had Covid before they would consider a claim so we headed a couple of doors up the road to a clinic where we were subjected to another pretty rough RAT, but at least we now have some proof - at a bit over $AU100 each.

Heather is still sniffly and coughing and has some muscle pain. I have very muffled hearing - makes It very difficult to communicate - and some mild muscle pain has developed during the day. We both have a vile taste in our mouths, but Heather’s is starting to abate. Despite this, we really aren’t too bad.

We simply don’t know what happens now. It is unlikely that we will be allowed to board, but there are a couple of landings along the expedition and we may be able to join the expedition somewhere along the route - if/when we both test negative.

We really don’t know when that might be and what we might do in the meantime, but we are pretty confident that we will be fine for the Greenland expedition even if the Iceland one falls over completely. Either way, it is likely that Covid is going to prove very costly. We think we probably caught it on the plane from Bergen.

We are feeling a little lost at present, not knowing what we will be doing over the next two weeks, but we will persevere. We feel almost dirty, like pariahs, avoiding even remote contact with other people, despite the fact that we have done everything in our power to avoid the plague. We took every precaution, we have had four vaccinations, we wear masks, we avoid contact with others wherever possible. Nothing was our fault, but it feels that way anyway.

(Wednesday morning update!) Neither of us are any worse this morning (although Heather’s horrible taste is back again) so hopefully, we will recover quickly. We are taking some heavy antiviral tablets our fabulous GP (Justin) gave us before we left – just in case we caught the virus. They are supposed to relieve the symptoms and avoid the more serious consequences of the virus and they seem to be working pretty well at present.

We have been advised that we can’t join the expedition part-way through so we either test negative by the morning of 2 August or we will miss the expedition – but should be good for the next one to Greenland. And NIB’s travel insurance is very limited. (Even then, we can expect them to deny and dispute anything we claim - but that is the way with all insurers. They grab your money and weave enough weasel words into the contract to ensure they don’t have to pay out. Not that I am a cynic! It is more that I have experienced this a few times before.)

Tuesday

Today was mostly just driving. We went to the Holmavik clinic at 9am and were out of there with our pieces of paper, but short $200-odd, by about 9.45. It was then basically a 432-kilometre drive to our digs for tonight and tomorrow night - the Laxa Hotel in the middle of nowhere but overlooking a lake that is renowned for its bird species, particularly ducks. We have seen thousands of ducks along the way, but always a long way away. The only two we have really identified here are the Eiders and the Mallards. I am sure we have seen numerous others, but it is quite impossible to stop for a closer look or a photo when we see birds because the roads don’t allow for it. The roads are 2.2 metres wide (max) if sealed, with maybe 300 mm verges when you are lucky - one lane either way. When you have a bus or big truck approaching, there is not a lot of room to move over, particularly onto the fatal verge - and if you do, there is that 3- (or 100-) metre drop from whence the road has been elevated. Or maybe straight into a solid rock cliff. A tad hairy on occasions, but 1200 clicks down the road and we are still alive. Max speed limit is 90, average practical speed closer to 70, and you have a headache after a couple of hours simply from concentrating on the 50 metres ahead. My eyes sting and start to blur as the day wears on simply from concentrating on the road immediately in front of us. I do sneak the occasional peek at the splendour around us, but it has to be a very quick peek if there are other vehicles around.

All of this limits your opportunities to take photos. It is often 20 kilometres or more between places you can actually get off the road safely. Oops, the birds I wanted to photograph are now 18 clicks behind me.

Despite this, the views are truly spectacular. On the one hand is the majesty of the mountains, the snow, the waterfalls, the raging rivers, the cliffs and the scree, the pasture and the lava, all simply magnificent, almost breath-taking. On the other hand is the quaint, the novel, the unexpected, the twee even – sweet little farms hidden in crevasses in the valleys, painted in brilliant eye-catching colour, with farm buildings huddled close, maybe an antique tractor or two and sheep dotting the surrounding ground, often barely visible in the sheep-high grass. The sheep are never sheep-coloured as we see them in Australia. They are much paler and range from pale cream through the entire spectrum of browns to solid jet black.

The skies have been mainly grey, but not threatening. We have had numerous showers, all light and gone within ten minutes, and it is a delight to see a patch of snow or a farmhouse or a freshly-mown paddock highlighted occasionally by bright sunshine. Mowing is obviously an important source of stockfeed or income from the sale of fodder because we have seen tens of thousands (at least) of plastic-sealed sheep lunch-boxes in white, black or yellow – I wonder if the colour of the plastic denotes anything, maybe the type of grass or moisture content? More likely the owner’s aesthetic sensibilities or the price per tonne of plastic covers.

We stop quite often when the occasional pull-off allows and we visited Godafoss just off the road toward the end of our long and tiring drive. It is a spectacular waterfall, huge and very loud. Foss means waterfall and you can probably guess what God means. It is said that in the year 1000, the king had to decide if Iceland was to become a Christian country and when he made his decision, he gathered up all his idols and related paraphernalia and threw them into the waterfall – hence Godafoss. Strange, we heard the same story at a different waterfall when we were here 3 years ago.

Sadly, despite careful scrutiny, we have not seen any trolls yet. I have looked under several bridges to no avail and we keep our eyes peeled just in case some try to slink across the road in front of us. Some people here really believe in them and we have heard that most people are unwilling/afraid to misbelieve in them. If a road is being built through an area or past a tree where trolls are suspected of living, the road is diverted to avoid the risk of invoking their wrath. There are lots of similar examples – but until we see one………!

We ate in the hotel restaurant that night. We felt we deserved it after such a long and sometimes stressful drive. We both ordered fish, ling and cod, but the highlight of the meal was probably the bread. It was a nice crusty bread, but was endowed with a light sprinkling of salt on top. Nothing comes with salt here apart from the brekky bacon (when it is on the menu) and we were really hanging out for something more savoury – and the bread hit the spot. Nearly everything has a slight sweetness about it and we are not much into sweet things. At breakfast next day, Heather tried some beetroot juice with fresh ginger and loved it but I missed out on that one.

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stargirlsuicide · 1 month

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62 seven characters you relate to

omg ive never really thought abt this tbh character that i relate to the most is milla from babyteeth. i would say both rebecca and enid from ghost world but mostly enid, tracy freeland even if not all that much, bev and richie from IT kinda veronica sawyer from heathers too

#opening mail !!

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lindsaystravelblogs3 · 8 months

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Day 83 – Wednesday, 16 August Off to Warsaw

We were off to Warsaw, in Poland, today so we ate breakfast at the Hotel, settled our bill, and waited in our room for an hour until it was time to trudge across the dog-park to our waiting taxi. One of the hotel staff helped us to get all our gear along the canal and across the kilometre to the Cruise Ship terminal. We really appreciated that because they knew where the cab was waiting – as well as dragging one of our big cases all the way to the terminal car-park.

The airport was no more horrific than other recent airports and we were soon up, up and away and heading for a whole new country for both of us. As we left Venice, we could see the wetland we had passed on the Waterbus and it was quite astonishing how big it is – probably almost as big as the Werribee Treatment Plant wetland. I hope it continues to be protected to give the birds a better chance of survival as they migrate back and forth across this busy heavily-populated part of the globe.

In Warsaw, we were a bit slow getting through all the administrative processes, but our driver was waiting for us and off we went. He had very little English and we didn’t have a word of Polish, but after we had driven a very long way, passing the city on the way, we asked him where he was taking us. We were on a motorway and thought there may only have been occasional places to turn off back to the city, but we were close to ten kilometres beyond the town when he finally understood that he wasn’t going where we needed to go. He found a place to turn back toward the city and then got lost in the maze of one-way streets and closed roads in the centre of town. He finally dropped us a couple of hundred metres from the hotel because we had reached a dead-end - an area where no vehicles were allowed in. (We eventually had some correspondence with the taxi company to explain the situation and they gave us an unsolicited partial refund for the confusion – not at all required because the ride had shown us parts of the city we wouldn’t otherwise have seen.)

We lugged all our bags to the front door of the hotel and found that it was locked. We eventually figured out how to get them to open the door for us and Heather went up a couple of flights of stairs (32 steps each way) while I guarded our luggage in the passageway at ground level. Then they told us that we weren’t booked in at that hotel – they had another section a kilometre away across the city and we had agreed to stay there. We hadn’t, but the booking agent had apparently made that decision (wrongly) for us. Things got quite complicated pretty quickly, including because the hotel couldn’t explain how to get to their other property and in the end, one of their porters went with us, dragging our poor cases across a kilometre of crowded cobbled streets. Then it was through an alarmed and coded door, to an alarmed and coded gate, up 47 steps to our room's foyer to another alarmed and coded door, and eventually to the coded door to our room. Alas, the code didn’t work! Fortunately, the porter who was there had a phone and after close to an hour, the code was reset and we were able to get in. (This happened three more times while we were there – we think the cleaning staff assumed that nobody stayed more than one day so they reset the code each time they visited the building – that was not often though, because I reckon it was about a year since the floor had been swept.)

Our wonderful travel agent (Bev) went to work on our behalf and we were offered a room (at about twice the price) in the original hotel we had expected to be in, but the thought of dragging everything back across town was pretty daunting so we decided to stay put without air conditioning and a few other desirables, given it was only for a few days. We didn’t bargain on climbing all those stairs in the almost dark as many times as we did, but que sera! We had a double room with a shared fridge, stove, toaster, jug, microwave and sink just outside our door.

A feature of Warsaw that really struck us was the trees – there are thousands of trees everywhere, many very big ones, giving the whole city a lovely greenish feeling – and of course, a few extra birds although not a huge number.

We went out for a walk to find a supermarket and bought a few bits and pieces, and we had a drink while we were out. We went out again a little later to a restaurant right below our window and had dinner there. It was supposed to be traditional Polish fare, but if so, we were less than inspired by it and certainly had better local food on other occasions.

In the middle of the night, there was a huge thunderstorm with violent lightning, mighty thunderclaps and a lot of rain – but by morning, apart from some wet patches on the road, it was completely gone.

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naturecoaster · 8 months

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September Hernando Audubon Activities

September Hernando Audubon Activities Hernando Audubon Meeting: Living with Wildlife. Join Heather LeBlanc from the Florida Fish and Wildlife Conservation Commission’s Wildlife Assistance Program. From bears and coyotes to snakes and raccoons, we’ll discuss different species of local wildlife, ways to find sustainable resolutions to conflict, and strategies to coexist with native wildlife. The meeting will be held on Thursday, September 28, at 7 p.m. at Brooksville Woman’s Club, 131 S. Main Street, Brooksville. Contact Bev: [email protected] or 352-686-0460. Hernando Audubon Adopt-A-Road Cleanup: Saturday, Sept. 16, 8 to 10 a.m. Help pick up trash on Northcliffe Blvd. between U.S. 19 and Deltona Blvd. High school students will receive credit for community service. Meet at 8 a.m. at the parking lot of Good Shepherds Plaza, 8417 Northcliffe Blvd., Spring Hill. To volunteer, contact [email protected] or 352-247-9793. Hernando Audubon Birding Trip to Perry Oldenburg: Saturday, Sept 23 At 8 a.m. meet in the parking lot at 13489 Government Road, Brooksville. From US-41 turn east on Deer Run Road. At the intersection with Government Road, go straight in the right lane. Along the 1.5 mile trail through sandhill and hardwood hammock and a powerline right-of-way, expect to see American Kestrel, Loggerhead Shrike, hawks, woodpeckers, other woodland bird species, and fall butterflies. Contact Bev: [email protected] or 352-686-0460. Hernando Audubon Beginning Birding Friday, September 29, at 8 a.m. at Chinsegut Conservation Center, 23212 Lake Lindsey Road, Brooksville. Learn to identify birds at feeders and during a short walk. There will be binoculars available for use. For information, contact Linda: [email protected] or text 352-428-2629. For more details about these activities, check https://www.hernandoaudubon.org/ All Hernando Audubon activities are free and open to the public. Read the full article

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angelayan183 · 1 year

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#IFTTT #YouTube

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lindsaystravelblogs1 · 1 year

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Almost the Last Post (for this time)

Day 58, Sunday, 12 February 2023

We arrived in Lyttleton, the port near Christchurch, in the early hours and although we could look around the port and nearby landscape from the deck, we were not allowed on shore until our selected tour became available. For us, that meant 2 pm – or a little before so we could get up to the bus. We were tied up at the bunkering terminal and not allowed out there but were ferried to the marina in the lifeboats, with a long way to walk to the waiting bus. The bus took us out of the dock area and up the hill to another bus that took us on our excursion.

I am guessing that we drove at least fifty kilometres, through old lava fields, pastoral and farming land, past Lake Ellesmere, and eventually to Manderley Farm. It was an interesting drive that made me itch to return to NZ for a long, slow campervan adventure. Of course, I was constantly scanning the area for birds and identified eleven species from the bus.

The road was pretty rough, very bouncy and at one point, there was a huge crash and jarring pain thumped through our backs – at least those passengers in the rear half of the bus. The back of the bus had bottomed out and hit the road very violently, obviously a common event because the driver never even blinked.

At the farm, we were treated to a sheepdog demonstration that was pretty amazing. There were eight merinos half a kilometre or more up the hill from where we were standing, and the farmer released one of the farm dogs and controlled it with a small whistle. It was very windy and I imagined that the dog would not be able to hear the whistle – it was quite faint to me and I was only ten metres away – but the farmer used long and short whistles in two pitches to tell the dog to go left or right, to approach the sheep, to stop and sit, etc., and within a few minutes, the whole little flock were down the hill and through the correct gate and to within a couple of metres of thirty humans. Then the situation was reversed and all the humans were ushered back up the hill by a different dog – no, no! Not the humans, it was the sheep!

We then went into the shearing shed and heard a bit more about the wool industry and the evil Chinese who manipulate prices to cheat honest Kiwi farmers out of a fair return – and in no time, the Chinese were being blamed for virtually everything that could possibly go wrong for the poor farmer. I am sure there is some truth in his assertion but I think he overplayed his hand. The Chinese probably don’t control the local weather – just as a ‘for instance’. Despite all of that, we still got to watch him shear a sheep – a young one, about 6 months old, getting its first haircut.

We then went through a really beautiful garden to where his wife had drinks for us to accompany the shortbreads and delicious sausage rolls. It was all very nice and civilised, quite countrified, and then it was back to the ship. The bus took us back to the second bus that is apparently the only bus allowed to enter the port area (no idea why). That bus delivered us to the lifeboat waiting at the end of the marina and that delivered us back to the ship.

We finalised the last of our packing and were ready to disembark. During the bus trip, Heather had a series of emails with our wonderful travel agent (Thank you Bev!) who had been monitoring the cyclone (Gabrielle) threatening Auckland. She is an absolute gem and arranged for us to stay at the Christchurch Airport hotel and fly with Qantas direct to Melbourne at the crack of dawn on Tuesday – instead of flying to Auckland and waiting nobody-knows-how-long to fly home with Air New Zealand. That was really great – but I wonder if we will ever recover the extra cost from our parsimonious insurer, NIB. Time will tell.

Day 59, Monday, 13 February 2023

We were up at 6 am and quickly dressed and ate breakfast for the last time this trip. There were lots of goodbyes, most of which were repeated half an hour later as we gathered to collect our passports and pass NZ Immigration and Customs – a very quick and easy process. Then it was on to the shuttle to take us to central Christchurch where we got a cab to the airport hotel – the Sudima.

When Bev managed to change our flight, we tried to change our booking for the shuttle from 7.30 to 8.30 but the ship said everything was locked in and they couldn’t change it. As a result, we had an enjoyable ride into the city with the bus entirely to ourselves. We had a driver and a guide who was very friendly and chatty, but it did seem a little excessive – surely a cab would have been cheaper or they could have made an exception and put us on the 8.30 shuttle, but not so. We were quite happy and where we were dropped in the city, a second guide called a cab for us and we were on our way to the Sudima within five minutes maximum.

Of course, arriving at the hotel at 8 am meant they didn’t have a room available until noon at the earliest but we just sat in comfort in the foyer, logged on to their Wi-Fi and did a bit more writing. Despite the noon deadline, we were in our room a tad after 10.30 with an upgrade to a very well-appointed suite. So who’s complaining? Not us!

We each went out for a short walk and found a shopping centre immediately adjacent to the hotel. It has a few restaurants, and we ate at a Chinese one – and found that the Chinese are not responsible for everything going bad. It was an enjoyable meal at a reasonable price, within very easy walking distance from our hotel.

Day 60, Tuesday, 14 February 2023

We were up and dressed by 3 am and ready to go to the airport. Officially, we were supposed to be at the airport three hours before an international flight so we should have been there by 3 am for our 7 am flight - but the hotel staff told us that 3:45 would be fine (the terminal doesn’t open until 3 am anyway).

Of course, I had been awake for a couple of hours checking the clock every few minutes in case we were late, despite knowing that the alarm was set anyway.

We took the free shuttle and made it in plenty of time. We beat the crowds and were through the airport nightmare reasonably quickly - despite my carryon being examined in the finest detail by an overzealous officer. She did find a small jar of a special spread we had carried for at least 25,000 kilometres as a gift for our travel agent. She decided that it was a liquid and was just over 100 mls so I am sure she will enjoy it herself.

We had over an hour and a half to wait to board and then sat on the plane for another hour while they fixed some problem with the electronics. We left more than an hour late with a promise to make up the time during the flight.

Of course, as usual, I sat behind an ignorant ratbag who tilted his seat back as far as it would go and refused my polite request for him to be a bit more reasonable. I had maybe 15 centimetres from my nose to his seat. I simply don’t understand why they have reclining seats in planes. I paid for my standard 28 inches of space but he thought he was entitled to steal seven of them.

We arrived at Tullamarine only 40 minutes late and got through the crowd relatively quickly. We had previously been told that our passports are not e-passports, but an attendant assured us that they were and that saved us at least an hour of two in the queue. I wish we had known that before – it could have saved us days of queueing over the life of our passports.

There was a long wait for our baggage, but it all arrived safely and we eventually escaped the Hell that characterises every airport in the world. Our Tony’s Taxi was waiting (Thanks again Bev) and we had a very comfortable trip home.

I collected our accumulated mail from the past two months or so (three mail items and two junk mails) and we spent the rest of the day unpacking and sorting all the clobber from the trip.

One really helpful factor was that we were able to repack a surprising amount of stuff straight back into our cases, in some cases, once the laundry was completed. About four days later, we are about 90% packed for our next trip. Watch this space!

Summary

How do I summarise such a diverse trip? I did a bit of a summary at the end of our first voyage so I will not rehash that, but our week or so in Ushuaia was an opportunity to catch our breath and explore a little of the tip of South America. It was a nice stopover but without any particular highlights.

The more recent voyage did include some highlights, not the least of which was reaching 78 degrees 44 minutes South latitude. And I have just stumbled on an online article that emphasises the significance of that. I recommend that you have a quick read at https://www.mycg.uscg.mil/News/Article/2969915/coast-guard-cutter-polar-star-sets-world-record-with-voyage-to-antarctica/. And note that the Spirit of Enderby is the ship that took us to Antarctica three years ago. By my calculations, the 1.32 seconds by which the US Coast Guard holds the record is equivalent to a bit under 41 metres that our ship could easily have beaten if we had just nudged up a bit closer to the ice. I doubt if we got within a hundred metres of it and I thought at the time that the Captain was being his usual conservative self, notwithstanding his expressed disappointment that we never set a new record.

Walking on the ice, particularly at Mt Siple, but also at Cape Hallett, gave me a big buzz - it was quite a unique experience.

Watching the ship crunch through the thick ice was also fascinating, even awe-inspiring, as we faced a solid wall of ice up to at least three metres thick - and simply smashed our way through. An amazing sight.

I loved the storms - Nature in the raw. They didn’t impact the ship to any great extent but watching the swell and huge clouds of spindrift was quite exciting. And seeing so much snow that decorated the external areas of the ship for several days was something quite new for me.

The wildlife is always a highlight although I never thought as much about it at the time this trip. But we saw five species of seals, millions (literally) of penguins, ninety-six species of birds and a few whales. We have probably seen more and more variety on other trips, but this was still impressive.

The Captain’s conservatism or risk-averseness meant we lost several opportunities to experience more but we had no control over that – unfortunately, he is God on board.

The food was fine, perhaps not quite what we expected from French chefs but perfectly adequate. The staff were brilliant and the lectures the best we have had on any previous trip. And ‘all you can drink’ for about 18 hours a day makes up for a lot.

All in all, it was a great trip with some once in a lifetime experiences that I will never forget. I just need time to cement the memories more securely before we embark on yet another extraordinary series of adventures.

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scover-va · 5 months

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Janet: sigh. You remind me of my ex…

Lauren: How-???

Janet: red 😔💔

#scov.txt #janet afton #lauren emily #fnaf: hauntings of the past au #bev heathers #posts that are only funny to me

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reveriehq-moved · 1 year

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mw horror characters?

hey, love ! i'd love to see mei misaki ( another ), bev marsh ( it ), nell crain & luke crain ( the haunting of the hill house ), heather watkins, deena johnson, samantha fraser, josh jonson ( fear street ), lee eunhyuk, cha hyunsoo, pyeon sangwook, park yoori, jeong jaehon, yoon jisoo ( sweet home ), morticia addams, wednesday addams, gomez addams ( the addams family ) , dani clayton, jamie ( the haunting of bly manor ), lee everett ( the walking dead ) , light yagami, l, misa aname ( death note ), ellie, joel ( the last of us ), natalie, jackie, lottie ( yellow jackets ), nancy wheeler, steve harrington, eleven, billy hargrove, eddie munson ( stranger things ), ken kaneki ( tokyo ghoul ), mima kirigoe ( perfect blue ).

i hope this helps <3

#mw.#appless rp #multifandom rp #fandom rp #answered.

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labelleperfumery · 1 year

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'RHOBH' Star Lisa Rinna Will Work With Anyone, Including Kathy Hilton

‘RHOBH’ Star Lisa Rinna Will Work With Anyone, Including Kathy Hilton

‘Real Housewives’ star Lisa Rinna says she’d be down to have anyone on the reality show with her, Kathy Hilton included … this coming after Kathy said she’s not comin’ back unless Lisa is out. We got Lisa leaving Jayde’s Market in Bev Hills …… from TMZ.com https://www.tmz.com/2022/11/20/lisa-rinna-rhobh-kathy-hilton-beverly-hills-heather-dubrow/

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#TMZ.com

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thelosersaretalking · 4 years

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whos been riding with who on the way to cali?

Richie and Eddie rode together. Bill and I drove together. Ben and Bev of course had their ride. Mike is with all of the animals, who are thankfully good in the car. Right now he has Heather and Bill's cat, as well as a trailer of a few farm animals.

-Stan

#bill denbrough #stan uris #richie tozier #eddie kaspbrak #mike hanlon #ben hanscom #bev marsh #stenbrough #reddie #benverly #heather

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lindsaystravelblogs · 2 years

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Departure - 15 July

Disclaimer: This has been written in many short segments so the timeline has been muddied on numerous occasions. Consequently, even I have become confused as to whether some parts are in the present tense or the recent (or not so recent) past. Make of it what you will.

Well, we are finally on our way after doing heaps of last-minute things at the last minute. Harry from Tony’s Taxis arrived a little early to take us to the airport - thanks always to Bev who gave us our transfers gratis - best travel agent ever! Some sad news yesterday when Heather’s Auntie Jean died aged almost 104. Very sadly, we won’t be able to go to the funeral but wanted to send condolences to some of the cousins and by the time Heather wrote the cards, Harry was waiting so we had to post them from the airport.

You would think there would be a postbox in the terminal, but no, the only one is way out, long past the end of all the terminals in a very dark and scary building site. I took the plunge and set off to post the letters and was quite glad to get back safely inside the terminal.

It was surprisingly quick through all the formalities: a bit of a queue to offload our bags, but quite quick through security with none of the usual absurdities. Immigration was quick and easy and the Tourist Refund Scheme procedure was a snap, with a guy who really seemed keen to help. Then it was just the (almost) 3-hour wait to board. We had lots of time so went to a cafe and enjoyed quite a nice wine ($10.50 a glass) and perhaps the worst bacon and egg sandwich ever created at $13.50). Presumably that was all duty free? Quite forgettable - at least I am trying to forget it.

We are flying Qatar and boarding was very slow, over an hour, with very hard-to-hear announcements and all a little officious, but we made it and are now probably somewhere over the Nullarbor or maybe the Bight at present. Just checked the flight data onscreen and I was a bit optimistic - we are just approaching Whyalla with more than 13 hours still to go on this leg. No wonder I dislike flying so much.

There is an excellent range of entertainment on board. Literally hundreds of movies an heaps of other stuff. Alas for me, even on maximum volume, I can’t hear enough over the ambient noise to follow any of it so maybe I will read or do some puzzles. They fed us plenty, but the food was nothing special - typical airline food just out of longtime storage, with only Cathay ever excelling in the culinary stakes in our limited experience.

As it turned out, I didn’t do many puzzles. It was very cramped, especially when the ignorant people in front of us all tilted their seats back to the limit - another reason I hate flying. Idiots design planes with reclining seats and thoughtless yobs think it OK to take advantage of the design fault, without regard for anyone else’s comfort, believing their right to extra space overrides the rights of everyone behind them. We encountered this problem a few flights ago when one loony reclined his seat and everyone behind him followed suit. We were in the very back seats that can’t recline so we spent the whole trip unable to move except to continually brush the filthy dreadlocks on the guy in front out of our faces.

This meant that my screen was so close to me that I couldn’t even read the flight data displayed. It was also very hot and there was no room in the overhead lockers so we had our bulky backpacks between our knees. I was so hot and uncomfortable that I became seriously distressed, very claustrophobic (and I am usually not) and on the verge of a panic attack - and that would have been a first for me too. I simply had to stand up and move and being in the window seat complicated the process. I swapped places with Heather and the woman on the aisle stood up to let me out - until the cabin staff drew attention to the Fasten Seatbelts sign and made me sit down again. Fortunately, the FS light went out after 20 minutes or so and I leapt up and went to the extreme back of the plane, where I paced and stretched and did exercises for 2 or 3 hours until I was so exhausted that I had to return to my seat. I may have dozed off for a few minutes, but I experienced more distress and took myself aft for a few more hours until we were served breakfast and almost ready to land.

I reckon that is my worst flight ever and I have had a few beauties over the years.

We arrived in Doha about half an hour earlier than expected, but I didn’t complain about that. It took a few minutes to find out where we had to go - at the far end of the terminal, but at least we had about half a kilometre of moving walkway that probably covered two-thirds of the distance. Then it was just a couple of hours wait. I spied some birds outside the window so photographed them in the hope of identifying them later. They were a long way away, but I think I will be able to identify them from the photos. (No joy so far.) I saw another one (a Common Starling) out the window of the plane when we boarded so I hope I will be able to start a Qatar list with two lifers on it.

I believe it was 30 degrees in the terminal and a lot hotter in the bus on the way across the tarmac to our plane.

An interesting observation from the airport bus was when we drove beside a security fence where all the poles had structures on top to contain the razor wire - and almost half of them had large bird nests contained in them too. No wonder in a desert country with few trees.

The trip to Oslo was another rough one but only six and a half hours instead of 14 and my noise cancelling headphones worked much better on this leg for some reason and that helped too. This plane has really strange windows. When we first boarded, the scene outside was quite surreal: a soft, otherworldly pearly sort of hue that turned glaringly hot and white when the plane turned into the sun. And soon after we took off, everything started getting dark: tinted as dark blue as late dusk and the cabin became quite dark as a result. All very strange - very clever glass. I do recall one daytime trip to Sydney a few years ago when all the windows were completely black and miraculously became completely transparent as we approached the terminal at Mascot. The cabin crew told me it was all controlled centrally by the Captain. Certainly very clever! (Captain Heather subsequently found a button under the porthole that enabled us to manually adjust it from opaque to completely transparent - we chose the latter. So much for the cabin crew’s expertise.)

I thought I would be fine on the shorter leg and in daylight, but a couple of hours into the trip, I was back in the galley, exercising, but at least I could watch the ground go by if I crouched and looked out a tiny window at knee-height. Soon after I returned to my seat a couple of hours later, Heather found the button to adjust the window and I was pretty good after that.

Once we were able to see out, the whole area appeared to be enveloped in smog for hundreds of kilometres out to sea and right across the entire land area. Australia is obviously much less impacted by pollution than this part of the world. It really brings the issue home.

The Passport and Immigration process was surprisingly quick and easy at Oslo - why can’t Australia learn how to do these things properly? - and we were soon on the very clean, comfortable and fast train into the city.

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