Wednesday 4 October 2017

So, the adventure has begun. We are travelling with a mini iPad this time (now that I’m retired), so a blog is even more challenging, for those of you who read it as well as those of us who aspire to write it. This is our travel diary, primarily as our holiday record, so if you don’t enjoy it please log off now! Or anytime the boredom sets in. So, here we go…..On Tuesday afternoon we depart from Sydney domestic terminal, where we bump into my old (and I mean that in every sense of the word) friend Michael Lynch, providing an amusing diversion for us. It’s a convoluted itinerary from Sydney to Dubai, courtesy of Qantas frequent flyer points. Serves us right for being cheapskates I guess. Sydney-Adelaide-Melbourne-Dubai, with a convenient 3 hour stop over in both Adelaide and Melbourne. By the time we reach Tullamarine we are somewhat over flying and consider a five week holiday in the bleak city instead. But, hey, the bright lights of the Middle East are calling. When we take off at midnight we have already been on the move for 18 hours, having woken for an early airport run. We have been looking after Bartie Arnott-Smith for the past 6 weeks while his mother Susie was in the UK. It was wonderful to have a dog around Quamby again and we loved every minute of it. Coincidentally Susie arrived back in Sydney the day we depart so we did a sunrise handover of the Bart.

We wil miss him but we expect that there will be plenty of distractions coming up.

An unevetful flight to Dubai except for some unexpected and significant turbulence 40 minutes before we touch down. So dramatic was it that there were some screams from alarmed passengers. Not us, of course. But it didn’t last long fortunately and was explained by a Boeing 777 a few miles ahead of us. We apparently got caught in the wake and a slight alteration to our flight path corrected everything. A smooth touchdown. We have 7 hours here before boarding our flight to Amman and so we had the good sense to book a hotel room in the airport. A cuppa, shower, snooze fixes everything. So, soon on to Amman and the beginning of our long planned holiday in Jordan and Morocco