Morning Moments

I slept like a rock. The cushions in the campervan sucked. There just isn't another word for them. They were hard and uncomfortable and the pillow was basically non-existent. Sleeping in a real bed with fluffy pillows was magical.

Erik barely slept. He even tried keeping me up last night and I shut that down and told him to go to sleep. I was so dang tired. Sorry love. He woke up coughing all night so he thinks he barely had any sleep.

This morning we woke up, got ready, finished packing and went down to the buffet breakfast. OMG. This buffet was extravagant. They had it all. Eggs, bacon, fruits, yogurts (the good yogurt that I had bought from the store a few days ago), croissants, Nutella, brioche, mini donuts, salad (weird), waffles, toast, and Vegemite to name just some of what they had. I hadn't tried Vegemite until today. I didn't spread a thin layer on buttered toast, as recommended. I had a dollop on my plate and I used a fork to taste the smallest amount. My taste buds went off like firecrackers. If it wasn't absurd and rude to wipe my tongue with a napkin, I would have. That is not something I ever want to try again in my life. I think I would only ever try it again if my kids or husband were held at gunpoint and eating it would save their lives. It has a strong grassy but almost meaty taste to it. I'm not even sure how to describe it. We were going to bring some back for the kids to try but I don't even want to waste my money on that. 🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮🤮

We did order our free mocha drinks from the cafe in the hotel. Mine was delish! Erik left his...without ever tasting it. Clearly he was tired.

I must shout out Medina at the Moxy Hotel. She was an angel. She even remembered that we told her we were going to the Opera and she asked about it. She is one of those people that truly seems to care. Super sweet.

Okay so then we went to get in the shuttle. There were two, domestic and international. The shuttle took a good 15 minutes to get to the terminal.

Inside, we checked the board to figure out where to check in at. We are flying Air Canada. They had check-ins by letter. We were letter J so we had to walk all the way to the right to find letter J check-in. We walked up to a kiosk but since we are retired military we can check up to 3 bags for free, each, up to 70 lbs each. This is a massive money saver as the 5 bags we were going to check would cost $450 AUD. The lady at the kiosk couldn't get us the free bags so we had to go to the desk.

There were many people traveling today with what appeared to be their triathlon bikes.

Ramon, at the desk, helped us with our free baggage. He was very diligent as he double checked the bag tags before he sent them off to be loaded on a plane.

Then he directed us to security.

This is where things are, let's say, different.

We walked ages to find security. No one checked our tickets. We were directed to the screening area where we didn't have to take our shoes off (this is new everywhere) and we didn't have to take out our laptops or tablets. Then we walked through the X-ray machine thing. We immediately fell into line to scan our passports and get our picture taken. It was all managed by the traveler. There were people behind a desk in front of us but they weren't helping people as they walked through. When you came out the other side, that was it. No one checked our tickets or passports together to make sure we were where we were supposed to be. It was incredibly efficient albeit not as "secure" as the US makes it seem..

Once through, we walked through an entire mall full of performed, expensive bags, and watches and makeup, before we found where to walk to our gate. The gate was also rather far away, but not too terrible. We didn't need a team to get here.

We stopped and browsed some little shops and then bought Erik some more cough medicine and lozenges.

Now, we sit and wait for our flight. Everything is on time.

I'm really sad to leave Australia but man am I excited to see our kids, our animals, and our friends.Læs mere