Hurry Up and Wait - travel in the 21st C

The main lesson my epic journey through 8 countries over 3 months (so far) has taught me is patience. Travel in the 21st century is very much 'hurry up and wait'. With bursts of very fast travel - except on Amtrak - punctuated by long periods of waiting and enduring the inconvenience and inhumanity of long security checks, body scanners and fingerprint machines.

In many cases these uncomfortable and unseemly experiences are mediated by machines and all seeing cameras rather than by humans. You can't smile nicely at a machine and get away with being 1kg over the limit... Its pay now or wait wait wait! In fact being directed to a human manned station is likely to result in even more time lost to the vagaries of 21st century air travel. There are far less people than there once where and far more machines. But then I remember the hay days of air travel in the late 80's and early 90's when arriving in a suit and smiling nicely at the check-in girls would get you a free upgrade to business or first class on flights that even in economy where never fulll and in which you had plenty of room. But that was before code-share and the economics of cramming ever more people into the same space to make more money. The photo is of a new TAP Airbus A320 plane done up in the livery of thier 70's jets... pining for the golden age of air travel.

The only place where travel is fast, smooth, on time and wait free is actually in Japan. I am still marvelling at the efficiency and magic of the Shinkansen and public transport in general in wonderful Japan. If you avoid air travel in Japan it's a brilliant travel experience. That said I did arrive by air in Golden Week and through Narita. Haneda was actually a very nice experince on departure.

Air travel everywhere is full of the same indignities and long waits. It is amazing how each airport and airline differs though. Many times I have been caught out by different carry-on weight or size limits and my carry on bag has ended up travelling in the hold more often than not. What ever happened to the good old days of 15kg or higher limits in bags which comply with most airlines size restrictions? Roll on my BA trip back to NZ, they allow me two bags up to 23kg as carry-on. Beware TAP Portugal (an 8kg limit) or Flybe with its tiny size restrictions... and then they have the audacity to charge you to put it in the hold or charge extortionate prices for every kg over the check-in allowance. Air fares are getting like Mobile phone plans,;so complicated and different for each supplier that you need to spend hours reading the small print. Oh well I guess you can use some of the endless wait times for that :-)

Theres the wait in the airports; the wait to go somewhere and then the wait on the plane; the wait to get somewhere. Plenty of time to wait wait wait but always the joy and relief of finally arriving.

I have finally arrived in Marrakech, Morocco, my pen-ultimate country, so stay tuned for some tales from the Medina :-)Read more