Day 73

Thursday 13^th January 2011

Car, Boat, Plane, Train, Plane, Car is the plan for today. We are up early to get down to Abel Point Marina to catch the ferry to Hamilton Island. We do manage to grab some breakfast at a café overlooking the water.

A couple of cockatoos were also up and about…

The ferry transfer was very pleasant – although the weather still hasn’t really decided  what to do with itself. It was 90 mins of a combination of blisteringly hot sunshine, rain and thick grey cloud.

Not that I really care anymore about the unpredictable Aussie weather – we’re heading to Thailand today!

Our flight out of Hamilton Island is on time and uneventful so we reach Sydney for 3.30pm. We land at the domestic terminal to discover that we have to catch a train to the international terminal – and pay $5 for the privilege!!!

Leaving Australia is a mixed bag of feelings – I’ve really enjoyed it but we’ve spent an absolute fortune despite living as frugally as we can. I’m looking forward to eating out in restaurants again and not paying over £4 for an undersized pint of lager!

We try the ‘honeymoon’ card again – well the guy on check in doesn’t know we’ve been at this for 10 weeks now does he? And we get the standard answer – the plane is completely full. There are no upgrades and no leg room seats available. But he HAS managed to seat us together!

We have a final Aussie McDonald’s – weight is soaring but it’s all we can afford as we only have $30 left (£20 – yes £20 to eat at Maccas!). Another good reason to get out of Australia while we can still fit in the plane seats.

We board our flight to discover that not only is it half empty but there is an entire row of seats available at the emergency exit. Lying b*£$%d at check in!!! We are informed that we must remain in our allocated seats for take off as the weight distribution of the plane has been taken into account with the seat allocation but that as soon as the captain turns the seat belt signs off we are free to move. This sounds like a great idea but we are on the back row of the plane – some 30 rows from the exit seats – and a number of passengers have their beady eyes on those coveted seats.

The seat belt sign is flicked off only minutes into the flight – GO! I yell at Franky and he dives out of his aisle seat and starts hurtling down the plane before anyone else realises what has happened. I’m hot on his heels and we make it. I narrowly dive into the row just ahead of another guy who only had 4 rows to move – ha ha ha!

We settle into our 9 hour flight in relative comfort. We pass the time watching the films on offer… The Switch and Dinner with Schmucks for me and

Wall St

and Salt for Franky. We nap a little and eat a little and before we know it we’re touching down smoothly in Bangkok where the local time is 11.00pm. We’re getting pretty used to these long hauls now!

Bangkok’s airport is HUGE and it’s a small hike to immigration. Sergeant Major Franky has me racing through the airport to beat the queues and it works so we sail through, grab the bags and head outside to hail a cab – the last in our numerous modes of transport for the day.

It’s 45 mins or so to the centre of Bangkok and then another 20 were spent aimlessly driving round looking for the Amarin Inn. The taxi driver finally caves and rings for directions – which is good job – we’d never have found it as it is positioned down a tiny alley that almost doesn’t fit me and my backpack down it. As we check into the room we discover that it is not only the access to the hotel that is tiny – our room is a double bed and a half a square metre of floor space to dump two bags. But it’s clean and air conditioned so there’s no complaints.

We collapse into bed at about 2.00am, absolutely shattered from our day of travelling.