The Long Trip

April 26, 2010 Monday

THE LONG TRIP (or What Happened to Tuesday?)

It had finally arrived: Departure Day. The morning was a flurry of last minute washing, packing, stressing, fixing a yard drainage problem, etc. Melanie had taken the day off, and we enjoyed some visiting with her as we went about packing. Pat and Nancy showed up about 1:30 to help take our luggage to the airport, and we left a little after 2 pm. We made a quick stop at the credit union to settle a few things there, and then we stopped at ShopKo for another suitcase (silly us—thinking we were going to pack for 2 years in 3 suitcases). Mike came to the airport from work for a quick goodbye and to help the “old folks” in with their 4 large suitcases, 2 carry-ons and one very stuffed purse. Hugs & advice were shared with Melanie, Pat, Nancy & Mike, and we entered the next step of becoming world travelers once again.
At 3 pm in the afternoon, the airport was relatively empty, and we moved right through check-in and security. I did have to be “wanded” because my new knee & hip set off the alarms. I ended up doing this in every security thing we passed through on the trip. I just told them about the artificial parts; they didn’t ask to see the small cards the doctor’s office had sent out. We flew to San Francisco at 5:30 on a 747. The young man who checked us in gave us a side row of 3 seats and blocked the middle seat so we had some room to spread out a bit. I watched most of “Blind Side” on the way down. We had a 4-hour layover there. We asked for a wheelchair when we landed to get me over to the international side, and are we ever glad we did! The kid who pushed me did it at top speed and it was a long trip. Poor Orson who was carrying both our laptops in his backpack had to hustle to keep up. We had a nice leisurely dinner in a grill and then had time to play a few games of our version of gin rummy while waiting to take off.
We flew on Qantas to Australia. After we boarded, we received a little bag with a toothbrush & the smallest tube of toothpaste I’d ever seen. We were on another big plane but were on a side row with just two seats so I only had to climb over Orson to head to the restroom. I took an Ambien (sleeping pill) and fell asleep after dinner. I awakened hours before we landed and entertained myself watching documentaries on the little TV screen on the back of the seat in front of me. We weren’t charged for headsets like happens on some US flights. We landed in Sydney with a 90 minute layover. We don’t recommend that to anyone. Clearing customs, waiting for baggage, moving it to the check-in side for the domestic area, clearing security, riding a bus to the domestic terminal and walking to the far end of that terminal got us there as the “Final Boarding” sign was flashing for our flight.
The trip to Perth seemed long but was really only 4 hours or so. Once again, documentaries kept me entertained since I couldn’t sleep anymore. We flew a total of 21.5 hours. We landed at Perth at noon on April 28th. Where did the 27th go? Into the land of the International Date Line. We will pick up an extra day as we fly back to the US in 2012. We found our suitcases, put them on 2 “trolleys” and went to the main part of the airport. No one was there to meet us. So we stood there a few minutes and then walked outside. Same story: Nobody there. We waited there a while, then Orson went back inside, found someone who would trade him some Australian money for American dollars, and called the mission office. Sister Kruger answered and was dumbfounded that we had come. She had received no information on when we were coming from church travel. The Mission President and AP’s were in a zone conference so she and Sister Hill came over to pick us up. We went to the Mission Office (by now it was 1:30) and waited until someone would be at the Mission Home so we could go there. The Maurer’s have a member who picks up their son after school when they can’t. Sister Kruger took us over around 3 pm. Leah wasn’t there yet but showed up in 20 minutes or so with Liam who is 11. (Did you know that name came from a nickname for “William?)
We were shown to the guest room and told to rest, shower, unpack, or whatever we wanted to do. The Maurer’s came around 5:30. Leah had started dinner, so Sister Maurer finished it, and we sat down to dinner. The president was picking up Nicholas from his guitar lesson, but Liam was starving so we started without them. The Maurers (pronounced Mora in Australian) are a great couple. They have 2 married daughters and brought their 3 young sons with. The oldest, Jayden, is in a technical school studying construction. They were both soooooo embarrassed because they had never left anyone standing at the airport in their entire mission. (The next day Sister Kruger told us she’d e-mailed church travel about it. The woman there said she’d somehow skipped sending out our arrival information.) Dinner was like a taco salad with apple “pie” and ice cream for dessert. We talked for a while and then went to bed around 7:30 or so. I woke up at 3:30, read for a while, lay in bed a while & then it was time to get up.