To A New Destination and Some Time in an Old One

Bloody hell its cold. Descending to -2C overnight and reaching the lofty heights of 9C at midday the cold gets into the bones and teeth. Especially when you have come from a balmy Sunshine Coast of 32C. We shouldn’t really complain as there is a quite lovely blue sky and its warmth has started melting the ice from the sidewalks. We are making progress. The Moody Blues were an English prog rock band of the 1960s and 70s whose songs included the top twenty hits “Nights in White Satin” and “Question”. They dabbled in psychedelic rock for a while but I don’t remember that.

We are now in Boulder, Colorado. A late and unexpected babysitting call up when Tammy and Glenn decided to do a bit of heliskiing in Revelstoke, Canada. So Brooke if you are reading this, then know you are not the only one in Canada – albeit only for a week. We have three lovely grandchildren here but it did seem a bit daunting to head away to the middle of an American mid-west winter. Scout, whose relationship with the cold is not a good one (she already has SAD apparently) declined the offer. I immediately confirmed my acceptance at which Scout whose nose was a little then put out exclaimed “Not without me”. So here we are freezing our butts off but loving it

For those of you who have travelled recently you will understand the nightmare that travelling has become. The eighteen hours that it should have taken became thirty. Not so bad you say. Except you didn’t enjoy the five hours in the sink-hole that is Los Angeles Airport. After arriving an hour late from Sydney – thanks Qantas for advising us that the one hour and a half flight delay was caused by the difficulty in towing the aircraft to its gate across hectic runways as Sydney is a very busy airport. Well who would have known? We missed our connection to Denver although the hour in the queue at passport control at LA Airport didn’t help. The actual time spent in front of the very pleasant border control officer was less than two minutes. Qantas to their credit had foreseen this and rebooked us onto the next American Airlines flight at 11a.m. Strange though because American informed us that they didn’t have an 11 a.m. flight to Denver. Possibly United. Try finding out with who and when you are booked when (a.) the Qantas desk is closed and (b) the United desk is closed. We took a punt on United who did have an 11 a.m. flight to Denver. L.A. Airport has seven terminals. International arrivals is Number 1. United is, naturally, number 7 some twenty minutes away. And time was moving on. Alls well though as United do have a booking. Except there is the little matter of the US$195.00 for that bag you are checking in. But we have paid for that! Take it up with Qantas. Fat chance. A great big shoutout to the fantastic United worker who seeing the queue summed things up and declared “You will need to hurry up or you will miss the flight. Give me your bags (n.b. including that hugely expensive one) and I will take them to bag drop for you”. Mate, you are a legend. I am not moaning really as here we are in a lovely part of the world with family. Its just that L.A. Airport – never again.