365 Pink Feather Boas All in a Row - Day 361 : Go North Young-ish Men, Go North!

Well eventually....


What a day! It started out in a rush, which wasn't so bad in itself since we had to pack, check out (a recurring refrain on this trip! LOL), sprint to Camberwell for more last minute Christmas gifts - checked out the Centro shopping centre in Box Hill too which was, um, quaint), and then head to my gorgeous guy's parents' place for one last yummy lunch - his mum made a delicious omelette out of the remains of the Christmas roast, which I love; my mum still does a similar thing called Bubble n Squeak) - before they drove us to the airport. As always the conversation was lovely, and the food great, and we made it to the airport in plenty of time, the e-check in working a treat, and while the terminal gate we waited out had all the charm of a cubicle (no, I didn't feel compelled to start scheduling appointments!), the flight left on time and we arrived in Sydney in time to make our connecting flight to the Gold Coast....


.... only the flight wasn't on the departures board. At all. There were no announcements - it galls me that airlines seem to regard announcing bad news like massive flight delays as anathema, when not making the announcement creates far more ill will than if they had gone ahead with telling us the bad news up front from the get go - and we had to resort to asking a Virgin attendant at the gate our now non-existent flight should have left from, to tell us there were horrific storms in the Gold Coast/Brisbane corridor and our flight would be greatly delayed from the original departure time of 5.10 to 6.30 pm or much later. So we retired, with all the other much delayed passengers - some of whom we found out as we talked to them in a camaraderie reminiscent of people collectively caught in bad situations had been trying to get up for 2 days or so with multiple unsuccessful flights - to the bar, spent a small fortune on 4 wines and 2 burgers and waited for our flight which was finally scheduled for 7.30 that night which was a relief. I felt vaguely guilty since other people who had been waiting for a day or two were still stranded including a couple in their 70s who were delightful to talk to, but it was wonderful to be getting up to my parents for the semi-delayed Gillman Christmas (they had a form of the Christmas lunch on the day itself as well as exchanging presents since it was my nephew Bodhi's first Christmas).

My brother in law, god bless him, waited till our flight arrived in at 8 pm Gold Coast time (9pm NSW time) and he dropped us off at the Alstonville Settlers Motel at 10.30pm. Reception was closed but I had spoken to them earlier and they had been so friendly and helpful, leaving the key to room 3 under the mat for us so we could just go in, collapse on the bed (my beautiful guy loves collecting all the pillows unto himself and did so tonight; I eventually got one to sleep on.... it's very cute) and look forward to seeing my lovely family in the morning.