Holding the Reins of the Runaway Extrovert 2013: Day 29 - The wheels on the train go ... slosh, slosh, slosh?

So after finding out we couldn't fly home yesterday - dear old Virgin sent the cancellation of flight email at 3.50pm when we were driving away from Ballina airport with Steve and Amie, and left it to the lovely airport staff to break the news to us that we weren't going anywhere till Thursday 31 January! - we went home, brainstormed and Steve came up with the idea of taking the Countrylink train home.

I wasn't thrilled at first but came around to the idea, so we booked, got the last room at Alstonville Settlers Motel and and after mum made us a lovely food goodies bag (including salmon sandwiches, a takeaway container each of mango and pecan-stuffed figs, Le Snaks and drinks) and we'd had breakfast, Gary drove us up to the main street, we grabbed some pads, a pen and a highlighter and waited in the park for the bus to Casino which may or may be able to make it through the floodwaters.

Thankfully the bridge had JUST opened and we reached Casino, had a lovely time waiting for the slightly delayed trains - anywhere with Steve is delightful ... awww - and then got on the train which was clean, modern, beautifully fabulously air-con'd and peopled by such friendly staff.

The water was just 1m below the very high bridge at Grafton but we made it through there just fine after seeing lots of other flood-affected areas and from then on I totally relaxed, spent 4 hours reading all the articles I had printed off for my author interview with Katherine Howell the next day, wrote all the questions, wrote a blog post on The Mindy Project, read a mag, had Devonshire Tea (from the buffet car - no buffet there btw), ate a yummy roast beef dinner ordered on the train (Steve had lasagne) and chilled.

It turned out to be a delightfully relaxing day with Steve where I got to spend time with him, and was a major blessing in disguise.

Still I was very happy when we got to Central, Fahmi picked us up, and I got to spend the night in my own bed.

Grafton

Grafton 2

Grafton 3

Grafton 4

Great dinner but this wine was god awful ... AWFUL.