The Longest day of the Year

I’m sitting outside in the cool summer air in Cairns, Queensland Australia. Its still stinking hot, but comforting. Its been a really long day...

We got up at 4.15am to leave the house at 4.45am. Of course, our family takes forever to leave the house so it wasn’t until 5 when we left. Esmee and I went straight inside the Wellington airport to beat the chilly wellington wind, only to be greeted by “BRISBANE.....DELAYED UNTIL 7.40AM” Great, now we had an extra half hour to kill. You gotta love waiting at the departure lounge, where all you can do is study everything about the stranger sitting opposite you. After eating a bread roll to cure my starvation being annoyed at the fact that my sister’s had cheese in it, we boarded.

Pacific Blue then decided to greet us with a ‘Due to the delay of this aircraft, there will be no catering on board.’ My stomach rumbled. We went and bought some water to keep us hydrated, but our hunger would have to wait for another 4 hours until we landed in Brisbane. We boarded the aircraft and squeezed our way to the back as our seats were in the last row. As I passed a crew member he said ‘Sorry, there’s a lady sitting back there who is not very well, we will move her soon.’ Great. A lady from Switzerland with minimal english sitting in my seat feeling queazy. Somehow, they got her back to her seat for take off, and I sat next to Esmee with Camiel at the window. No Ross. There was no cute guy :) . I read my last months edition of Cosmo, which entertained me for a good hour then just killed time by watching my siblings. They had The Simpsons playing though, which was good.



We landed in Brisbane and realised we had a short hour to catch our flight to Cairns thanks to the delay of our first flight. We collected our luggage, went through customs, then got lost. Then we went to the domestic transfers, where the kind Aussie lady informed us we had to catch a bus because we were at the international airport and needed to be at the domestic airpot. ‘The bus comes every 10 minutes.’

So we waited outside for 10 minutes. Then frantically jumped on the bus first as we realised we had about 15 minutes until our flight actually took off. We didn’t make it. We were trying to go through customs not realising that we had our cabin luggage. So we got caught up on all sorts of things. ‘M’am there are scissors, pocket knives... you cannot bring these with you on board.’ So we then rushed to check in to put our luggage on the plane. It was so embarrassing. Rushing around the airport. Literally running while carrying our huge bags as our flight took of in 3 minutes. So we got connected to the next flight, which left at a 11.30am. We had an hour and a half to wait, which I was quite greatful for as it meant I could finally fill my stomach! I noticed an Eagle Boys in the food court, and also Red Rooster, which looked exactly like KFC. The prices are horrendous here thought. $8 for a cheeseburger, $10 for a combo.

Back to the departure lounge. Our flight was in about 20 minutes, but our plane hadn’t even arrived yet. Once it hit 11.30, we realised that there was no way we were going to be on time. We left at 12.30. An hour later. It’s so ironic that the 21st of December is the longest day of the year, and all the flights were late. Oh well, at least mum gets to celebrate her birthday for an extra 3 hours. Doesn’t make her any younger though!

I slept on some of the flight to Cairns. I was exhausted by this point from running around with luggage and waiting for late flights. It was the most...scenic flight I have been on. Looking down you see small tropical islands with golden sand and the sea was mixed with different shade of blue and green, creating a turquoise pacific look. The Great Barrier Reef certainly looks amazing from birds eye view. I can’t wait to actually swim in it!

The word ‘Beauty’ or ‘Beautiful’ is probably the most common word I have heard all day. Add an Aussie accent to it and thats pretty much their most commonly used word haha. I’m already picking up on the Aussie accent a little, which is bad. Sorry Ross. Well the car was a disaster. We had hired and organised this car which had beds and a fridge and everything in it for us! Until we realised we were short one seatbelt. 100 phone calls and 2 hours later, we had a car. Then we had to find a place to stay. Then we had to eat. Subway it was. By the time we actually got to our room, after all the travelling, it had been 14 hours since we left home.


All our luggage

It’s been a really long day, but lots of fun! Cairns is quiet and reminds me of Rotorua. Although I haven’t been shopping yet, that is still to come! Hmm, I see a Mac shop across the road. I just might have a look...

Until next time!

Fem
xox

ps. Happy Birthday Mum! :)