We had breakfast at 6.30am.
The breakfast room is a couple of floors above street level and looks directly
out onto Times Square. At this early time of the morning New York was just
starting. The screens continued to flash of course, but not many people were in
the street and traffic was light. The grandstand in front of us was being
cleaned by men in red overalls, firstly with a blower to clean rubbish out
(swept up at bottom by another), then pressure-cleaned. The little food stalls
were opening up, and setting out their tables and chairs. The longer we sat
there the busier it got. In many respects it was like watching a fire, or a
fish tank. Kind of mesmerising!
Scenic had organised a
transfer for us, and he was waiting when we went outside. A nice chatty
Columbian who has lived in New York for 21 years and loves it! He took a
round-about way to go to the airport to avoid the traffic starting to stream
into the city. JFK Airport is about an hour’s drive from the city, but we
arrived in plenty of time, being nearly three hours early. Straight on the
footpath we were directed to outside
check-in counters and our seats were organised and our bags gone before we even
set foot through the door!! Getting through security took a little while but
there was no hassle. Lesley’s gold bangle, which sets off the machines in Aust,
went through fine here! We walked around a bit, then sat down and read until
time to board the plane.
The US had a very odd and
seemingly unpredictable way of loading a plane, and it took forever. First they
spent some time asking for volunteers to take a later plane firstly offering
$500US, then $1000US, because the plane
was over-subscribed!!! Passengers are put into ‘zones’ on the boarding pass and
loaded accordingly, but it doesn’t mean that the back fills first (after
business and premium of course) – no, people could be part-way down, or at the
back, or near the front, on the right or on the left. There seemed to be no
rhyme or reason to it. Of course, we were down at the back and one of the last
to board, so had to walk through a filled plane to get to our seats, and hope
there was room in the lockers for our backpacks! Passengers were allowed to
bring on large trolley bags, and prams, and long tubes (fishing rods?). Would
not be allowed at all in Aust. Prams were put aside and loaded into the cab
when passengers seated.
We had a five hour 12 minute
flight to Seattle. We watched movies. Delta (the airline) is trying light meals
for every passenger (the way Qantas does) and is still trying to get the
balance of variety right. By the time it got to us there was only one choice
left, so tough if that didn’t suit! We had bought some food, not knowing they
would supply something, so we ate it on the second flight, an hour from Seattle
to Victoria, BC. At Seattle we saw a familiar backpack on another passenger, so
spoke with them. Chris and Vicki are truck drivers from Sydney (Emu Plains) so
we chatted before the plane was loaded (another silly loading episode, on a
small plane that really didn’t need zones at all!!
We were met at Victoria by a
Scenic transfer driver who took the four of us to the hotel. We met our Tour
Director, Laurel, who already knew about us because Gary had spoken to her. She
seems very nice. We showered and dressed up, then attended the welcome dinner
in the hotel. The group dynamics of this group already is a vast improvement on
the last one. So much more friendly.
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