Click to Zoom Time to say Goodbye

Jane called a taxi last night for a pickup at 7:30 am.  We needed to be down at the Grayhound station at 8:00 a.m. so Jane could catch her three day Ozze bus trip up the coast to Melbourne.  It sure felt strange to watch her drive off by herself and leave me behind.  Andrew will meet up with Jane in the Sydney airport on their flight to Auckland, New Zealand.  It was hard to say Goodbye.  After Jane left I caught a cab to the airport.  There is no carrying of my bags possible now. My pack and extra bag both weight 26 kilos.  I have overflow stuff of Jane's and books and clothes from Andrew. I also have a third piece which is the two didgeridoos that Jane and I bought.  The people at the Ansette counter talked it over and decided not to charge me for the third piece.  My first leg of the odyssey home was from Adelaide to Sydney.  We flew right over Sidney and I could see the opera house in the distance. That was the closest I got to it. This was not a city trip. My Air New Zealand flight took off at 5:30 p.m. as scheduled.  The captain said the take-off weight of the 747-400 was 330 tons, 160 tons of which was fuel.  The plane was totally full with just under 400 people on board!  The two movies on the flight were "The conspiracy theory" and "Contact". I got to looking at my tickets and realized I have a 12 hour layover in LA, bummer. I had a short scare because I couldn't find my ticket when we landed.  I found it in my bag on the third search.  I had to retrieve all my bags to go through customs.  Luckily they had the free carts.  Then I had to wheel them across the street and around the block to the other side of the terminal to where Delta is.   I made one last check to see if there was and earlier flight than the red eye. No luck.  I laid down on the floor in a quiet corner and tried to sleep a bit  I decided that after spending $15AU per night at hostels that I wasn't going to go to town and get a $100US room to take a nap in.   My flight leaves right at pumpkin time.  It is a four hour flight to Atlanta and I am suppose to be home at 9:30 in the morning.  The first thing I will do is go to bed.   This is my second go-around with December 10, 1997.