It wasn't, technically, a difficult journey but it was memorable nonetheless. We drove to Christchurch and spent a couple of nights with Eve's brother and sister-in-law, Russell & Ivy.
For reasons beyond our ken, the airlines schedule flights from Christchurch to Australia very, very early in the morning. Ours was programmed to leave at 06:10. The Qantas web site was uncertain about what time we should arrive at the airport, so we telephoned the 0800 number for a human's opinion. “Between 2 and 3 hours before take-off.”
That gave us any time between 03:10 and 04:10. We opted for 03:30 and booked an Uber to pick us up from Russell and Ivy's house at 3:15am.
Set the alarm for 2:45? No, better make it 2:30. Bill has only recently bought himself a new 'phone so he sensibly tested the alarm function. It went off at the right time, but with such a feeble, whispered sound that wouldn't wake anyone. Much time was then devoted to adjusting settings and looking up advice on the Internet. More testing gave no better results. This was raising the tension levels for no good reason because Eve has a 'phone with a proven, reliable alarm.
But the tension levels had been raised and neither of us slept well. We estimate that each of us got an hour or so's sleep before giving up just after 2am. We were dressed and zipping up our cases well before 2:30. At the scheduled hour both 'phones delivered maximum volume wake-up calls. If they woke up Russell & Ivy as we feared, they were too kind to say so.
We were delivered to the airport in good time. Despite checking-in online and having printed boarding passes ourselves we had to queue and go through an old-style at-the-airport check-in. Apparently the online check-in is really only useful if you have no checked bags.
Up the escalator to departures to find that security screening only opens at 4:00am. At least we found somewhere to sit down. Because of all the Australia-bound flights there was a huge queue when processing began. As usual, Eve's artificial hip had to be explained when she walked through the 'door'. Then Bill's cabin bag was tagged for further investigation. To avoid packing batteries in his checked luggage he had removed them from a camera and put them in the cabin bag. Apparently there is a proper way to pack them. Luckily we found a workaround by jamming them all in his hearing aids container.
Beyond security there was roughly an hour and a half to wait, but at least there was coffee!
We set off on time. The 'plane climbed to cruising altitude and the seat belt signs were extinguished. At last, we could tilt the seat back and catch up on missed sleep. Except. When the seat back was tilted back the bit you sit on was moved forward. This jammed Bill's knees into the seat in front. It was the most uncomfortable aircraft seat he had encountered since a Lufthansa sector from Singapore to Frankfurt in 2011. Not quite as bad as South China Airways.
We tried to doze, but neither of us got any serious sleep.
At Melbourne the only contretemps was not realising sooner that we had to ascend to the departures level for our flight to Hobart. This we attribute to sleep deprivation. Christchurch had issued our boarding passes for this sector, and the checked bag tags had the necessary bar codes for Hobart so we only had to go to the bag drop. It was as easy as we had been promised. And at Melbourne Airport we had more coffee. Try to avoid this if you are ever at Tullamarine Airport. It was dreadfully expensive.
The 'plane to Hobart was another Qantas 737, with the same knee-destroying seating. We did not get even the catnap that we craved.
Hobart Airport is not a forgotten backwater with two flights a day. It even has direct international flights nowadays. Much busier than Nelson Airport. But it only has 2 baggage conveyors. When we arrived they were both busy with the bags of Virgin Australia flights that had the good sense to land just before we did. So the concourse was crammed with passengers from at least 3 large airliners. Eventually one of the boards signalled QF1005 and hundreds of annoyed Australians surged forward.
We recovered our big bags without incident. The issue now was that our motel didn't accept checking-in until 2pm and, despite 4 hours on the ground in Melbourne, it was still only about 1pm local time. Eve found a seat and guarded the luggage, while Bill went in search of the Uber pick-up point. No worries there. But the airport Wi-Fi didn't work outside the building and we needed to use it to request a ride.
Bother arriving early. We decided to go. The Uber was requested from inside the arrivals hall and we set off. Bill went ahead to hopefully get to the pick-up area before the Uber driver gave up on us. Eve followed as fast as her luggage would allow. It wasn't a dazzling example of efficiency, but we did make contact with the driver and we did get delivered to the Blue Hills Motel.
Never mind that it was before 2pm, we were checked-in immediately. There is much to criticise about the motel – maybe in another post – but it did provide a bed so we could lie flat, stretch out and get some sleep!
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