Let me Ex-Plane

Scrooge would have taken a steamer or a sopwith camel with three Junior Woodchucks. I took three planes, with only one meal provided in over 18 hours flight time. Clearly Qantas is on a quest to emulate Scrooge too. The Mystery of the Chicken Pot Roast was down the hatch and solved very quickly – although the barley might be on a milk carton somewhere as it was largely MIA. The rest was cookies, bars and nuts. I also question the legitimacy of the Coconut Jelly Lamington in a gelato cup with a lid. Australia Day three weeks early?

I am 5’1. I was essentially built for this. Economy is Gold Class cinema to me with a blanket and a disturbing lack of cocktails the size of fishbowls. The problem this time was the 14 hour flight with one solid meal. Lift your game Qantas. I was one hour away from Lord of the Flies – the vegan next to me was perhaps ironically destined to play Piggy.

LA transit was the usual shitshow. Pleasantly surprised by the speed of the ESTA machines and their new ability to take a photo of my face, not over my head. But, as per usual, an hour wait in the queue played havoc with my spare time smiling at Babe Ruth chocolate bars and thinking about the Goonies in the shops. Three guys on the desks looking more Brooklyn 99 than dedication to the job. Not particularly concerned about the huge queue. Then I thought maybe I would prefer than to an authoritarian, in-your-face Trumpian moron. If they would hurry up. Then there was a huge fight by bag check between an airport guy and one man just trying to move quickly through. Probably didn’t help that the bag trolleys handled like three wheeled homemade go-karts and I banged the officious airport guy on the leg. I would like to say he was the first, but it would be a lie to make baby Jesus cry. In the end my two hours between flights turned into a 20 minute dash for food and some headphone cords. The American Airlines flight was a bit of a doze fest. 3.5 hours with no screen. A patient ginger gent on my right might have copped a semi-comatose Hocking shoulder slump or two.

I was picked up by the Intrepid transport promptly, cranking ‘Uptown Girl’ on an 80s channel. They love a bit of 80’s queso here.This is my country.

The hotel is cute. I have never seen a lift with a door that pulls open before you then enter it like a normal lift. Interesting. See photo of room above. I have an alcove. Facebook will have a couple more photos. After a run to the nearby convenience store for snacks for today’s tour and an expensive but delicious steak and red at an Argentinian steakhouse downstairs, I retired to crash. Not before discovering the only TV channel in English is the retro music channel playing best of Backstreet Boys and Britney.

Will update after my first day of proper adventuring today!