A Long Night's Journey Into Day.

Well, modern technology has prevailed once again, and I have been delivered without incident to the Land Down Under, where it is a balmy 85 degrees at present, or roughly 45 degrees warmer than what it was when I left home.

The flights to Detroit and then LA were uneventful. Detroit has a really nice airport with very modern in-terminal transportation devices to speed you from gate to gate. I thought of having dinner there. They have some very presentable restaurants. But I elected to wait til I got to LA, on the theory that a good meal just before a 14 hour flight would be a good thing.

Big mistake. LAX is the WORST airport I have EVER been in. Worse than Panama, or Cancun or Saigon! There were NO restaurants past the security check point. The entire place was under construction. And the traffic at the gates reminded me of nothing so much as the airport scene at Cartagena in Romancing the Stone. I finally found a bratwurst with onions and peppers, with a bag of chips and cranberry juice for 12 bux. It wasn't the worst wurst I ever had, but it wasn't all that great either. There were no tables available, so I had to eat standing up next to the trash with people swirling all around me.

The plane was a mile away from the gate, with giginormous busses to take us out to the stand-alone terminal. The busses had no seats. We all stood like hogs on the way to market. I was way, way underwhelmed with LAX.

The flight itself, though, was superb. I was on a 747 that was only about 50% full. The seats were wide and comfortable. The Quantas service was impeccable. The entertainment selections were plentiful. Mostly, I put the audio channel on the "New Age With Peruvian Pan Flutes" channel and just drifted in and out of sleep for the 14 hour and 10 minute crossing.

We did encounter some signicant turbulence southwest of Honolulu. It was as bad as I have ever experienced on an aircraft, which is probably about 2% of what the plane is capable of tolerating, but it did make me offer up a paean to the Great Spirit that the adhesives used to glue the plane together were not concocted from a pastiche of pig poop and yak spittle. And that the bolts holding the thing together were not bought from a conglomerate who got them from a company that obtained them from a consortium who bartered for them with a man who made them in his backyard blast furnace somewhere in Jerkajerkastan.

I actually arrived feeling pretty refreshed, which is rather remarkable, considering I had been sitting in an airplane seat for the better part of 24 hours. I even got to watch Dirty Harrt again. What a great movie!

The one thing Matt and I didn't do much of was plan where to meet at the airport. After getting out of immigration, I scanned the crowd but didn't see him. But a few minutes later, there he was, right on time.

So, I'm at his apartment in Sydney right now, posting this up so that all of you who feared my plane might somehow end up in the Coral Sea can put your minds to rest and go to bed.

More when there is more. G'day, mates!