The Journey Begins....

On a miserable Melbourne morning (alliteration, sweet!) we made our way to Tullamarine Airport with Eva's mother, Margaret, and sister, Katerina, to embark on the first stage of our journey. We won't bore you with details re: the anti-terrorism measures taken by airport security to ensure that no one takes more than 100 ml of deadly toothpaste aboard (don't ask!), but we ran the gauntlet of check-in to finally sit at the airport cafe, and kill time until we faced the anally retentive scrutiny of customs (as you can tell, Shayne was especially worried by the whole thing...though in the end he got off very lightly, surprisingly).


At 10:00 am, we farewelled Kat and Margaret and passed through the International Departures gates...after having the mandatory goodbye photo taken.


Our first stop was Sydney, so the flight was...well, uneventful. A bit of an anti-climax, if anything. No turbulence, no spewing babies. That came later. See below....

Getting out of the airport was surprisingly quick. We found our luggage in good order but suspect we were ripped off by the guy who drove us to Eva's godsister's place, with whom we were staying the night. She lives in North Bondi, in an awesome house on the cliff with...

...an amazing view from the guest bedroom.

However, we had no sooner enjoyed the view, and were about to hook up with another Sydney-dwelling friend Li, when Eva got a call on her mobile from the airport. She had picked up the wrong luggage. This was in spite of the silver-and-bright-pink-sparkly ribbon that Margaret had insisted we tie on our luggage. Hmm. And Shayne hadn't noticed either. Double Hmm. Turned out some poor guy from Pennsylvania was without his stuff. Ouch.

So, Eva insisted that she'd go alone to the airport and get it herself (as Shayne was rather unimpressed and she thought his temper would cool off down by the beach). After an expensive, somewhat amusing taxi ride (the driver was a bit of a character), Eva arrived at the airport only to be directed all over the place before finally reaching a non-descript, out of the way part of the airport signposted "Toilets" and arriving at a door marked with a large "O" and a sign reading "Please ring bell only once." She was greeted by a grumpy pleb airport official who reprimanded her with "When will you people learn to check your luggage tags??" before she could retrieve her bounty.

Meanwhile, back in the beauty of North Bondi, Shayne had the best chicken burger ever (Ogalo Burgers. Must be a Sydney thing. Mmmmmmmmmm...Ogalo), calmed down considerably, and took some typical touristy shots of Bondi Beach...



...when who should he bump into on the North Bondi boardwalk, but Li and her boyfriend Daniel? When Eva came back from the airport with the right luggage, we all went out for a coffee and an evening stroll. Here's a photo that Daniel took of the three of us, although only Li looks good as she's a BLOODSUCKER! (private joke...and not even ours...)


Some photos of our gracious hostess with each intrepid traveller in turn:



She took us on the scenic route to the airport the next morning, showing us sights of the Sydney coast including a room-sized boulder that had washed up onto the rocks in the 30's at North Bondi that the locals thought deserved a plaque:


After farewelling Clare at the airport, we embarked on the next leg of our journey...the 12 Hour Flight From Hell To Hell L.A..

Kids. Oh god, we might as well have been in an ABC Centre (if you're saying, "huh?", think WORST CHILDCARE CENTRE EVER). Kids at back, front, and side, no less than four families with at least seven sprogs between them, most of them under the age of 5. Suffice to say that very little sleep was had by either of us, and even Eva, who loves kids dearly, was having very uncharitable thoughts towards the little cretin behind us who proclaimed loudly, "This is not your space, this is myyyyyy space!" in a cringe-worthy American accent. Shayne's thoughts were more homicidal, as you can imagine...the one source of amusement was the customs and immigration form to enter the U.S.:

Eva would like to know (see point B), what exactly is considered an "immoral activity"? Shayne was tempted to declare himself a former Nazi (see C).

What we saw of L.A. was a hole. Thus, it didn't warrant many photos. However, it is worth commenting that it appears to be the home of the Ministry of Crap Design^TM, to borrow a concept from Ben Elton.
Evidence:
a) All the toilets we came across were squat affairs (to perhaps accommodate larger North American posteriors?), with the water filled almost to the brim. You can imagine the difficulties that arise. Or float.
b) The hotel we stayed in had the most dysfunctional showerhead known to mankind. Trademarked as The Original Massage Head^TM, its settings were either painfully hard (what kind of massage did they have in mind, exactly?) or pathetically soft.
c) Finally, the seats outside the airport were shiny metal half cylinders which required the utmost concentration from the user not to slide off them. Not conducive to comfort for jet-lagged travellers. Or anyone, for that matter.

But, there were some funky structures at the airport. This was one Shayne managed to snap while waiting in the customs line:

I mean, what the hell is that?? The Jetsons, anyone?

You think Eva's smiling at Shayne? No, she's just happy to get the hell out of L.A.


Shayne was not hassled at L.A. airport at all, or at any airport, for that matter. This is despite the fact that he refused to shave. Eva thinks that they were just too busy to bother, and that next time he won't be so lucky. Shayne says, "Pah!"

So on Monday 16th July 8.30 pm, Toronto time, we landed in Canada, and have spent the last week settling in to our new "home" for the next 5 weeks in Mississauga, Canada, which is a satellite city of Toronto. We're staying with Shayne's aunt Margaret and his cousin Twiggy.

Here is Twiggy, buying us iced coffees via drive-through at the Canadian institution that is Tim Hortons coffee (think Starbucks, but better):


Mississauga is very urban. Nice place to raise a family, not for the excitement-seeker. There is a big mall called Square One which seems to be its hub (think Chaddy or Highpoint). Eva went shopping and got her haircut there while Shayne stayed at home and felt sorry for himself after picking up the TRAVEL BUG OF DOOM^TM (which he still hasn't fully gotten over).

Mississauga also has a very big library. Which even has a cafe outside its entrance called Great Expectations (oh God...) and evil public toilets which were opened by a push button, but then failed to open from the inside. Yes, Eva got trapped in a toilet. Heh heh. Eva wishes it to be known that, according to library staff, this happens quite a bit. Shayne tried to rescue her, but she managed to escape by herself. After Shayne had called for a security guard. Suffice to say that we're both avoiding fancy toilets from now on.

Finally for this, we leave you with,

The Canadian way of torturing pigeons who dare to land atop speakers at bus stops:


and on a more cuddly note (that's Eva speaking, by the way):


A squirrel! There are many here. Mmm....squirrel....That reminds Shayne, dinner is almost served.

In our next (hopefully more exciting) instalment, we'll tell you all about our exciting days roaming Toronto, the charming capital of Ontario, Canada.

EDIT Anyone reading this, you can now add a comment without having to join eBlogger, which would be a bit of a pain. Sorry if anyone tried and couldn't because "anonymous" posting was not enabled. Shayne really stinks at this sort of thing...