Getting to the Starting Line - Part A

 It’s a Long Way from Hobart to Salzburg

… but first, a couple glimpses of Battenski at Hobart Airport before we got on the plane:

Catching a few  🥱 😴 💤 

… and then catching me catching her catching those 🥱 😴 💤 !

Hello Darling! ❤️

Hobart/Sydney; Sydney/Singapore

What I’m calling our first stage involved flying from Hobart to Sydney, staying  overnight at the airport there, then flying on to Singapore. I’m not counting the drive to Hobart airport from home in adding up how long the journey is, because it’s only about twenty minutes. The flight is just under 2 hours. 

We’ve chosen to overnight at a hotel at the airport because our international ticket actually starts from Sydney and we didn’t want to risk missing the international connection because of a cancellation. Therefore, I’m not counting the time on the ground in Sydney as part of our travel time.

Arriving in Sydney: averting a major inconvenience 

There was a little drama as we were making our way on foot from the domestic terminal in Sydney to our hotel. We were crossing a busy intersection pulling our bike bags behind us when the towing strap on Di’s bike came apart. Luckily she immediately spotted the bolt and washer that fell off and scooped them up before we scurried across to the other side.

The bolt and washer that had fallen off

It was a good thing we only had a few hundred metres remaining to get to the hotel when it happened. We found the nut and the other washer inside the bag when we arrived at the hotel, then I got my multi-tool out and reassembled the bits as well as tightening the nut and bolt at the other end of the towing strap and the two on my bike. They were all looser than they should have been! Someone should have used some type of thread locker. 

The thing about these straps is that - although they aren’t essential - they  make a huge difference if you’ve got to move the bike bag any distance.

Sydney to Singapore 

Our flight from Sydney to Singapore was about 8 ½ hours, so total travel time from Hobart to Singapore is about 10 ½ hours. We left at 11:15 a.m. and crossed two time zones so we arrived at about 5:45 p.m. local time. 

As we walked towards the plane for boarding we were presented with this view …

Our jet to Singapore awaits us!

… which helped raise excitement levels and made us feel that the journey was really underway… and here we are a little over halfway to Singapore …

As time passed I attempted five “quick” cryptic crosswords …

The first three went pretty well: one solved completely (fairly unusual), two where I had to look up a few answers and then another two that were dismal failures.

In between I watched two movies. We missed “Marty Supreme” when it was on in Hobart so when I saw it was on the playlist I seized the opportunity. What a movie. Hilarious at times, cringeworthy at others, inspiring too, it was an amazing ever-engaging rollercoaster. The other film I watched was “Saipan”, the story of Roy Keane’s controversial departure from Ireland’s football team (of which he was the captain!) just prior to the 2002 World Cup. No doubt not everyone’s cup of tea but I’m a sports fanatic and found it quite engaging. 

Di started watching the recent remake of Wuthering Heights but found it so disappointing that she turned it off after a very short view. Instead, she jumped into the novel she’d picked up yesterday in the Sydney airport …

Suffice to say she devoured it - and still managed to get about two hours of sleep along the way. 

We’re both big fans of Michael Connolly’s crime fiction so now I’ve had that added to my luggage and I’ll get it read between now and starting our bikepacking journey with the Three Cliftons and a Duckworth.  

We’re now in Singapore Airlines’ “Silver Kris” Lounge. We’ve got a seven hour layover in Singapore before boarding our plane for the 10 ½ hour trip to Munich. It’s quite comfortable here so we’ll probably spend much of our time relaxing and take turns having a stroll. Di’s off at the moment searching for something else to read at the moment. There’s an artificial stream on the floor below where I’m sitting that is filled with Koi Carp …

… so I will probably go down there shortly for a closer look.

Oh, and guess what: Di has just returned with a new and fatter book for the rest of our Transit to Salzburg …

I’m pretty sure it will keep her occupied through our flight to Munich and on to Salzburg.

My intention was to do one post for the entire journey from Hobart to Salzburg but I think I will finish this second post here so it isn’t too much of nothing really happening, and cover the rest of our journey and stay in Salzburg with the next post. Hopefully the bikes will be on board with us for this, the last, flight of our journey and arrive unscathed in Munich.

Please let me know how you’re finding the presentation so far. And I would also like to know how quickly the images I’m posting are loading for you. It’s a new experience for me using this iPad to present a blog and I’m still in a very steep learning curve.

Cheers and thanks for following our journey.

Doug