Planes, Trains, and Automobiles

Oh the joys of budget traveling...in the last 56 hours I have boarded two trains, 6 buses, 2 shuttles, and 3 airplanes, traveling a total of around 8000 miles to arrive here on the other side of the world. What's more, today I get to board another plane to Melbourne (we'll throw in a train ride too for fun). Despite wandering into this travel marathon with the tail end of a cold and a mild hangover, I don't feel too bad at all...thanks to the mysteries of the immune system.

I'd spent the better part of the last month prepping for this trip; booking reservations and plane tickets, investigating national parks and wine regions, fixing bicycles and all the while visiting friends and transporting myself from one gracious couch to the next. And yet despite all this preparation, I still found myself running around past midnight the day before leaving trying to tie up last minute details. Inevitable maybe, but to date I haven't really thought of anything major that I forgot. In fact, the morning I departed I was running through lists and checklists and feeling pretty proud of myself, that is until I blew a red light in downtown Salem and came about 3 feet from an accident. A good reminder perhaps, the rest of the world cares little for my plans and itineraries, so I'd better be paying attention.

Made the train to Seattle after switching trains in Portland, and was surprised to learn that not only was there an in-ride movie, but that it was a recent show of Cirque de Sole, something I knew of but little about. The 35 minutes I watched before dozing off was pretty interesting, almost as interesting as the half-asleep dreams it prompted (a mixture of trapeez artists, satan, and the lion king in an airport security line). Met my buddy Bill in Seattle, had a great dinner and headed to a local college pub near his place for a few drinks (ill-advised maybe, but then again it was my birthday). Realizing that our time-sense was losing ground, we set the Mambo Number 5 alarm on the jutebox and headed out.

I declined an early ride to the airport the next morning and chose to sleep in and navigate the Seattle bus system instead. I needed to get to LAX that evening for my flight to New Zealand, so I had booked a really cheap ticket on Virgin Airlines that afternoon. Despite carrying 75 pounds of gear and needing to catch 3 buses to get to Seatac, the trip was without incident. Made a few goodbye phone calls from the terminal (I was shipping my phone back to Salem from LA) and boarded the plane. The plane was unbelievably awesome. Instead of the harsh and sterile (ha!) white lights of a typical plane, Virgin's cabin lights were purple, which contrasted red and white seats. And though this was a domestic flight, every seat came with a touchscreen in-flight entertainment system, which allowed you to watch movies, tv shows, music videos, and even order food! If only I had been flying Virgin to New Zealand...

The contrast with the futuristic plane and LAX couldn't have been starker (like walking out of a movie theater after watching Star Trek and realizing you're still in 1984), the terminal smelled and was badly in need of renovation. Aparently someone else agreed with me, as the international terminal was very much under renovation, and had English been my second language navigating it would have been a nightmare. After checking my bags through, I had about three hours to figure out a way to mail my cell phone back to Oregon (it would be useless in NZ). Before leaving I had prepaid a small box and the postage and needed simply to drop it into a mailbox. Sounded simple enough, except that since 9-11, all post office drop boxes in the US were removed from airports. I had no choice but to venture out into LA to try and find one.

The information desk informed me of a post office across the street from the Hertz rental car station. Thinking I was home free, I went out to wait for the Hertz shuttle. However unlike most car rental companies, the Hertz buses were for customers with reservations only, and the driver wouldn't let you on board without a reservation number...well most drivers anyway. I wandered down to the domestic terminal thinking that there would be more passengers there (too many to check), and three shuttles later managed to slip aboard. I remember wondering why Hertz was being so elitest with their reservation policy, but as the rental lot came into sight I realized it wasn't so much elitest as a security measure. The place looked like a maximum security prison, complete with floodlights and electrified razor wire fencing. Not the kind of place to be wandering around in jeans and hiking boots with a car thief sized black bag at night stammering about mailing a cell phone before leaving the country. For a moment I thought about hoping another shuttle back to the airport and figuring out another way, until I remembered something I read in a spy novel once. The key to not seeming suspicious is to do everything with complete confidence, even if you have no idea what you are doing. So I shouldered my bag, walked straight to the exit gate and walked briskly through, head held high above the curious looks from the security guards.

The post office was across the street (thank you information desk) and the cell phone in the mail, I needed to figure out a ride back to the airport, some 5 miles away. I didn't dare try my luck twice in Fort Hertz, but I needed to find another airport shuttle someplace where security wasn't quite as tight...but where? The TSA employee parking lot. Strolled through the gate after nodding to the guard who questioned me in broken English about a permit and hopped the nearest bus with our nation's finest security team, all of whom were in uniform and didn't seem to think twice about what a guy in hiking boots and blue jeans was doing on their bus.

Turns out that in addition to being smelly and confusing, LAX is also incredibly expensive, even by airport standards. Two sandwiches and a snack for the plane ran about $35, and I was being thrifty. I briefly considered a beer before the flight, but $7 Budweiser was just too much (I didn't even venture a glance at the microbrew section).

My flight to New Zealand was aboard Air Pacific, and included a stopover in Fiji, having found the tickets at SkyAuction.com, sort of like the ebay of travel websites. I saved a considerable sum of money on the tickets, and quickly found out why. Let's just say that Air Pacific isn't Virgin Airlines. For starters I was in the middle seat of the middle row of the plane, and some clever airplane designer had decided to place the leg of the seat in front of me center-right of what traditionally had been considered leg space. And while equipped with an in-flight movie system, I could only manage to get the left side of my headphones working (not that it really mattered, the movies were all unknown to me, although City of Ember was pretty good). Dinner was served as lasagna (meat-based airline food options are never a good idea) in marinara sauce, a sauce that was repeated on "eggs" the next morning. And of course, within 3 minutes of taking off the guy in front of me immediately put his seat all the way back, and left it there for the next 12 hours.

The guy sitting next to me was friendly, a former flight controller for NASA named Joe who was spending a free month in Fiji working for Tony Robbins (the lifecoach). We talked a bit about traveling (he'd traveled pretty extensively throwing on a backpack and wandering Europe for 3 months in 1989, witnessing the Berlin wall come down) and other things before finally attempting sleep. I managed a few hours and awoke in time to see the sunrise over Fiji.

The Fiji airport was pretty tiny and we were the first flight of the day. I briefly wished this had been my final destination walking into the terminal being greeted by a tropical band, but the prospect of spending a few months surrounded by nothing but foreign tourists sort of ruined the appeal. A couple of Americans in line behind me (one of whom wore a hat with the geographical map of the US against a stars and stripes backdrop) started grumbling about the band almost immediately, wondering why the government would allow panhandlers in the airport (after concluding they were all from the same poor family). This didn't stop them from ridiculing a man who danced briefly with the band for not giving them a tip. No wonder American tourists have a bad reputation abroad...

I had originally thought about trying to slip out and find a beach during my three hour layover in Fiji, maybe drink something out of a coconut on a beach chair, but it wasn't to be. Instead I amused myself wandering the small airport (which was really a big duty free shop) and trying to guess the Americans in the crowd, as well as those who had been on my flight and those who were leaving after a holiday. I attempted more sleep, and finally dosed to the competing sounds of the native band (who were now playing in the departure terminal) and a duet of "I will survive" between Beyonce and N'sync playing from one of the music shops. For those of you who might be interested, the carpet in LAX and Fiji is exactly the same.

The flight from Fiji to the US was largely uneventful, my seat companion this time was a Field Biologist from Fiji who had grown up in Africa. The flight pulled in early and both bags made it. I breezed through the New Zealand immigration (its a pretty casual country as it turns out) and tracked down my hotel. My second piece of luggage was a large box of wine and harvest gear (not the type of thing a weight concious backpacker needs to haul around for a month), so I grabbed a taxi to the post office a few miles away and mailed it to my future employer. It was a brilliant summer afternoon so I elected to hike back to my hotel, stopping along the way to explore a tiny national park and buy some strawberries and ice cream. Returning to my hotel, I gloried in the value of the American dollar and ordered room service twice before passing out for about 14 hours.

I have learned exactly 6 things since being here:
1) Apparently if you are the first person to arrive at customs from a flight you do not get a pickle (although I am unsure as to what number you have to be to receive said pickle).
2) Wealthy people in New Zealand drive Fords.
3) At crosswalks, walking signals are accompanied by a sound that is precisely like a laser in Star Wars.
4) New Zealand cabbies would rather take exact change than make change, even for a tip.
5) The hot and cold faucets are backwards (still haven't determined the opposite swirl down the drain thing yet).
6) After watching Cricket for 2 hours, I still couldn't figure out the point.

Today I'm off to Melbourne to visit my friends Colin and Mary, attend the Mornington IPNC wine festival, and sleep on a beach for a week. That is, if all goes according to plan...

Pictures will be coming just as soon as I find a computer with a USB port!