In Changi Airport

(Written on 4th Dec 12am Melbourne Time)
So the trip is now underway! Everything has gone off largely without a hitch, despite a bit of a scare regarding the weight of my bike bag. When we first put it up on the scales, it was 35kg, and the check in guy was definitely not letting me put that on the plane. I frantically looked for things to take out to get it down to 32kg and after putting my bike lock in my take on luggage as well as a few other things, it was down to 32.2kg, which was an 'acceptable' weight. Then he started making some phone calls to work out how much we were going to have to pay in excess baggage fees, because he didn't realise that our bike bags counted as sporting equipment, which can be carried free as long as it's only one item and it's not too heavy. It was quite nerve wracking, especially when we heard him whispering about $60/kg! In the end though, the British Airways rep set him right, and he begrudgingly let us through without paying anything extra (we later started concocting spurious explanations for his officiousness, concluding that he was jealous of us:P).

The flight to Sydney was ridiculously short. Seriously, it felt like we got on, got served a drink and got off again. A trip of one hour and twenty five minutes just makes a mockery of the distances involved (1400km)!

I'm writing this from Changi Airport, Singapore. On the flight board in Sydney, the stopover point was written as Bangkok, which might have worried us (I'm pretty sure the protests are still preventing any flights from coming in or out) had the message not come over the PA system, that we would actually be stopping in Singapore instead.

We've had a pretty good flight so far. The entertainment system wasn't working properly, but both of us just wanted to sleep anyway, and at least they actually gave me vegan food:) Our connecting flight to Heathrow has been delayed a little bit for 'operational reasons', but luckily we have a 6hr stopover in London before the short flight to Frankfurt, so it's not going to pose any problems.

I'd really like to get some sleep, but I don't think it's going to happen in cattle class.