Monday, 10 March 2013
Sydney > Townsville > Bowen
Much of the previous evening's failure to kick on had been down to an awareness of an eight-thirty booking on the airport shuttle, and twelve-thirty is way past Hughesy's regular bed time, butI was on deck by half seven, having packed the night before, and made my way downstairs to check out around eight-fifteen just to be on the safe side.
That was just as well since eight-thirty saw me on board the shuttle heading through Redfern en route to Sydney Domestic.
Checking in for the flight wasn't quite the smooth procedure one would have hoped for since tapping in the booing code at the terminal produced a direction to head for the service desk because we are unable to process your request at this time. That's the sort of thing that fuels the old paranoia, but as it turned out they wanted to know if I was happy to sit in an Emergency Exit row.
That was fine with me, particularly when a quick squiz at the boarding pass revealed I was in the aisle seat and would probably be limited to offering helpful advice rather than doing any actual heavy lifting in the unlikely event of an emergency.
The individual who would be doing that turned out to be another retired teacher for Newcastle, travelling with his better half to visit their daughter and grand daughter in Townsville, and instructions regarding the emergency exit provided a handy conversation starter.
On the ground in Townsville there was a short wait while Madam made her way around from The Strand, and from there we headed to Milk in Hermit Park for lunch, followed by the regulation visit to The Domaine to pick up another supply of bulk cat food and make the equally regulation visit to Kathmandu to check out the discount rack.
I was in the market for another backup drive, which meant a visit to JB HiFi, and a new USB hub, something I'd sighted at Next Byte inBrisbane and reckoned I'd be able to buy from their Townsville operation. That one didn't quite run according to plan since Next Byte had issues with strange smells through the air conditioning and had decided to lose for the afternoon. In any case, it seemed JCUNQ had bought up the supplies of what I was after and there weren't any in stock.
In any case I was ready to head for home.