Vancouver Journal : Round the World - DAY 1 Perth - Vancouver

2006-06-17

Arrived in Canada last night. Trip over was ok - Los Angeles was interesting having never been to mainland USA before - it makes me realise how lucky we are in Oz! Everyone talks incessantly! The background noise is amazing - in Oz everyone tends to mind their own business - yesterday seemed surrounded by people intent to make sure everyone around them was aware of all their issues!

Our introduction into the US was interesting with a 150kg african American at the airport metal detector yelling at Nick and I ' Get your goddam shoes off!' Nick and I looked at each other and started laughing- needless to say the guy didn't take it too well and we had images of the said chap pulling on the dreaded rubber glove so we meekly complied.

We progressed through customs to our next flight on Alaska Airlines - easily identified by the Eskimo painted on the tail of each aircraft. We were relieved by the standard of the member lounge and the ignorance of the staff to ignore their maximum three alcoholic drinks per patron policy on the account that we were Aussies (and because we seriously sucked up to them!)

LA airport was a marvel in logistics with aircraft taking off and landing every 20 seconds - although we thought that a country capable of moon landings and remote precision bombing could have ensured the airconditioniing in their airports and a PA system that patrons could comprehend.

Anywy, we lined up inseveral queues ith the intent of boarding the aircraft to be told that we were in the wrong one several times and no guidance provided where the right one was! We were lamenting the usual ignorant traveller difficulties when we spotted a group of extrodinarily good looking hostesses heading towards the gate of aircraft. Things were looking up we thought and all derisive thoughts vanished and our opinion of Alaskan Airlines took an immedate valuable grades upwards in our assessment of the provision of sevice to the customer. We diligently stepped into the aircraft to be confronted to my dismy that I was in the mddle seat of two rather large ( no lets say very large) elderly ladies. The next two and a half hour provided Nck and Bob with much mirth and merriment as I had to sit forward in my seat for the entire time!

The hosties were something else! The Alaskan beautes had been evily substituted with several grannies dressed up in rather tight fitting uniforms (the sereotypical mutton dressed up as lamb). It was obvious that passenger were an inconvenient necessity who cluttered up ther vital office environment for these girls . We were put on notice immediatly when we were informed we could have anything we lliked as long as it was a coke or a pretzel. The whole cabin was introducd to the office politics of the cabin crew and one of the hosties was most put out when one of the passengers had the hide to place her bag on top of the hosties bag in the stowages - the cheek. Didn't e knw that those passenger stowages were actually staff stowages! It didn't passify the hostie in the slightest when t was pointed out that it was one of her mates that had put the bag there.
Anyay we flew over some spectacular country ncluding Mount St Helens (an impressive sight) before landing in Vancouver.

The airport at Vancouver was amazingly busy - apparantly Vancouver is the tour ship capital of the world - the lines were amazing but did move at a decent rate. The low point was that we had to wait for 2 hours to find that Nick's bag had been left behind at LA. Fortunately it arrived later that night at about 11pm.

We ventured out for a meal at the pub at the hotel - we stayed at the Holiday Inn at the Northe Vancouver - very nice and friendly - and walked into the second last game of the NHL ice hockey final of which apparantly one of the teams was Canadian. As we sat their scratching our heads and trying to work out the rules several patrons we concerned that we might be closet Americans! Putting on our broadest Aussie accents we convinced them of our nationality and were warmly embraced and provided a comprehensive briefing on the intracacies of the match and how much the USA team (the OILERS) sucked and why natural justice sould prevail for the Canadian side - obviously it made quite an impression as I cannot remember the name of the Canadian side!

Well after 20+ hours in planes one beer and a healthy serve of carboydrates we had difficulty keeping our head out of our burgers and we trundled off to bed at 8pm.

Travel Journal:

Round the World - DAY 1 Perth - Vancouver

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