South America Part 34 - Homeward Bound

When we got to Madrid airport - we attempted to check in at the "Business" Iberia check-in. The woman at the check-in was probably the first person at check in (all of the world) that couldn't speak hardly any engrish. "We would like to check in - we are going to Canberra, Australia." "Que?" Ant was very suspicious - wondering if she would put on the right bag tags (noting that Iberia have lost our bags before for 11 days).... but apparently - everything was OK (even though Canberra was spelt "Camberra"). Ant took the opportunity to swipe as many Iberia bag-tags he could (they are plastic and superior to those sh##y Qantas ones and those LAN ones which fall off your bag even on a short flight).

We have got progressively worse over the holidays in trying to guestimate how much money we needed out of ATMs in each country. I was running out of money big time up until the second lunch in Madrid - I had originally got out 150 euros - but had spent 100 at H&M, 30 on Muesum passes and the rest on falafels... so I had thought I had better get out another 70 (most of which I didn't need). So I was in a bit of a mad rush trying to get rid of it (buying various gifts and trying to buy food)...

Our flight to London was surprisingly bad - although everyone is dressed for winter - Iberia thought it might be appropriate to keep the aircraft at "Tropical Heat" temperature. Also - you know how most airlines play music to calm passengers before and after a flight - well Iberia were playing the worst gawddamn Christmas (or should that be Navidad) music I have heard. To add salt in the wounds - they were playing it in January. One of the songs sounded like Celine Dion singing "I want to wish you a Merry Christmas" - but midway thru the song - they would start singing "Feliz Navidad" and various other spanish language lyrics. Stuff all that Iraq prison torture techniques - try putting "suspected terrorists" on an overheated Iberia flight with bad spanish christmas music on in January.

We got to Heathrow and it was "chilly" to say the least. We both rocked up to the BA lounge with Ant's Qantas Club card and used their strange showers with extra nozzles (just in case the overhead shower fixture doesn't get you wet). It was a little strange - they were playing a "bird chirping CD" in the lounge - maybe they were trying to outdo Iberia in terms of the annoying stakes.

If the Iberia flight to London was bad - the BA flight was truly hell. Their seats make Qantas's economy seats look spacious. To add shards of glass to our wounds - there was this morbidly obese guy sitting next to me who was pretty much occupying half of my seat for the whole flight. I tried watching a couple of movies - but the guy was lying on top of my movie controller thingy - so I couldn't turn it off "The Island".... (NOOO!!!).

Hong Kong airport was fairly pleasant - we both had another shower at the Qantas Club and changed clothes (definitely recommended). Time passed really quickly (maybe because we were both really tired).

Our Qantas flight was a lot better - we managed to get a exit row to ourselves. Ant really likes the exit row because he always talks "shop" with the flight attendants. It so happened that the flight attendant who was sitting near us - was on our "doomed flight from hell" from Melbourne to Sydney at the start of our trip. Ant finally got to see the Wallace and Grommit Movie and I managed to beat my Lumines (PSP Game) record despite only having 3 hours sleep in 24+hours.

Arriving at Sydney Airport - Ant did his usual "buying gifts for his parents" (aka buying 2 cartons of cigarettes) - being very careful in not buying the menthol ones.

We got our bags (Ant was in shock) and made our way thru the "Something to Declare" line at customs. After the customs guy was asking us about South American women (cough) and bagging me out for being a public servant (...who does customs people work for again?? I forgot?) we showed them all of our wooden parafanelia - all of which was OK. Then we showed them our two tins of Dulce de Leche (one was for us, and the other we bought under instruction for a friend)... He checked a list and said - "where did you get it from"... We said "Argentina" and he said no - no dairy products from Argentina and took the tins away from us and chucked them in a bin... Apparently - if we had gotten the stuff from Chile instead of Argentina - it would have been OK (Argentina has foot and mouth disease). It wasn't like we were going to use the Dulce de Leche and feed it to cows or something.

Even though we lost the Dulce de Leche - I did manage to smuggle in a copy of Ken Park on DVD (banned in Australia). (YES!). Be sure not to miss the australian advanced screenings of Ken Park at CineNickandAnt near you.

When we got back to Canberra (in a bit of a postscript from our doomed flight from hell to LA) - Ant received a letter from Qantas - which apologised over the screw up. The letter also contained a Qantas $600 coupon - not too bad. We think it was because he wrote what he did on Flyer Talk (and Qantas people check it fairly regularly). The letter was dated 6 December (which was the Monday after the flight). I don't think Qantas staff regularly scan "Blogger.com" for nasty stuff - so I might send them a nasty letter - and see if I can get free money in the mail.

This concludes our South American Adventure - it has definitely been a bit of a rollercoaster (in terms of the great and the bad). Highlights for Ant were Buenos Aires and Madrid - and for me - BA, Peru and Rio. Chile was a little disappointing - I don't think there is all that much to do at Valparaiso (do it in a day trip instead) - but I think the problem with Santiago was the fact that we were over there during Christmas - so things were bound to be shut. Muchu Pichu (or its lack of) was a disappointment - but I think we recovered in terms of Seven Cities of Gold pretty well. We have enjoyed putting together this blog and will definitely keep it going for any future trips (which won't be that far off - Japan in a month).

Adios for now.