Monday, May 07, 2012

the other bit (& other wanglings)

#2 of Brisbane.

The day after we saw One Direction we headed to the airport to drop off the car (nice and early) so as not to miss our flight.

We arrived an hour and a half early, dropped the car off and checked in. We had so much time left we headed to the food court to grab a bite to eat - listening for announcements (since there was no screen in the food court) to see when we should start heading over. At 25 minutes to flight departure I said "lets go to the gate" even though we hadn't heard any announcements yet.

As we arrived at the gate the flight attendant informed me that the gate had closed! I could see the plane, and the stairs were even still at the door to the aircraft but they had literally just shut the doors to the plane & wouldn't let us on!

They must be super on time at the Brisbane airport considering they had every one on the plane ready to go with 25 minutes to go before departure.

The flight attendant said they had called our names over the PA (and a bunch of other people we found later..suspiciously all sitting in the food court) and closed the flight after last call. I was perplexed because I had been deliberately listening for any announcements but we shrugged our shoulders and headed back down to the desk and transferred to another flight (which didn't happen to leave for another 10 .5 hours!) We had all ready dropped the car off and the train to Brisbane was $50 return so instead we decided to take the courtesy bus down to Airport Village where we hired a locker and left our bags then headed into the DFO.



If you ever want to start a conversation with a bunch of strangers (we were stopped literally every 10 minutes) just wear a One Direction t-shirt around the DFO.


I got Boy a sponge bob jumpsuit for bed time- ugliest thing ever but it is hilarious when he has it on and we have taught him to say "Unge ob" (sponge bob)

We ended up spending 5 hours at the DFO! Walking, Talking and mucking about - (my legs were a wee bit tired by the time we took the courtesy bus back to the terminal)

While we were going back through security the guy who bomb tested me asked if I was over 18 (because he couldn't bomb test me if I was under 18) and then said he thought I was younger than Emily! huh! (but he also said he thought Em was older than she is so.. I suppose that evens itself out.)

After security we decided instead of going anywhere else we would go straight to the gate (this time we were NOT being left behind) We were 4 hours early but definitely getting on the flight. Em went in search of a power point for her ipod so she could use the free airport wifi and go on twitter (who knew you could spend 2 hours on twitter?) because a LOOONNGG time later she came back and I think it was only because they booted her off the system. 


Then we sorted through our shopping and mucked around for a bit before heading off to find some dinner.


Em was waiting with the bags while I went to hunt and gather like a man. I walked down to the food court and got a couple things.. on the way back through I saw a sign which said  "domestic announcements cannot be heard beyond this point" -the sign - might I add was placed sneakily behind a pot plant. The mystery of our missed flight was solved. No wonder we didn't hear any boarding calls!

We arrived home to Melbourne safely at 12.20 and after a 1 hour drive back to the G were finally in bed by 2am . Its safe to say we had an EXTRA big day but it was worth it to spend time with Em !

Here endeth the Brisbane saga..




2 comments:

Lisa Helen said...

Haha a very eventful Brissy trip. How dodgy about the sign & no speaker in the food court, sounds like a revenue raiser to me!! Glad you made the most of it though & still had a great day!

The Kings said...

wow - what an adventure! :)