All our stuff packed into a borrowed backpack, Iris and I were ready for a weekend jaunt up to Syd-n-ey. Heading for the airport, we boarded a train which whizzed us straight into the city, where we came face to face with thousands of racegoers heading home from Flemington after a long hard day’s punt. We roamed around Flinders Street station for a few minutes looking for a cab, but found none, at least none that weren’t already full. Jumping onto another train for Spencer Street, where the airport bus
leaves from, and where there should be more cabs and less people, seemed like a good idea, so we did it.
Alas, there was a queue for cabs at Spencer Street too, but it seemed like a shorter one. The airport bus wasn’t due to leave for 20 minutes, and it was already 6:10, which was going to be cutting it fine for a 7pm flight. I was almost starting to panic, but I knew from having checked the Qantas web site before leaving home that the flight was going to be at least 15 minutes late anyway. And besides, we thought, what use would panicking be?
A mini-bus taxi pulled up, and the enterprising driver worked out that a few of us wanted to go to the airport. So we piled in with a bloke going home to Brisbane and drunk woman who had been to the races, and was flying back to Sydney without her luggage because she didn’t have time to battle the traffic to her St Kilda hotel before her flight. She did, however, have her mobile phone, which rarely left her ear. The driver also promised to give a lost woman a lift one block to King Street, to an address which she said was "opposite The Men’s Gallery". And that’s not exactly a place where you view art.Hmmmmm….
We got to the airport by about 6:45, and checked-in to hear it confirmed by the woman (who I suppose could be classed as a check-in chick) that the flight was indeed, delayed by a few minutes. But all went well after that, and we were touching down in Sydney before 9pm to be met by my sister Susannah and her hubby-to-be, Adrian, a thoroughly nice guy of whom my grandad once declared "she could do well with him." He’s happiest when everyone’s married, is my Grandad.
We went for a quick spin around the city before heading over the Harbour Bridge to their flat in North Sydney where we fairly rapidly dozed off.
