Up bright and early - feeling a bit better after a decent nights sleep, I was planning on having a nice hot bath, but the alarm call jsut went off which means I only have 1/2 hour to pack and get to brekky.
definately going to have the biggest brekky I can manage as I have no idea when or if we'll be stopping for lunch and after being used to 5-6 meals a day, thats going to be a bit of a shock to the system!
Ok get to reception for 7am - its bedlam - people everywhere, bags in piles and all over the floor - there's a line of tour vans outside....and....
yep
no sign of Peregrine.
Am not filled with confidence about Peregrine right now - hope this isn't an indication of how the trek is going to work....
I find a peregrine bus in amongst the line and there is a chap coming towards me who looks like an Abdul and he has another bloke with him - phew, could this be part of my group?
So the other bloke is Ian, a mancunian pom who lives in Caulfield - cool.
I tell Abdul that I have to check out and go and join a queue at the desk - there are only 3 people behind the desk today and all are either shuffling bits of paper, talking amongst themselves or on the phone - is there anyone doing checkouts?
turns out the only person who can do the check out is the bloke in the currency cashiers box.
This is taking forever - I can see Abdul is getting impatient, so I apologise, but he's cool and tells me 'to be free'.
When I finally check out (took 25 minutes to do the 3 people in front of me!), I get given a piece of paper which I then have to hand to the security guard at the hotel door....eh? no idea what the point of that is!
Bureaucracy rules!
On the bus is Ian and also Fritz, a german who lives in Sydney. Apparently there was supposed to be a 4th person, but they haven't arrived, so we set off out into African rush hour - crazy world! we crawl along a jammed 4 lane highway at slower than walking pace - how do I know this? because there's people walking along our lane amongst all the cars!
there are cars trying to change lane and blocking the few cars that are able to move - strangely enough nobody is leaning on their horn - its like nobody is in a hurry to get anywhere (just as well really!) if this was Melbourne, you wouldn't be able to hear yourself think for the horns!
After about an hour, we're still crawling - I'm fading again, my chest is tight and wheezy so I figure a snooze is the way to go...and promptly crash.
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