Wednesday, December 3, 2008

This leg of the flight was one a Boeing 777-300, which was nice in the sense that each seat had its own monitor and multiple On Demand movie choices. I watched Wall E and Ghost Town. The only problem was the seats were too close to each other. There was little leg room and it is very difficult to work on the laptop. With my elbows by my sides and hands near my chest, I feel like I’m a T-Rex trying to type. Fortunately, the flight wasn’t full and there was an empty seat next to me so I did have plenty of elbow room.

Rey and Liza were a couple rows in front of me, so I didn’t get a chance to visit with them.

The guy seating in the aisle seat wasn’t very friendly. Both times I need to use the restroom; he seemed rather annoyed that he had to get his butt out of the chair so I could use the restroom. I felt like saying “just get over it.”

The flight itself was tame. No funny characters to comment on. I realized it was probably because there weren’t many Americans on board. Ray from Mississippi may have been annoying, but entertaining. I can only wonder what the rest people on board our flight thought about these three annoying Americans.

Johannesburg Airport

I take back what I said about the Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. It has just been upgraded to a three star airport.

We arrive in at the Johannesburg airport around 10:40am. As we enter the terminal, we are greeted with the scent similar to paint thinner, dust falling from the ceiling, and no AC. It appears that the terminal is in the middle of being remodeled, however, I see no one doing any work. We stand in line for a while to get through customers. As I start getting warm, I try to keep my distance from everyone since it has now been almost 48 hours since I last bathed or changed cloths. I’m sure by now I am quite ripe. I imagine the snooty man sitting next to me looking over at this smelly, unshaven, obnoxious American in khaki cargo pants and hiking boots asleep and snoring away on the plane. I doubt he will on line and blogged about it to his friends and family, so I will do it for him. After getting through customs, we get our luggage and proceed to the domestic departures to catch our flight to Kruger national park. We are greeted by aggressive porters who help carry our luggage to the check in counter. Once at the counter, the lady informs me that my check in luggage is over the 20 kg limit and must pay extra. She says each passenger is allowed only 20 kg total for check in luggage. One bag is 25 kg, but she says she’ll let that one go. The smaller bag is 13 kg and I must go to a different counter to pay. I inform Liza and Rey about this, and head over to the other counter with my porter, who the whole way is telling me “No, this is not right. You are connecting from international, so there is no weight limit. I’m going to ask for the supervisor. This is no right. She must be new.” And so on. We arrive at the other counter and hand the gentleman the slip of paper which the lady in the check in counter wrote the total weights and excess weight on it. The porter and I explain the situation. He examines the piece of paper and saw the lady did not fill it out correctly, so he can’t do anything. We only have a couple hours lay over in Johannesburg, and at this point I’m willing to pay a small fee to check in this bag so that I can make my flight to Kruger. I’ve paid enough already and come this far, I don’t want to miss out on the opportunity and inconvenience Rey and Liza. The man behind the counter tells me he can’t collect any fee because she did not fill out the form correctly. She put the excess weight on the back. Plus, total weight minus the allowed weight does not equal the excess weight, and I have to go back to have her fill it out correctly. I’m starting to get more than a little annoyed. So the porter and I head back to the check in counter. Concerned about the time and being frustrated, I’m walking very fast. The poor porter who is carrying my bag and still ranting “This is not right... I’m going to talk to the supervisor….” can barely keep up with me. We get back to the counter and cut the line and go directly back to the original women and told they would not let me pay since she filled it in correctly. She’s took offense to that, and the fact that the porter is telling she is wrong. As she starts to explain the policy, I interrupt her and ask the counter lady sitting next to her if she can listen and confirm if the information is correct. She said she was listening. This annoyed my check in lady even more. She explains the policy again as I ask question and ask to reweigh both bags so I know the amounts myself. During the discussion, the counter lady on the other side (the lady who checked in Rey), who was now listening too steps in. She asked if I just arrived from Paris. I said I did. She turns to the girl and says, they are connecting from an international flight, there are no restrictions. This lady must be the supervisor or her senior, because the girl checking me in sat quietly, with her lips pierced and motionless as the other lady said this. The older lady apologized and explained that these are small plane and they are very concerned about the weight they have to carry. I was just happy it ordeal was over. I smiled and told her I understood. As the girl completed the check in process she was talking with the old lady about the policy and said one of the other supervisor had her do that just the other day. The older lady said as long as they arrive from an international flight within 24 hours, they are no restrictions.

After completing the check in, the girl apologizes and I smiled back at her said thank you. I was just happy to make my connecting flight and not have to pay extra. If she was new, I understand people do make mistakes. And since she was nice after being corrected and did apologize, I was over it. I knew I had to tip my porter any way, but I felt the poor guy did deserve it, having to run back in forth with me, carrying my luggage, and trying to explain to both of the counter people that they were wrong.

Flight to Nelspruit

Our flight to Nelspruit airport outside of the Krugar national park was on a small Jetstream 41, a 26 seat prop plane. Nelspruit is just to the right of Johannesburg on the map.


When Liza saw the size of the plane she was not very happy. She started telling us about her past experiences with turbulence on small planes. Before we boarded the plane it started to rain. As we taxied down the run way for our take off, it started to rain even harder. Liza was not very excited about this. I, on the other hand, was looking forward to the turbulence. I told her that and she thinks I’m crazy. We did have a little turbulence as we took off, but once we climbed higher, the flight was a lot smoother.






Ride to Kruger

We arrive at the Nelspruit airport and meet Tim our driver to the Jock Safari lodge. On the drive to lodge, we see quite a few local people waking along side of the highway, a number of them hitchhiking, or waiting at bus stops. Walking appears to be the only means of transportation available to a lot of the local people.


This is the first time I have experienced driving on the left side of the road; the correct side, according to Tim. I also notice that the drivers of the vehicles are much more considerate and harmonious then any other country I’ve been in. The slower vehicles and trucks on the highway frequently drive on the shoulder of the road, allowing faster vehicles to pass. Sometimes drive three or four vehicles wide on a two lane highway. I know this sounds dangerous and scary, but from my observations, it is common practice and they have it do so perfectly synchronized using their horns and head light/tail light signals to each other.


Tim informs us that the rocks in this area are some of the oldest on the planet. They have been dated as old as 3-5 billion years old.

Once in Kruger national park as we are still heading to the lodge and not even on one of our safari rides, we see all sorts of wildlife, including crocodiles, hippos, giraffes, and kudu to name a few. I’ll post all my pics once I return home. I will post some of the better shots soon in a separate post. As of Dec. 8, I have already shot almost 1300 pictures on this trip.






We arrive at the Jock Safari lodge and wait for the staff to open the sturdy, well protected gate. The place is enclosed by a heavy duty fence which is electrified along the top. It reminds me of Jurassic Park. After a completing our check in and a glass of Champagne, the host gives us a tour of the lodge and our cabins. We arrived a little late and decide to pass on the night safari. We agree to wait for the next evening. The first item on my agenda is a shave, shore, and a change of clothes. It is now 6:30 pm on Wednesday, 53 hours since my last shower.







I immediately fall in love with the outdoor shower.


This is the view from the shower.


As I shower, I hear Liza, who is inside the cabin soaking in the tub her scream “Look at the elephants!” From the shower, I see a herd of elephants walking by. I quickly dry off, throw on some shorts, grab my camera, and start taking pictures. Liza calls Rey who is in the next cabin.


Drinks are at 8 pm and dinner is served at 8:30 pm. We head over to the bar where we meet JV the ranger who will be our guide during our stay, and Larry and Morla, a retired couple from Ireland. They will be in our group for the safari drives. Around 10 pm we head back to our cabins, since our wakeup call will be at 4:30 am. I am more than happy that we are calling it an early night. I am in need of a good nights sleep in a real bed.

Update

Paris was interesting, and I’m glad I made the effort to get out and see it. However, it was not nearly as entertaining as the rest of the trip, after meeting up with Rey and Liza, and venturing down to South Africa.


This is Rey, the birthday boy. I first met Coach Rey in 1994 right after I moved to San Jose at the Benton gym where we use to play volleyball every Sunday afternoons. I took a couple of the volleyball classes he and Matt W taught, which considerably improved my volleyball skills. Not only was he my coach, but also became a very good friend. Now that he lives in Los Angeles, I don’t get to see him as often as I would like. I could not pass up on the opportunity to travel to South Africa with him for his 40th birthday.


This is Liza. When you see Liza’s photos, you will notice she takes most of her pictures this way. I met Liza for the first time in the Paris Charles de Gaulle airport. We fell in love, eloped, and traveled to the Jock Safari Lodge for our honeymoon. Well, not really, but that was one of the possible answers we joked about as the guests and staff at the lodge wondered who in our group was married to who. There have been a number of times this trip I have laughed so hard I had tears coming out of my eyes. One time, something stuck both of as funny at an inappropriate time. We tried not to laugh, but the more we tried to stop, the harder it was to stop laughing. That hasn’t happened to me since I was a kid with my younger brother.

We have been without internet connection for over a week. We are determined to document our adventures and post them on our blogs. It has become one of the running jokes of this trip; blogging. “I have to blog today. I have to blog today.” Every chance we get, we’re on our laptops typing up our journals while the events are fresh in our minds, even at the expense of sleep. Last night, for example, I was determined to finish an entry in my journal but was having a hard time staying awake. I fell asleep momentarily, and woke up to find several rows of a single letter filling my screen because my hands were still on the key board. Of course I deleted all of the letters and went to sleep. Today I mentioned that to Liza and she laughed and said “Oh, you should have left those in your blog.” I laughed and said “Yeah, I should have, and type: Oops, I feel asleep blogging.” Then, she had the nerve to tell the story tonight at dinner and everyone had a good laugh at my expense. (Thank you, Liza. Buy a donkey!) I’ll explain that one later, after I find out how to spell it correctly.

One only have one USB modem and limited data transfer, so we will share internet access and wait to post most of our pictures after we arrive home. We will, however, continue to blog. Rey is a head of Liza and I, so he may be able to post his journal to date. Liza and I are catching up.

Okay, it's 3:15 am here in Cape Town. zzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzzz
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Time to get some sleep.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008: Part 2 – Paris

The Paris Charles de Gaulle airport is the largest, most user unfriendly airport I’ve ever experienced. It took me nearly an hour to figure out how to get out of the airport and how to arrange transportation the sites I wanted to see. I felt like I was in a Las Vegas casino looking for an exit. They didn’t want me to leave. At first, it was a little intimidating, since I do not speak the language, nor could find out how to get to the city. I contemplated just staying in the airport until Rey and Liza arrive. It was not like the US airports. I didn’t even see a restaurant in the airport. I decided that I had traveled all this way and booked that early flight with the intent of exploring Paris and not the Paris airport.

I finally found were I could buy a bus pass to the Arc of Triumph. The gentleman selling the tickets told me I could take the Metro to the Eiffel Tower or other sites. The bus ride took about an hour and a half due to the commute traffic.

While on the bus, an older gentleman sat down next to me and asked me a question in French. I asked him if he spoke English. He said he did and asked me what day it was. This struck my as a little odd; a local asking a tourist what day it was. I told him it was Tuesday December 2. He informed me that he had just arrived from India and hadn’t slept in 36 hours. I laughed and told him that I just arrived from California and hadn’t slept in about 24 hours. We chatted for a while making small talk about India, the US, and Paris. He really warmed up to me when I asked in people in France were as happy as the people in the US that Bush was no longer president. He gave me a lot of advice of places to visit in Paris and some of the old castles if I ever make it back with more time for site seeing.

He was use to work for Exxon but now was retired. He traveled a lot while working for Exxon, and was now living part of every year in India, France, and the US to keep his green card current. He was back to visit his mother, who wasn’t doing well and leaved in a small town outside of Paris (don’t ask me the name of the city because I won’t remember). Towards the end of our bus ride together he shared with me his motto: “No wife, no kids, no money, no worries.” He got off of the bus one stop before mine, and we said good bye and wished each other luck.

My stop was at the Arc of Triumph, the last stop for that bus route. It was quite cold out. Luckily, I had a sweater, fleece pull over, a shell, hat, and gloves along with me. I walked around the Arc along with a few other tourists and took a few photos.







Next, I took the Metro to the Eiffel Tower. After I get off at the stop and am searching for the exit, an older couple that also looked lost walk up to me. The man starts asking me a question in French. I tell him I don’t speak French, but do speak English. They smile, nod, and search for someone else to help them. As they walk away, I start to wonder if people there really think that I am a local, or do I just have an approachable look. I sure look like a tourist carrying my back pack and carrying a camera.

There were actually two Metro stops for the Eiffel Tower. Taking the advice of the guy on the bus, I get off at the Palais de Chaillot for the view, and walk the rest of the way down to the tower, which is only a couple blocks.

Once there, I decided not to stand in the cold in the long line to go up the tower. Instead, I walked around looking for ways to take non-touristy photos of the tower. I was surprised to see guards armed with machine guns patrolling the area. I saw two groups, each consisting of three people.
















Around noon, I decided to grab some lunch. Up the hill from the tower and across the street from the Palais de Chaillot were a few small restaurants. After looking at the menus, I chose the Café Kléber. The waiter greets me and naturally starts speaking French to me. I tell him I don’t speak French and asks if he speaks English. He says he does and asks me a question that I don’t quite make out. I ask him to repeat it. He repeats the question and I still don’t understand what he is asking. He repeats it a third time, a bit agitated. This time I realize he is asking me if I’m eating alone. More than a little embarrassed, I said yes, just one. I order lunch and a glass of red wine. After traveling for nearly 24 hours straight with no sleep, it felt good to sit, eat, and relax in the warmth of the café. So much so, that I ordered a pitcher of the red wine, and later a chocolate mousse and an espresso, and struggle with communicating with the waiter. The steak fillet was good, but the best part of the meal was the chocolate mousse. It was thicker than most mousses I’ve had. I wanted to take picture of the food, but I didn’t want to standout even more as a tourist as I was seated next to five French business man eating lunch (sorry Levon). Instead, I tried sneaking some candid photos of them. (Actually, I did get a picture of the food, but not the dessert.)



After about an hour of eating and relaxing, I ventured out walking around the area taking photos until the sun started to set leaving little light for taking photos.



By this time, I am starting to get a little tired, cold, and in need of a rest stop. I walk into a coffee shop on one of the corners on Kléber Avenue and sit at one of the tables next to a window. As I peel off the layers of clothing, the waitress approaches. Before she can speak, I ask her very politely and apologetically if she speaks English. She smiles and says she does, and I order a double espresso. I am starting to regret not spending more time trying to learn the language. I think the waiter at the Kléber Café may have been less rude if I had tried to speak French or could understand his English.

As I take a sip of my espresso, I notice that I have a small cut on one of my knuckles. I use a napkin as I dig a bandage and sterile wipe out of my back pack. (I’m sure glad I packed a small first aid kit in my back pack.) While digging through my back pack, I see the glass on the wall is broken and has a sharp edge. I must have cut myself on it while digging something out of my back pack earlier. Trying not to draw attention to myself, I try to quickly and inconspicuously clean and bandage the cut. After I bandage the cut, I finish my espresso and prepare to leave. I now notice that there are a couple small blood stains on my pant leg, and I won’t be able to change until we get to the safari. I was thinking to myself, oh great; this could look bad going through security at the airport. I only in Paris from a few hours, I leave the airport and return with a bleeding hand and blood on pants. Luckily, it was only a small cut and it stopped bleeding quickly.

I decide to walk back to the Arc of Triumph as the sun started.


From there, I took the bus back to the airport and found Rey and Liza just finishing their massages in a spa near the departure gate. I didn’t have any problems or get questioned about blood spots on my pants. However, Rey did notice it and asked. Oh well, what can one do. I felt like making up some dramatic story about what happened to me in Paris, such as being attacked by an angry waiter for not understanding his English, but I don’t.


We have a few hours before our flight to South Africa, so we grab a snack, and connect to the internet to check email and up blogs.

Our flight left at 11:15 pm, and my lack of sleep was starting to catch up with me. I feel asleep while we were taxing to the run way. Some how I managed to wakeup around mid night just in time for dinner (which was one of the better in flight meals I’ve ever had). After finishing the dinner, I fell right to sleep again and didn’t wake up for another six hours.

Connected in Cape Town

We arrived in Cape Town on December 5. We finally have internet access. Please stand by as we post our daily journals. We have a lot great stories and photos to share. Just wanted to post a quick note to let everyone know we are alive and well, and having a great time.

Tuesday, December 2, 2008

I arrived at the Paris Charles de Gaulle airport at 6 am Paris time without getting any sleep on the plane. I took a bus to the Arc of Triumph, which took about an hour an a half due to traffic. From there, I took the Metro to the Eiffle Tower and walked around taking photos. Luckily I brought a hat, gloves, a sweater, fleece jacket, and wind breaker because it was COLD! I had lunch and a pitcher of wine at a small cafe, before heading back to the airport to meet up with Rey and Liza.

We are currently waiting for our flight and blogging. I'll provide more details, humor, and pics of my day day in Parus later, since I only have 20% left on my battery. I at least wanted to post my journal from my flight.

Here's one pic in the meantime.

The funnier pictures I took with my DSLR. This laptop doesn't have a built in reader for those cards, so I'll have to upload those in South Africa.

Monday, December 1, 2008

3:30 am arrives too quickly when you are too excited about the pending adventure and when your mind is still processing its To Do and packing lists, seeing if there was anything it missed. I finally fell asleep between 10:30 and 11:00 pm.

San Jose to Atlanta

I arrived at the airport around 5 am and the flight departs at 6:30am. Luckily the lines weren’t too long and the flight left on time. The first leg of the trip was a flight from San Jose to Atlanta, which was about a four and a half hour flight. The plane consisted of one center aisle and three seats in one row on each side of the aisle. I normally choose a window seat so I can watch the scenery. I chose an aisle seat since it is a short flight (relatively speaking), and since I’m traveling to Paris and South Africa, looking at mid West from 20-30,000 feet didn’t sound that appealing. I’ve seen my share of wheat fields and prairies. Okay, I’ve never seen corn fields, but from that altitude, I’m sure it looks the same. (I’m being a little silly. I know it’s not all prairies and corn fields between San Jose and Atlanta).

The in flight movie was Mamma Mia, which I hadn’t seen. As I watched it, I wondered who casted Meryl Streep and Pierce Brosnan, and why. Both are good actors (well, Meryl at least), but for a musical?

A couple times during the flight, someone aboard the plane felt comfortable enough to share some nasty fumes with the rest of us. After one of the events, as I visually inspected the immediate vicinity, I spotted what I suspected was the source of the odors. The gentleman across the aisle from me, I’m guessing in his late 40’s, somewhat on the large size, wearing hiking boots, dark brown khakis, an old blue wool sweater, shaggy graying hair, three or four days growth of beard, listening to his IPod, which he wore around his neck, was fast asleep and snoring away. While looking at him, I noticed the lady sitting next to the window in his row was looking at him too, with the same look on her face that I’m sure I was wearing. The lady and I made eye contact. In that brief moment, in silence, we can to a unanimous decision; Guilty! We both went back to watching the movie.

Mind you, I don’t make fun of or criticize other people. I’m simply giving an accurate description to complete the mental picture since I don’t dare sneak a real photo. Since I’ll be traveling for nearly three days straight without a wardrobe change or a shower, and expecting rain and possibly snow in Paris, and 80’s in Johannesburg, I’m dressed similarly to that man with the gas leak, and dressed in layers. However, I do have brand new REI boots, Tommy Hilfiger khaki cargo pants (sorry, I opted for comfort and function over fashion), and a dark blue form fitting Puma shirt. It’s tighter than I’d normally wear in mixed company, but it was suppose to be the under layer for mixed weather.

I feel sorry for however has to seat next to me on the flight to Johannesburg, since it will have been a while since I last bathed. It will probably be my friend Rey, LOL.

The stewardess, walking down the aisle carrying a trash bag looks at me and said “Trash!” I felt like retorting wise-assed comment, but instead I bit my tongue, put my “trash” in the bag, and said “Thank you.”

For the most part, the short flight was uneventful. The rest of the people on the flight didn’t draw my attention, until we started our approach to Atlanta. The gentleman sitting next to me, (I’m guessing early 30’s and Middle Eastern decent), who had been reading a Financial text book the entire flight, didn’t catch my attention until I caught him admiring his perfectly manicured nails in the reading light. Instead of having his palms faced towards him and his fingers curved towards his palm, his palms where faced away from him. Busted!

Atlanta to Paris

This is a full flight. This leg is on a Boeing 767-300, which consists of two aisles. The window sides have two seats. The middle, three seats per row. This time I chose a window seat. So far, all my flights are in coach. I inquired about upgrade for this flight, but the flight is full.

I took us a while to pull away from the gate as people played musically chairs. The flight crew was trying to find seats so that a father and his baby could sit next to each other, and asked the people in the middle aisle if an of them would be willing to change seats. One of the ladies in the aisle in front of me said “No, not a baby!” One of the stewardesses looked at her and said “How selfish.”

So they seated the father and baby in the in the center aisle in their row. A few minutes later, the father and baby ended switching seats with and older Middle Eastern woman and teenage girl. Shortly after that, one guy in his early 50’s from “Mississippi” who had been flirting with the two women sitting in front of me started trying to convince an older Middle Eastern woman to change seats with him. She was refusing since she just changed seats with the father and baby. He was trying to sweet talk her into change seats and offered to buy her a drink along with the other two women he had been flirting with. I thought to myself, this is going to be a long flight. Luckily, a stewardess walks up and told him to take his seat so that we can leave. He explain to the stewardess that he was trying to talk “this sweet lady” into changing seats with him, “just three rows away” so he could sit near his friends. She calmly but firmly said “We cannot take off until you take your seat. I don’t get paid until we take off, and when I don’t get paid, I get cranky.” He said “Okay, I don’t want you to make you cranky” and returned to his seat.

The in flight movie is Fred Clause, which, well, doesn’t deserve any comment. I’m only listening to the movie as a noise filter. ;-)

Last night I found out from Rey that Expedia changed flight to Paris. Now they will be arriving around 2 pm Paris time. Our flight to Johannesburg doesn’t leave until 11:15 pm, so they will have a long lay over, but Rey didn’t feel it was long enough to try to do any sit seeing. I’ll talk to the Delta desk when I arrive in Paris to make sure I can leave and do some site seeing. I don’t see why I can’t as long as I have my passport, boarding pass, and my carry on back pack. I’ll meet up with them at the gate. I’ll return to the airport early enough to get through security, hopefully connect to the internet, and meet up with them. To bad our cell phones won’t work in Paris so we can contact each other.

Dinner time: chicken or pasta. Hmm, chicken? I haven’t decided yet. Shutting down for now.

I’m back, and so is Ray from Mississippi ready to buy his lady friends their drinks. The movie is already over, so I scramble looking for my MP3 player to filter out good ol’ Ray. “Where are you ladies from?”

“Texas,” one of them answers. Where’s my MP3 player? Here it is. Luckily I didn’t find it right away, other wise I may have missed “the question.”

“Do you have a wife?”

“Yes, I do.”

LOL, music on.

In case the suspense was killing you, I had the chicken. It was nothing to get up in the middle of the night and write home about, even though it is 1:20 am Paris time. My first reaction to the meal: “Where’s the chicken?” As in the old commercial: “Where’s the beef?” I imagined the lady sitting next to me saying “Why don’t you look under the over cook broccoli?” (Sorry Levon, I didn’t take a pix of this meal.)

Luckily, I was able to wash it down with a complimentary bottle of Redwood Creek California Chardonnay 1890. Wait, that can’t be right. Where are my reading glasses? Oh, Established 1890. It’s a 2006. It’s okay. Think I’ll look for a case in Cape Town and have it shipped home. Just kidding! (For those of you who don’t know me well, I have a very dry sarcastic sense of humor.)

“Watch your arms and legs. Watch your arms and legs. Watch your arms and legs.” The stewardess repeats as she pushes a cart up the aisle. Why? What are my legs and arms going to do? I have to see this. Sounds exciting. Still waiting…

Ok, yes I get bored quickly and I’m easily amused. These are going to be long flights. Think anyone would mind if I did laps round the plane to burn some energy, like our father use to make us do as kids at rest stops or gas stations on long road trips? I hated doing them, but hey, it worked. I’d probably do the same to my kids.

I wonder what they put in the food. Half of the plane is now lined up for the rest rooms. I feel fine. They must have had the pasta. Wish I had a copy of the DVD Airplane 1980! I love that show. “I’m not kidding. And stop calling me Shirley.”

They’re starting another movie. Wait, I think its Mamma Mia, again. Nevermind.

It should try to get some sleep. After all, it is 1:35 pm Paris time. Wow, only five more hours until we land, and I only have 15% battery left. I should rest.

What, turbulence coming up? Cool, this sounds fun. :) I love turbulence. Maybe I’ll stay awake after all.

It’s now 3:45 am Paris time, and I cannot sleep considering it is 6:45 pm San Jose time. I’ll sleep from Paris to Johannesburg, I hope.

The turbulence didn’t amount to much, unfortunately.

I decided to try to download new music to my MP3 player instead, and write more for my blog. I hadn’t installed the software for my MP3 yet on the laptop, and it looks like it doesn’t support Vista. I’ll have to search for a new driver once I get internet access.

It’s now 8:05 pm San Jose time, 5:05 am Paris time and they are starting to serve breakfast. Not sure what adventure is in store with this meal. More complimentary wine perhaps? Well, the bag it is in is warm. A croissant (LOL), and a banana and OJ.

I now see city lights out the window. Wow, a lot of lights. We’re no longer over the Atlantic Ocean. I wonder where we are. It looks like we’re starting our decent. I guess that’s enough of my miscellaneous ramblings for now. This will probably be the longest entry of the trip since I’m traveling solo at the moment and killing time on the plane. I’ll try to post this as soon as I can in Paris since it may be at least a week until I can post a new entry. Unless I make time after exploring Paris (if I can) and before I board for Johannesburg.

The lights I saw must have been London. According to the in flight monitor, we flew over England near London on the approach to Paris.

Final quote for the flight from one of the ladies in front of me to the other lady: “Did you enjoy your drink from Mr. Mississippi?”