Travels off duty

Leaving Brisbane marked the end of the first phase of my Quaker visiting. Now I'm on holiday! The flight to Sydney was totally full but simple enough. I took the train into town and checked in at the hotel, a different one from before and conveniently very near the central station. After a short rest, I went up to the Meeting House to collect the package I'd left there and to arrange with Nick about tonight's opera, for which he is joining me. We agreed it was easiest to arrive independently and meet in the bar: but in fact I came upon him walking up from Circular Quay to the opera house. There was some kind of pop concert on the forecourt, so loads of crowd control and security people, but we weren't delayed at all. The production of Tosca was the Opera North one I'd seen and didn't like. For those of you who know Tosca, this production used only one set, a dingy church basement, and changed the story significantly in places, so that some of the words didn't make sense. However, the singing was glorious, and Tosca herself - a last minute substitute as the billed singer was ill - was superb, with one of the best Vissi d'arte performances I've heard (the famous aria in act 2) which received well deserved applause. So it was an enjoyable evening, and good to have company. Nick, bless him, ran me back to the hotel, having seen how I was walking on the path back to Circular Quay. Next day I was very restful. I posted a package to my hosts in Perth - 2.5 kilograms of weight not to be in my suitcase! I won't travel so heavily again, though to be fair I don't think there's anything I won't have used or worn by the end of the trip. The Australian 'Post Shops' are excellent, they keep all sorts of packaging materials and will tape packages up for you, so I was able to walk in with a carrier bag of stuff and send it securely wrapped. Four days or so, they said, from Sydney to Perth: try that with Parcel Post in the UK!

This done, I had a light lunch and flirted with the idea of doing the Opera House tour, but decided that an hour's walking around wasn't going to help the knee. So I rested and wrote up my journal, and went to eat in the hotel - a huge steak, very good value, with a glass of house red (less so but at least acceptable). At about 9.50 my sister was due, so I went down and stepped outside to see if there was any sign, and at that moment her taxi drew up. She'd had a good journey: we went up to the room, did minimal unpacking and went quickly to bed, as we had a very early start.

Next morning we were up at six, and took a taxi along surprisingly busy roads to the airport. We were on different flights, my agent having not done what I wanted, so we separated and I took the plane to Christchurch and then waited for the connecting flight to Queenstown. This latter has a small airport and you fly in literally through a gap in the mountains, a quite spectacular approach! The B & B proved very nice with lovely views of lake and mountains: in the evening the sun was just on the mountain tops. I think this will be a good start to our New Zealand holiday.