Wednesday 18th November

Departure.

My flight out the country was scheduled for 2.55pm, Wednesday 18th November 2009. Mum had very kindly agreed to pick me up from Portsmouth after my "Final Send off" on Tuesday night. I dont think she quite realised at the time quite what that might mean. Despite numerous wake-up calls, and even toast hand delivered to my "bed", At 10.30 (departure time) I was still in dire need of a shower to remove the black marker pen and had still not seen the full effect of the night before's antics. With everyone sat around we recapped some of the nights events, until Mum rang to say she was outside but there was no parking available. Finally jarred into action - I flew to the shower while cars were re-shuffled and Mum was then entertained downstairs. A groggy 15 minutes later I was back - having cleared as best possible the pen off and having assessed the damage to my head. 5 years of harsh tricks on people at Uni has finally had payback - although it did take Mum a little while to notice!

Effects of Last Night Out

 After much rushing around, I was ready, Mum was back in the car all my bags had been taken out and it was time for goodbyes. As I stood there, with 4 of the 5 fools who had put up with me on the sofa for the last month chatting about the events of the previous nights it felt more like I was off on a weeks holiday. A few hugs later, and I was off. It wasn't sinking in yet that I wouldn't be back. I'd borrowed a hat to cover the failed mohican look and settled down into the car to go get my Canadian Dollars, adjusting it to a "jaunty" angle to hide the missing eyebrow. We were only 1 hour late leaving, and with a 5 minute stop off to collect the money what could possibly go wrong.

Arriving at the Ferry Port, the collection point for my money, we were directed into a car park right on the outskirts of the port, due to "congestion" which actually turned out to be just some building work. After 5 minutes of patiently waiting in the queue with very little action occurring in front of me, I was finally asked to take a seat to wait. It turns out that the 2 guys ahead, despite their young age, were entirely unable to fill in the required details for a cash passport online and had made the unfortunate assistant fill it all in for them. a lengthy task. After spending less than 2 minites at the collection counter, we were once again off! Now just past 12, a mere 1hour 30 mins behind schedule we started the journey to the airport - giving me the perfect opportunity to have a nap to try and recover. With the sat nav giving us an ETA of 2.20 and gates closing at 2.25 we started puzzling it.... and came to the conclussion the time must be wrong on the sat nav. An hour later, nap done, and ready to join the M25 and we discovered the problem. Instead of the clockwise 10 minute journey to the airport, clever sat nav had decided that we should go anti-clock wise for 1hour 10 minutes! Thankfully as both of us had brains, sat nav was retired and we reached the airport with plenty of time to spare.

Still not feeling the imminent departure, goodbyes were said and I was through to Security. Thankfully there was plenty of spare. My 2 items of handlugage include too many electrical items, which cluttered the xray scan so badly that my laptop bag had to be emptied to go through again! Finally with all cables wire and devices scanned and repacked I could move on - and finally had a chance to sit down, reply to a few of the masses of text message wishing me well, and make the promised phone calls. Boarding was smooth as pie, and the benefits of early check in was proven with my acres of leg room and great stretching out. I was next to a spectacularly untalkative Canadian heading home from a European tour. He was stuck with conversation as we waited ages for the plane to be refuelled and could finally take off before the entertainment system could be started.

Last view of UK before take off.

A short nap, a couple of films, some tv and 9 hours later - We'd arrived in Canada.Clearing the plane at 5.30pm I had an hour to make it through customs and baggage collection. No problem right? Wrong. As is always the way when there is a choice of queues, I managed to choose the slowest moving one. As my passport was about to be checked, a change of passport officers had me standing at the front of the queue for a further few minutes. Once through, it was time to get my work permit. Stood there with bullet proof vests, thickset scowls, the Canadian officials chatted more about how i had to give up beer as they dont have that over here and instead needed to drink Jack Daniels than any serious questions about me getting in and after they had broken, then fixed the printer I was issued my work permit and off to baggage reclaim. My delays meant my bags were already circulating, and i grabbed them and moved onto Customs balancing the over packed ski bag as it wobbled into everyone and everything. Due to the Christmas Cake declared on my landing card, I was directed to have my bags searched.... approaching 6.15 with my bus leaving at 6.30 and the extremly overpacked nature of my bags I was getting worried!

Find out in the next post what happens! :-)