Awake from ~2:40 for a couple of hours.
Got up and ready and blogged yesterday.
Mum went off for a bushwalk around 9, and we repacked and cleaned shoes and got ourselves organised.
Left Mum's around 10:40 and headed for the airport. OMFG they've widened President Avenue! It used to be a dinky little 1 or 2 lane road, now it's three lanes in places. Also Sydney is a riot of purple at the moment with all the jacarandas in bloom.
Stopped for petrol at the big servo on General Holmes Drive. But then coming out the GPS didn't start (it's trash anyway) and I forgot you needed to exit to the right for the airport. So we had to go around the block. Pretty big block too. Whoops.
Then had to try and find where to return the car. We knew it was in the big parking stations but Sydney Airport is trash and didn't have clear signs where to return the hire car. In the end we went around THREE times in different lanes trying to find the right place to go. Hopeless!
Got up to checkin and saw the same lady from Sunday. The flight was going ahead today (they'd cancelled another flight this morning although apparently that was an engineering issue). I was looking at the wind movements on windy.com and thought probably the right side of the plane would be better, but the lady said the most common approach means the left side of the plane is the best for the view (which was the case in 2007 and I missed out because I was on the right).
We grabbed a sandwich on the way to the gate to have for lunch.
Once the opened the gate we piled onto a Rex bus to drive us round to General Aviation (almost back to the Ibis hotel!) to board the plane.
The flight was scheduled for 12:55 but we didn't start moving until 13:20, with a 13:30 takeoff.
Took off to the north on 34R and headed north. Because of the weather they needed to refuel in Port Macqaurie.
They gave us some water and a packet of nuts once we were in the air.
Bizarrely, even with two cancellations in the past two days, there were still eight empty seats on the plane!
At one point they made an announcement about the storms but the speakers were a bit trash and we couldn't hear most of it.
So then we started the descent. But we were nowhere near the coast. WTF? Turns out we were going to Tamworth.
!!!
Once we landed in Tamworth they started the refuelling. We were there for a while and the cockpit door was open so I wandered up to say hi. Had a bit of a chat to the copilot and he said it was looking very unlikely that we'd make it out to Lord Howe Island. There was a massive line of storms all up and down the coast that they'd have to fly through, plus it was starting to get late and they were getting worried they'd be stuck on the ground after sunset (LDH doesn't have any lighting on the runway).
So a little later they made the announcement that the flight was cancelled and we'd be returning to Sydney.
Our trip was over. There would be no getting to Lord Howe Island.
We decided we'd go home that night. I called Murrays to ask for a change to a 19:00 coach that evening.
They let us off the plane around 15:42 to wait in the terminal while they waited for a landing slot in Sydney. They said to meet back at the apron gate around 16:45.
I immediately called Skytrans to discuss the option of rebooking for a future date, and they said that would be no problem, and they'd even offer a full refund. But when I said we'd booked through Qantas they said I'd need to talk to them. Sigh. I *hate* trying to talk to Qantas, you're always on hold for hours.
I also called Murrays again to change to an even later coach (time was marching on and I didn't think we'd be back by 19:00). 22:25. ok.
Now that was all sorted I relaxed. I'll still ask Blue Lagoon for any sort of refund, but *hopefully* it'll be covered on travel insurance. On the plane and in the terminal we started chatting to various other people who had been equally screwed over. Such sad times for everyohne.
They had some water and snackages laid out for us in the terminal which was nice.
At 16:45 we headed back out but not everyone was there, and neither were the pilots. So we wandered back to the terminal. Turns out they weren't in any hurry because we still didn't have a slot for Sydney.
Eventually a bit after 17:00 we got back on the plane (no security recheck, funny stuff).
At 17:21 I got an SMS from Skytrans that our flight had been rebooked for Friday the 6th. Remember we were due to come home on the 7th.
They had the APU going so there was aircon, but it was still pretty stifling. After about half an hour they said the storms were still over Sydney and it was chaos, so we'd need to wait a bit longer.
So we got off the plane again haha. The terminal wasn't open this time but the sun was setting and it was very breezy so it was a lot nicer than being on the plane (Stu waited on the plane though).
There was a super cool little bearded dragon (or similar) literally sitting on the apron gate. I may have picked it up. Chatting to various people while we waited.
Stu was watching the flight trackers, it was definitely chaos in Sydney. Lots of planes were in holding patterns waiting for the storms to pass and the ground stop to lift. The scheduled Qantas flight from Tamworth to Sydney that left while we were waiting was looping around as well.
Eventually a bit after 19:00 we got back on the plane again and started off around 19:15.
The sun had just about set by the time we left so no good photos, and we could see the storms and lightning off to the east. They gave us some more snacks and complimentary wine/beer which was nice.
Our flight was simple and straight in, landing on 16L and at the parking spot around 20:23. Just a bit of rain around but easing. Back onto a terminal bus around to T2. Got our bags and wished everyone luck.
Stopped at the Inbound Convenience cafe to grab a light dinner and a drink.
Then around 21:25 we went out to catch the transfer bus around to the international terminal to get our coach. It was running a bit late, not even arriving until after 22:25. Just before it arrived I had another look at my latest email from this afternoon and realised they hadn't changed the date, only the time. So were still booked for Saturday, even though I said tonight. Had a bit of a panic that we'd have to stay the night in Sydney. Luckily they just called the office and moved the booking and we got on. Phew! Left around 22:34.
I was ok for the first hour but at 23:27 the restless legs started. So the next two hours were torture.
23:58 passed Sutton Forest (half way point) and at Jolimont at 01:32 (and no red lights all the way down Northbourne until our turn off). Stu managed to get us an uber in like a minute, and home at 02:00.
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