#transcontinental flight

[mudwerks]

Project Bullet: The Golden U.S. Navy Helmet Worn by John Glenn during this Record-Breaking Transcontinental Flight in 1957

[brainheartpizza]

Dean should not be touched by anyone but Castiel, with anything but worship. He is so beautiful, so powerful, so fiercesome. He is the night and the rush of wings in the darkness. He is the desert and the heat that burns off the sand. He is the wind and the shiver as it passes over. And in all of these aspects, each and every one, he belongs to Castiel, every cell, every movement, every shadow he casts.

[ninks]

Plane(t) hopping in covid times

When the Covid-19 hysteria kicked in back in March, we (Jono and I) were living in Chamonix, a ski resort in France. We were working there as transfer drivers and from one day to the next we lost our jobs, along with everyone else that worked for this company. Borders were closed rapidly and we made the decision to return to the Netherlands. My sister Edith has a big farmhouse here and offered us to stay in the area that they sometimes used as a bar. It had been transformed into a little emergency apartment with everything we needed. We all expected it would be for a few weeks at the most, but it turned into almost four months! 

Jono could work for my brother in law as a roofer, and I was doing some freelance work but mostly I was doing nothing. Edith has a lot of animals so I spent a lot of time with them, our love for animals is mutual. My mother and other sister, brother in law and nieces all live in the same village as do some old friends so it was very nice to be back for so long, I have never spent that much time in the Netherlands since I left in 2001. We were there for Edith’s 50th reduced birthday - she had planned a massive party but due to covid restrictions she was unable to celebrate as she had intended, but it was still a nice party until well into the next morning. That was a pre-requisite; we cannot go down until the sun comes up again. 

This is George the sheep, he was madly in love with me and followed me everywhere. I would have to scratch his head and if I would stop he would tap me with his front leg, to say I had to continue scratching his head. As soon as his wool was shorn off, his love for me had disappeared. He no longer wanted anything to do with me, the bastard! 

There were 7 cats and 7 kittens, I managed to lure most of the cats to our little abode much to my sister’s dislike. All the cats used to sleep in her bedroom at night but now she had none left, they were all with us! I will really miss all the animals. 

George the sheep and Willem the donkey coming in to have a nosey

We strongly felt  it was time to make a decision of what to do next. We couldn’t stay forever, and the intial plan had been to move to Bristol in England for the summer, travel in South East Asia for a few months, then move to New Zealand later in the year. England is one of the worst places to be right now, and travelling through Asia as a tourist is out of the question too, so we let that whole plan slide and decided to move straight to New Zealand. That was easier said than done! I won’t bore you with too many details but after Jono obtained permission to enter New Zealand we had to apply for so many permissions, permits and exemptions, just for our flight connections. When we finally had everything in the nick of time we were booted off our flight without any warning! This resulted in having to apply for different transit permits and exemptions again, because the transit city and state had changed, Applied and obtained, only to be booted off the flight again, except this time we didn’t find out until we were in the check-in queue! We eventually managed to have our flight changed from Qatar to Singapore airlines, going another five days later. This was organised by a very nice helpful Qatar man that felt so bad about how we had been treated by his airline that he booked us onto another airline all up. We didn’t even know that was possible and we were thankful that we wouldn’t have to go through Australia anymore, which is getting stricter and stricter.  Third time lucky, as that flight actually went ahead, and it seemed too good to be true! The flight from Amsterdam to Singapore had only 29 passengers on board! This meant we could all have a row to ourselves, it was great. Too great. 

As fantastic and spacious the first flight had been, the second one was ridiculously packed! We were all being treated like leapers before, with keeping 2 metres distance at the airports and in between any other people, but as soon as we got onto the plane that rule had gone out the window - in airplanes covid contamination apparently simply doesn’t exist! We went from an empty plane with comfy seating to a much older plane that was completely full and the seats were incredibly uncomfortable. The worst of it all was that we had really expected the second flight to be similarly empty so that was a big booboo! That’s what you get when you get spoilt!  We got to Auckland around 21:30, which wasn’t too bad, it had taken us  24 hours and 15 minutes to get there, quite the record! As soon as we disembarked the plane, it was back to keeping 2 metres distance again. We were asked the same questions by five different people, then were chartered to a very nice hotel in the city centre of Auckland. This is where we will be locked in for the next 14 days.  More on the room and what it is like to be in managed isolation in the next blog. 

[bobmccullochny]

November History

November 5th - Remembered as Guy Fawkes Day in Britain, for the anniversary of the failed "Gunpowder Plot" to blow up the Houses of Parliament and King James I in 1605.

November 5, 1733 - The first issue of the New York Weekly Journal was published by John Peter Zenger, a colonial American printer and journalist. A year later, he was arrested on charges of libeling New York's royal governor.

November 5, 1911 - Aviator C.P. Snow completed the first transcontinental flight across America, landing at Pasadena, California. He had taken off from Sheepshead Bay, New York, on September 17th and flew a distance of 3,417 miles.

[jennifrrr]

I leave in less than two weeks. With no wi-fi and no power-charging source in economy (plus!) I have one current iPhone, one old iPhone, one old iPod mini, a Kindle, and work MacBook that I'm dragging along and need to fill with stuff to watch & listen to & read & entertain me for almost 15 hours. There might also be an analog book or two.

I am not relishing this particular part of the journey but know I will have the time of my life once I arrive.