Sunday, 18 May 2025
With a mid-afternoon flight we were able to fit in a decent 50-minute walk this morning in lovely sunshine. It was still cold, only about 7°C, but the sun was shining which made for a more pleasant walk than yesterday when it was cool and wet most of the day.
Kerry arrived at about 11.30am to ferry us to the airport dropping us at Terminal 2 just after noon. Because I was paranoid about our cheap (Aldi special buy) soft-sided bags bursting their zips in the hold of the plane I insisted that we should get them security wrapped so our first stop was the wrapping kiosk.
Hmmn, first we had to wait for the bag wrapper to come back to the kiosk where the sign said ‘Back in 5 minutes’. Which turned out to be pretty accurate, but we were standing at the wrong end of the kiosk and the man at the other end snuck in first to have his assortment of bags (which included a toolbox) wrapped. OMG, the wrapping is seriously heavy duty. I wasn’t concerned about security I said, we just want to make sure that the zip doesn’t fail and spill our luggage everywhere. It seems the service is one size fits all though and our bags were so securely wrapped in plastic that the attendant then had to make cut-outs for our wheels and handles. And Bernie pointed out that the wrapping service was costing us as much as the bags themselves cost at $20.00/bag!!
So, now our bags were wrapped they were sort of shorter so the distance between the handle and the end of our arms was far from optimal. And, despite the plastic being cut from around the wheels, they didn’t wheel so good!! Thank goodness it wasn’t far to the check-in counter. Cathy and Steve cruised up with their branded soft-sided bags – not purchased from the Aldi centre aisle! – that even sported telescopic handles. Maybe we shouldn’t have been such cheapskates with our bags?? Only time will tell if they will be up to the rigours of being on safari. Worst case scenario we will be buying better bags somewhere in Africa??!
Our check-in was supposed to be at Counter K, but first a Malaysian Airlines flight had to conclude check-in. Even after an announcement made that the Singapore flight had opened for check-in the kiosks to print luggage tags still said Malaysian Airlines. We sort of split our resources with Bernie staking out a kiosk waiting for it to be re-booted to the Singapore flight and the rest of us in a queue for the check-in counters which probably wasn’t the right place to be as we had all checked-in online, we just needed our luggage tags to be able to proceed to the bag drop.
Eventually the kiosks went red with no flight details on them and then gradually they all came back online with the Singapore Airlines flight details. Bernie commenced our check in and then found that because Bunnik booked all our tickets together Cathy and Steve came up next on the screen because they were linked to our details. Finally with all four luggage tags printed we were able to tag our bags and proceed to the bag drop. Ah, always such a relief to have the bags checked in and only be worried about carry-on bags.
Sans checked luggage we proceeded to security. So easy at Melbourne now that you can leave everything in your bag for screening. A zip on Bernie’s pants drew extra attention at the body scanner but otherwise we both made it through without any trouble. Of course, at least one member of our group HAD to be picked out for extra scrutiny and today it was Steve’s tub shunted to the side. A staff member scanned it further with an attachment that looked a lot like an ultrasound paddle, but nothing could be identified. In the end his various items were separated into individual tubs and sent back through the scanner which cleared them all individually. I guess that’s a note for the future to use more tubs so the scanner can get a better look???
Cathy and Steve were very organised and had had an early lunch at home before being dropped at the airport. While they proceeded to the gate we stopped in at Brunetti’s to have toasted sandwiches for lunch. We soon joined our travel buddies at the gate and settled in to wait until boarding time rolled around. For Bernie that meant firing up the laptop to watch his beloved Tigers playing North Melbourne at The G.
A little after 2.40pm boarding finally commenced for SQ228 to Singapore. With the game just entering the third quarter, and with the Tigers four point behind, Bernie had to shut down the computer to sweat on the outcome until we reached Singapore. Although boarding commenced a little late it was achieved efficiently with our B777-300ER aircraft pushing back from the terminal on-time at 3.40pm for our seven-hour fifty-minute flight to Singapore.
This flight is a first for us because we are flying from the southern hemisphere over the equator to the northern hemisphere to then travel back over the equator to finish in the southern hemisphere in South Africa. Because we booked through a travel agent we just went with the flights that they booked for us and didn’t do any research to know if there are flights directly from Australia to South Africa that do not go via an Asian hub? It seems a complicated way to do it rather than fly straight across the Indian Ocean from Perth to Johannesburg/Cape Town but if there is insufficient demand for such a flight to be offered, I guess via Asia it has to be.
The flight was entirely uneventful although to a soundtrack of crying babies in the bulkhead row just a couple of rows in front of us. We were served kung pao chicken with rice soon after take-off which made for an early dinner with our tummies still on Melbourne time of 5.30pm.
For entertainment, Bernie watched ‘Captain America’ and I binged the first five episodes of season six of ‘What We Do In The Shadows’. And we slept (dozed) a bit missing out on the second food offering which was a snack offering with a choice of samosa or chicken and vegetable pie.
We arrived in Singapore slightly ahead of schedule at 9.10pm and made our way into Terminal 3 keen to find out if our ongoing flight to Cape Town via Johannesburg was still scheduled to depart from Terminal 3. With our flight not due to depart until 1.30am the details were not even on the departure board yet. Bernie had a 500 Kroner note (acquired from an ATM in Norway) that he has not been able to exchange in Australia, so we wandered around looking for a currency exchange booth. First one, nope cannot exchange anything larger than 200 Kroner. This was also the case at the second AND the third money exchange booths. Aaagh, even in a large international hub like Singapore no-one wants a 500 Kroner note! Ah well, a problem for another day, how to convert 500 Kroner (about AUS$75) into a currency that we can use.
Once the departure board confirmed that we would be departing from Terminal 3 we ventured upstairs to the Singapore Food Street to buy some food and drinks to tide us over until midnight. Bernie checked the footy score and was gutted to learn that Richmond lost to North Melbourne by four points. At least he was spared going to The G to watch them lose in person?!
Steps: 15,126 (10.36kms)
