Lets Rendezvous Down Under

Excitement is now at fever pitch as Charlotte and I start our journeys to circumnavigate the globe and rendezvous in Sydney. Charlotte will be travelling west via Los Angeles whilst I will be travelling east via Hong Kong. So this marks an exciting start to our adventure already as we depart separately to next meet in Australia!

Thanks to the Virgin staff concessions we are allowed to take 3 pieces of luggage each and luckily for me one additional piece of sports equipment each...free!!! which is a massive bonus!!! So Charlotte has been entrusted with my surf board and I'll be taking my mountain bike. It was quite a sight this morning as we gathered our stuff for our journey: plenty of bags, surf board and bike.

Travelling light!

After an emotional goodbye to the parents we set off for Heathrow in Rob and Hannah's bingo bus, they'd even managed to clean it especially for us. The bingo bus did us proud though as not only was it a nice smooth journey up, all our stuff comfortably fitted in.

At Heathrow, after a little bit of drama checking in, we'd developed a thirst due to the hot weather  so headed straight for the Virgin Atlantic Upper Class lounge for a well deserved beer and moijito (or 2). We also met up with all the other crew on the exchange in the lounge and started to get to know each other. They all seem like a nice crowd.

This will now be our surrogate family for the next 12 months, as Charlotte will training with them for the next 7 weeks, whilst I'll be forced to tag along to all the social gatherings in and around the pubs and clubs of Sydney (oh! if i have to!!!).

After a spot of lunch (washed down with more beer and moijito's) it was time for me to say goodbye to Charlotte as she headed off to board her plane to Los Angleses. Thankfully she managed to get a seat in Upper Class, so that should be a nice flight for her. The next time we see each other it'll be in Sydney.

So now I just had to keep myself occupied for approximately 7 hours before my flight to Hong Kong.Thankfully though, it wouldn't be as hard as you might think, what with a free bar, waiter service, comfortable lounge chairs and a pretty impressive TV wall (yes! a wall) showing the F1 (and a pretty spectacular crash strewn GP2), England v W. Indies cricket and Ireland v Bosnia footy, plus the England game on later.

Impressive TV wall in the lounge

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"Garçon !!! one more glass of your finest champagne please!!!"

Next stop Sydney........................