We made it...finally!

After all the waiting and anticipation, we are in Brisbane Australia!

The flight was great for the first 13 hours. I slept about ten hours of the flight, it was fantastic! Pitch black on the plane, I had Big Boi's latest bouncing through my Skull Candy's to block out the screaming babies two rows in front of us, I was out like a light! Britt and Jake slept too, just not as much.

We flew Qantas, a 747-400...very smooth. The Qantas staff was wonderful, they took care of every detail, everything from warming up baby formula for people, to keeping us fed and warm, big ups to Qantas! In addition to great service, Qantas is a member of "One World" so we each get 14K miles for our American Airlines account!

The trouble started with about fifty minutes to go in the flight. The captain announced Brisbane was fogged in and we would have to stop and refuel on an island called New Caledonia, the city of Noumea as we did not have enough fuel to circle Brisbane.

In reality it was not that bad, we were only on the ground in Noumea fifty minutes, then back on course to Brisbane. However once we reached Brisbane the captain informed us we were 13th in line, that would require us to circle for ninety minutes! Ughh. At this point we were ready to get off the plane and get on with getting on!

The captain kept us informed about every fifteen minutes, and eventually told us planes had to divert as they were running out of fuel as well. Good news for us as that cut our wait time to about an hour. When we did land it was all good!

Customs and Border Security was a simple process, we then caught a taxi to the hotel, where again we had to hurry up and wait as our room was not cleaned from the night before. We made the best of it by grabbing some lunch and touring a beautiful church just down the street from our hotel.

Some observations about Brisbane:

It is very American! If you have walked down the street in St. Louis or Sacramento, you have an idea of what Brisbane feels like!

Public transportation seems to be pretty strong. There are bus routes that criss-cross the city making it easy to get from here to there.

Everyone smokes! All the hot chicks, the ugly guys, the young and the old...everyone smokes, and it is expensive, $12AU per pack...everything here is expensive; $9AU for a bowl of soup! Gas is sold by the liter at a cost of $1.20AU per liter, that is $4.80AU a gallon!!!!

There is a huge, old, beautiful church on every corner. Just gorgeous (Britt will post some pics later), breath taking stained glass windows that all tell a story, wood carving that makes you feel the emotions of the carver, and wonderus marble dating back to the 1800's...and all are open to the public with friendly volunteers more than willing to tell you about every inch of the joint!

The people are great! Super chill, relaxed, not judgmental at all! We went to lunch at a "club", in reality it was a bar with slot machines and pool tables. I liked the rule that says men have to take off their caps when they enter. It was difficult not to put the cap back on out of habit, however the grizzly veteran bartender who was busting my onions about the Chicago Bears t-shirt I was wearing, even going as far as to tell me Mike Ditka was a great man, deserves our respect because he was easy to deal with and even explained that we do not need to tip waiters and waitresses in Australia as they are well paid already...for that I tipped him $2AU, he was thrilled!

There are so many American things here: McDonald's, 7-11, Coca~Cola, Ford and Mazda...America is clearly a big influence here...As is Europe, the people here seem to be very Euro, they all smoke, there is a TON of coffee shops. More coffee shops or churches? Not sure!

There is also a substantial Gay & Lesbian presence on the streets here, and I appreciate the freedom they have. There is no head turning or awkwardness about it.

At the lunch club, what show do you think was on TV? Would it shock you that Ellen was on the TV? No joke, the table next to me stopped eating to watch her interview Russell Crowe!

We rented an apartment for the first two nights...MONEY! Even has a washer and dryer...super small toilet!

Australian cash has windows in it...feels like wax paper, looks like play money!

There is a commercial on TV right now asking "do you have Cankles?" (not kidding). After the long plane flight I did have swollen ankles! Ugly!

We are having a great time! We will post more soon!

TM