An Antarctic detour to Joburg

I’d forgotten how convenient rolling luggage is. It’s been years since I’ve had to carry a bag, and boy am I out of practice. Small aircraft travel in South Africa has meant carrying a soft-sided camera bag without wheels, and a North Face duffel bag (last in action on Kili in 2007 and suitably filthy), also without wheels. My Think Tank Photo Airport Essentials camera bag weighs in at a whopping 10kg, and the duffel at 14.9kg  (that 100g saving will count somewhere). 10kg I can manage to carry a long distance as a backpack, 15kg as an unwieldy duffel bag isn’t a lot of fun. So far I’ve cursed it along the concourse to the bag drop at Melbourne Airport, then again from the taxi to the check in desk at Sydney International. Mainly because I object to paying for a trolley when every other international airport I’ve been to provides them as a matter of course.

QF63 from Sydney to J’burg is due to leave at 09:50am, and is slightly delayed due to the ‘late arrival of the inbound aircraft’. An aborted takeoff adds another 30 mins. The crews’ expression as we start to roar down the runway and suddenly stop is priceless. We roll to the end of the runway, where the Captain advises that there was a warning light associated with the temperature of the brakes that Engineering will need to be consulted on. He goes on to try to reassure the passengers, the gist of which amounts to ‘don’t worry, I won’t be flying this 30 year old death trap of a 747 if I think anything is wrong with it’. A meander around the block of the runway, we are cleared by Engineering, and take off an hour late, with a estimated arrival time in J’burg of 15 minutes ahead of schedule.

The Captain also advises that we are on a flight path due south to Antarctica, and expects to reach 64 degrees south before boomeranging back up to J’burg. We do indeed make it far enough south to see a decent amount of light Antarctic pack ice, with the ice shelf visible in the distance.

Pack ice en route from Sydney to J’burg

We land safely in J’burg 13 hours after departure, slightly earlier than planned. I’m due to fly to Hoedspruit tomorrow, so am camping at the Intercontinental O.R. Tambo overnight, a leisurely walk across the road from the J’burg airport. It turns out to be a good choice – booked late last year, the hotel has been able to data match that the (non-loyalty club) person who made the original reservation is same person who is now a Gold loyalty member, without being prompted. Not that being a Gold member of IHG seems to be worth anything. An Executive room at the Intercon, however, is suitably luxurious, and reminds me how basic the Crowne Plaza I’ve stayed at in Auckland every week for the last 4 months is in comparison. A bathrobe, nice shower, desk, king sized bed and I’m all set. Writing a blog entry is the only thing keeping me awake at the equivalent of 3.30 am Melbourne time.

A leisurely morning stroll back to the airport tomorrow morning for a midday flight should see me at Ngala Tented Camp in time for an afternoon game drive.