Day 8

Weather this morning looks promising for our ocean safari. We’re down at Barra Lodge for 10:30am, and we leave at about 11, having been issued with wetsuits, snorkels and flippers. My flippers are a manly size 9, with a ‘medium male’ wetsuit, while Nick is issued with a pair of size 6s and a wetsuit that appears to have an age range sewn into the back.

Day 8

I woke up late again and packed, then wandered over to the Silk Bar for breakfast. I spent most of the morning there, ordering fruit shakes and catching up on my journal, then I went to see my old stomping ground at the Viengtai Hotel. Stopped at the massage parlour for a second Thai massage, this time even more enthusiastically delivered, and then set about wandering through the city.

Day 8

On the morning of our first full day in saint Petersburg, we had reached the halfway point of our trip.  Breakfast

was good – we met Sasha, and collected our passports, then did some laundry before we left the hotel.

The metro was busy as we fought our way on, and then took a trolley bus into the centre of town.  This was Sasha’s

Day 8

location:Plett. Bay
summary:Whale and Dolphin spotting, lots of rain
trip:sa02
day:8

Day 8

No repeats of the previous days delay – I knew the metro by now and I was in the centre in no time. I had a few other things to do before seeing more of Budapest, the first of which was to arrange to leave it. I went to the MAV office (Hungarian railways) to book a seat, and found yet another take-a-number system. I took a number and went to play with the touch screen information terminal while I waited.It was quite a long wait, but the system on the touch screen terminal was excellent. I looked up trains to Istanbul, Venice, Bucharest and Athens, so I had quite a lot of food for thought by the time my number was called. It was all getting very complicated. I could go to Istanbul, where I could then connect to Greece easily, but I’d be way ahead of John, Chris and Sunil so we’d probably never regroup. Bucharest would be a good place to stop on the way to Istanbul or Athens, but it seemed silly to go there simply because it was conveniently located. Going to Athens directly was a long trip, and it would probably result in passing the others in Italy somewhere but not managing a proper regroup. Venice was an interesting option, putting me in northern Italy to get to Greece from the other side, and almost certainly meet up with the others en-route, but it meant cutting short on Eastern Europe.

Day 8

I got up early to pack. After checking out, I met Charlotte, my tour leader. She looked puzzled, and asked why I’d checked out. Obviously we were going to stay at the Viengtai another night then. As I checked in again, to the general amusement of the reception staff and confusion of the porter, another member of our tour group arrived. Lorna, who was travelling alone, worked at a hotel in Edinburgh. The final two members of the group were apparently sleeping off their jet lag after arriving only this morning. I got a different room, with quieter plumbing, but a distinct smell of cigarette smoke. I put the aircon on and went back to the lobby in time for the first full group meet at 12:30. Sue and Steve, a couple from Swindon, completed the group.

Day 8

Otherwise known as the day we met Phil the bus driver. We had to get up very early to meet the Oz Experience bus at the Esplanade, and it didn’t seem like a very good sign when it turned up over half an hour late. Phil (who was a new Oz Experience driver – this was his first trip) had, it seems, broken down covering the mile or so from the place where he’d picked up the bus to the Esplanade where we were waiting. This guy was about to drive us over 2000 miles.