After the first leg of my vacation at Sydney, I was eager to see more of Australia (and get some snow), so I booked a few days in Melbourne. This is my first time to book a domestic flight overseas. If only the in-between had a Shinkansen or something, but oh well. I remember in Japan years ago, I booked a Shinkansen from Osaka to Tokyo, so not much different. Just a brief two-hour jaunt.
Day 5 – Sydney-Melbourne
I did my best to wake up early for this day, as my flight to Melbourne is at 12:10pm, and I have a habit of being 4 hours early to any flight I go to. I woke up at 5AM to ensure I had the time to pack my things.
I went down the lobby to pick up two cups of coffee – I chose a cappuccino and a latte, and four tea bags because I’m a sucker for free hotel stuff. I also grabbed two granola bars for later. While packing up, I already noticed my baggage had gotten some heft. After all, I bought the bulk of my “souvenirs” in Sydney. I had no idea what souvenirs I might find at Melbourne, but at least I had my fill of Sydney for now. I also packed my things in such a way that the beach apparel I brought with me is at the bottom of the luggage – I thought I might be able to use it in Bali later, but definitely not in Melbourne. But it was a Jetstar flight, and I had a 20kg limit. I did bring my handy portable luggage scale, and it tipped at around 17kg. This bit me hard later, but I just put it up to chance and binned it for a while.
I finished packing up my backpack quick, and after I zipped up my luggage, I took a long warm shower and made sure to clean up well. Flights can be sweaty sometimes, so better if I could start clean. Regarding my fever, I already knew last night it was way down. But I never slacked, and I kept taking the fever medication and gargled with the Betadine solution. And in that morning, I knew the threat of the fever was over, but some last vestiges remained. Like some scraggly coughing and some phlegm that refused to be expelled yet. Not that troublesome, but it was at a point I can manage long periods without a mask on. But I still planned to use a mask on the plane later – it’s an enclosed space after all.
My final review of the “28 Hotel” was that it’s a decent hotel for 3-4 nights. If you’re going for 5 nights or more, I suggest at least find a better room even if it’s pricier. It’s good that the room was quiet, and had a window that I can look out at and determine if the day was going to be sunny or not. The room amenities were passable, no complaints. I did sniff the towels they provided and they smelled decently clean. I’m glad they had a coffee pod machine and lots of teabags at the lobby, and I liked they stock it up with granola bars in the morning. That’s a plus for coffee people like me. However, I wished they invested in having a flat-screen on the wall. The TV was far from the bed. And the room lacked pizzazz, so much so that I got tired of its drab colors and the plainness of it all. By the 4th night, I was eager to check out the next morning.
I checked out of the hotel by 7:30am, and headed to the Central Station towards the domestic terminal. I had to take extra care for my luggage – the sidewalks and roads weren’t kind for the luggage wheels, and I found myself making swift decisions to carry the luggage instead so as to spare the wheels from abuse. From my brief research earlier in the hotel with Maps, I had to take the green line going from the station and stopping at Syndey Domestic Terminal station. Not that hard – by this time I got used to the bustle already, and I kind of appreciated the long pathway from the hotel to Central Station for a brief morning walking exercise (like lifting the luggage at times). The train itself was full at the start of the day – it was Tuesday after all – but the nearer the train got to the airport, the lesser the crowd were.
I still wore a mask during the ride – the thick sporty UA mask with lots of padded space – however, its entire purpose was for me to avoid people with coughs. That was my worry – at my age, I already found out the hard way that my prized strong sickness immunity from my youth has been long gone, and I had to find out then that I easily got the same sickness back after recovering from it.
For example, in 2014 I was forced into taking a few days of medical leave after getting a bad case of coughing that led to migraines – the doctor prescribed rest and lots of meds, so I did. After three full days (plus two weekend days) of rest and tinola (chicken soup), I was fit again for work. I rode the bus to work, and it was an extreme misfortune that I got a sick guy as a seatmate. He kept coughing at times, sometimes a polite cough and sometimes a full-on cough that he was not able to suppress, and from his work attire and looks, he was sick but he could not afford to take a day off to rest. I had no heart to berate him, nor I was in a position to vacate the seat – I was in the window seat, and the bus was packed like a sardine. And later that day, I got to coughing again. The doctor at the office clinic then advised me to try and stay away from public transport for a few days after recovery, so no choice for me, I ponied up a couple of medical leaves. Using Uber and taxis were expensive but consuming my medical leaves was a prospect I was not willing to manifest back then. Never forgot that day since.
Mask wasn’t an issue – the entire pandemic era trained me on that – but the mask’s design was in such a way that my breathing kept fogging up my glasses. Just to keep myself occupied, I just perused some online manga, but I grew tired of it quick due to the sheer number of popups. Once I was in the domestic terminal, I popped a fresh Difflam lozenge in my mouth to suppress any cough or phlegm, and followed the signs leading me to the check-in counters. I tried to check-in via their machines, but I got redirected to the manual check-in. Guess that’s a perk for direct bookers, as I booked on an intermediary app (Trip.com). Fortunately, they only checked the passport. I dropped off my luggage, and I was off to their departure area.
It was a WIDE area full of bougie stores (of course), but my eyes were on the food area. I only had a granola bar for breakfast, so I was eager to have a decent breakfast here.
I went to a stall nearest to some rows of seats, and ordered a falafel wrap, a minestrone soup in a cup, and a latte. Decent breakfast, I must say. I picked a seat near a socket outlet, and spent a good hour or so whiling away the time, nibbling on the wrap and sipping the latte. The soup, I had to consume right away. There are soups that are good cold, and minestrone’s not one of them. It’s eaten either decently warm or GTFOH. I connected my Switch to the airport WiFi and then had it download the necessary software and console updates. Then I spent a good while observing the people moving in and out the food hall area. I must say, the Aussies sure love their Middle Eastern food almost the same way the Brits love their Indian food.
I sat there until it was 20 minutes before the airline started letting people in the assigned gate for my flight. Once we were in the gate, we were ushered out into the tarmac. My seat was at the F-U seat section, so in true F-U fashion, we had to get in from the back. Not a new experience – I experienced this in Singapore and Osaka as well. But at least, I thought, wasn’t there a better way to get passengers on the plane other than to climb some stairs? Some of my fellow passengers had bags that I eyeballed to be above 10kg but somehow got past check-in. Oh well, their small exercise set then.
The flight itself wasn’t so bad – nearly two hours, tops – so I just treated it like a Bangkok flight. Did good enough progress grinding away at the Trials of Mana game. I must say, I really wanted to finish this game this year. I only played this game during either plane trips or on trip lulls, like bus or train. But as a JRPG fan who likes grinding, I couldn’t stop going to certain dungeons and wailing away repeatedly. But at least that occupied my travel time attention, so by the time I had my fill, the plane announcement came on that we were to land soon, so I shelved my Switch in my bag.
Briathrail // Albert 2MNG 
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