Sitting in Nate’s in the Ottawa airport waiting for flight.
Last Canadian meal before beef time!
Dreary weather is looking in on us from the outside world. Overcast and the like.
I’m peering out at a robin’s-egg blue Air Canada plane at gate 17. Ours is next to it.
C-GJWO is our equipment. Airbus 319. Looks air-worthy. We’ve got about 1:15 till lift-off 0:45 till we board.
Update: there was a gate change, we were actually at Gate 15. Don’t know what the tail ID was. Sorry kev.
28/03/08
Good day and greetings from the land of snow and taxes, as my father put it. As some of you have rightly pointed out, this post is definitely a touch on the tardy side. I’ve been back in Ottawa for four days, and owe you all at least a few paragraphs to sort of close off this adventure of mine. I suppose part of my reluctance to write this final blog post had to do with wanting to absorb everything before writing my parting thoughts. Of course, on the other hand, getting back home was a bit hectic, as I was anxious to get settled back in and come to grips with the return to my ‘routines’. On that front, I definitely have a few things I can share with you all, as well as tell you about the last leg of my return journey. So if you’re ready, kick back, polish up your glasses, and I’ll try to entertain you or at least enlighten you on my brainspace for one more time 🙂 Be patient, as it will likely be a long post, but I suppose I have to do a bit of reflecting in this, the final chapter of my New Zealand adventure.
20/01/08
Greetings webospherians! So, what to tantalize you with today? Kinda hard to make a really good story out of todays activities. Basically, I got up, got ready, and pedaled my little heart out to get to the coast while the wind was more or less in my favour 🙂 Yup, that’s right, upon waking up, the wind had essentially done a 180 while I slept, and I awoke to another brilliant day with the winds either at my back or from the side for most of the ride. This was most welcome, as you may imagine, especially after yesterday’s debacle. As a result I’m in a better mood, and invite you to check out the map and my pictures. I even came across my namesake as you’ll see from checking out the shots! My ride was about 77km, and took me from Palmerston North to a place called Otaki Beach, which is along the Kapiti Coast. Tomorrow, I’ll be in Wellington, with only a short bit of biking (about 30km) followed by a recommended commuter train for about 50km. Read on for a little more about my day.
Well my friends, here it is. A worthy blog post about travels within the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia. Not only would Jody and I be undertaking internal flights, but we were actually bound for Medina, which is one of the two holiest places for all Muslims. In fact, the city centre is completely forbidden to entry by any non-Muslims. Luckily, the airport is located outside the city, and our transport would be taking us all the way to our hotel without ever entering the city. Of course, the actual purpose of our traveling to this area was not to visit a holy Muslim site, as that is a very bad idea. We were bound for two very special places, one known as Al-Ula, and one known as Mada’in Saleh. These are areas of archeological and historical significance. Mada’in Saleh in fact has just recently been declared a UNESCO world heritage site, the first one of its kind in all of Saudi Arabia. We would be visiting these two sites together on the same day, but I would argue that each of them on its own is worth a blog post, so that’s how I’ll write them up and present them to you. For your pleasure, I have of course put up a whole boat-load of pictures to check out on flickr. So why don’t you do that, then read my story?
Wow! I can’t believe I’m finally writing up this post. This will be my final post dedicated to talking about the African Adventures that we recently had. There really isn’t all that much to share in this post either, as the day was dominated by a really long shuttle ride to the airport and then whoosh, we were off! However, it will give me a chance to perhaps close out with a few of my final thoughts on the overall trip. I’m not sure how that’ll turn out yet as it will possibly just make me want to pull out my credit card and charge up my next adventure right away. Isn’t credit great? I’ll try to resist the urge for a little longer, but rest assured, there will be many more adventures by ActiveSteve in the coming year(s). No map to share either, but I can at least point you to a few photographs that were put up onflickr. Read on if you dare for the rest of my tale.
