Getting to Balikpapan

So my journey began by leaving Nanaimo on the last ferry out of Duke Point- the beginning of a mind-numbing amount of sitting around in a big plane doing what is commonly referred to as the ‘head bob’- being interrupted every hour and a half or so with drinks and meals. Fellow students Jesse and Nadine met me early in the morning at the Vancouver airport where I spent the night sleeping fitfully on the waiting-room benches. The ridiculous American “homeland security” measures that followed our check-in were almost funny if not for the frustration associated with them. After carefully packing all of my underwater housing/battery-packs/u.w.strobe/flashlight etc etc, in one bin- that had to be completely emptied (understandable I suppose but still frustrating) The issue of the carry-on baggage was completely different however. The online rules regarding carry-on baggage clearly state that there is to be no carry on luggage with the exception of cameras, laptops and musical instruments (along with life-support devices and other obvious things) So unfortunately I assumed that meant I could take all of my camera equipment in it’s padded camera-case… not so. I was made to empty the contents of the padded bag, into a clear plastic sac without padding- and then check the empty padded camera case and other bags. This did not make any sense to me whatsoever, as I emptied absolutely everything from my camera case into this plastic bag, and then had to carry around this awkward sack full of delicate gear that was no longer protected, while the baggage staff had to load and unload completely empty bags. It definitely felt like a futile exercise. We agreed that it appeared to be more of a bullying tactic, because once we arrived in San Fran, the security was comparatively lax- without even pat-downs coming through security. Also, carry-on baggage was clearly allowed, and it was more of a normal scene going through security. I guess it’s not possible for a terrorist to do anything on a plane leaving the states, and the only possible cause for concern is planes entering the states (sarcasm).
Not to complain however, everything has worked out quite well- and although there were times of some frustration, we just went with it, and recognized that we were going to be traveling at least 48 hours to our destination either way. Singapore Airlines manage to make the whole experience quite as nice as I think it could possibly be- providing hot damp facecloths, movies on demand, bottomless drinks (alcoholic included within reason) and a selection of decent airplane fare- far better than could be expected of another airline such as… say… air Canada which we flew to San Fran with.
We stopped for about 2 hours in South Korea- it would have been nice to have more time to explore there, but since everything was covered in snow and freezing cold we were not too put out when we had to leave. We did get to disembark and walk around for an hour or so as well which was very appreciated.
The long stopover was in Singapore- where we spent a solid 14 hours between flights. Honestly, I’ve always thought the Vancouver airport was quite nice, but after being to Singapore… nothing will ever be the same. There are sleeping booths you can rent, free massage chairs everywhere, a sky-train between stations, beautiful koi ponds, the worlds only butterfly garden in an airport (we opted to sleep instead of visit this, but we may have enough time on the way back) there was a rooftop swimming-pool, and all kinds of other nice things. The most impressive thing we found was a completely free tour into the city of Singapore, and so we jumped all over that. It is quite incredible to be able to visit an airport for less than 24 hours and come away with a pretty good understanding of the country. Our tour-guide was very informative and quirky, and took us to the China-town to visit a temple… and then showed us around the city by bus explaining things about the city and how because they have no real resources, or land to expand to, they have had to be very creative and efficient with everything they do. The city and the roads are incredibly clean and extremely organized, and there is shopping to be done EVERYWHERE. It was a fun tour, and just long enough for our attention spans (as we were pretty wonky from the time-changes and long flights)
In the airport we met up with two more members of our expedition Cassandra and Sonja, a pleasant surprise. We all boarded the last flight of our trip, a two hour hop-skip-and-a-jump from Singapore to Balikpapan, Indonesia. The flight in was very interesting, I finally got a window seat, and since we flew over most of Borneo I was able to get a glimpse of what we are going to be seeing from the ground. Ultimately along almost every waterway I was able to see from the air, there were mono-crop plantations. (most of the time I could tell they were palm trees, but sometimes it was not so obvious…) Another thing we got a preview of was the rain… it poured on us as we landed and disembarked. The plane had to circle around the airport and find an opening in the heavy heavy cloud cover, which was very low. At last, we stepped off the plane, and into brutal monsoon tropical rain- and we were soo happy about it.
Brent and Sheryl were there to meet us which was great… there is always the hoard of taxi drivers just diiiieing to rip you off coming out of the airport, so it was really awesome that they had a driver ready to take us back to the hotel. Everything feels damp here, and the smells and colours are so similar to Thailand. We decided that the air here is best described as being ‘soft’ and my skin is happier already.