The trip back to the land of Oz

My long trip back to Oz was broken up by a few days visiting my brother and sister-in-law, Ben and Ruby, in Denver, Colorado. The trip over was quite good actually. Despite the three hour delay in London, when BA had engineers fiddling with the engines, then eventually decided we needed a 'new' plane. The flight was direct to Denver, so I eventually arrived in the evening without getting to see any of the scenery. Denver had had an unexpected amount of snow just before we landed, but my brother had managed to avoid all the cars strewn across the freeway to pick me up.

The next couple of days, I spent finding the best yarn store in Denver (The Lamb Shoppe). Unfortunately, I didn't get any pics of my own, but it looks exactly like on their website! Everyone was really lovely. Denver people in general are really friendly actually. I sat in their comfy arm chairs for the entire Thursday and Friday mornings, knitting a Clapotis scarf and drinking their great cafe lattes. I did buy a couple of things, despite my worry that I wouldn't know how to fit it into my suitcase. Initially I bought some lovely lace weight Alpaca With A Twist 'Fino', which is 70% alpaca and 30% silk. Two skeins at 875 yards each should be enough for a decent lace shawl (I hope: it wasn't exactly cheap). I haven't settled on a pattern yet. A trawl through Ravelry should fix that though!
I went back and bought one skein of Misti Alpaca Chunky (100% baby alpaca) in a lovely red colour, along with a pattern to make a rolled brim beanie. This was with a view to having a hat to wear when we went show-shoeing on the weekend, but as you can see, I didn't quite get it finished! It will be done eventually, but the Australian summer is putting me off for the moment!

Saturday was a fairly lazy day, where we went out to one of these massive outlet malls that Americans seem to have, and Ben and Ruby bought watches. I saw lots of stuff I liked, but unfortunately my UK cards weren't cooperating and I was pretty skint after my yarn buying. Plus: no more room in my suitcase! Saturday night we went out for proper American BBQ, which seems to actually mean BBQ ribs. Ben and Ruby happen to know the owners of one of the franchises, so we got great service! The portions are immense, so we were all fixed for Sunday dinner as well!

Sunday was snow-shoeing day, and Ben and Ruby had scraped together clothing and shoes for me (since all my stuff was in shipping boxes, presumably still in Scotland), and we had hired snow shoes. It was about a 1.5 hour drive up into the Rocky Mountain National Park. From there, Ruby, Ben, Carmel and I went on about a 5-6 mile trek through some alpine forest, visiting Nymph Lake, Bear Lake and Bierstadt Lake on the way.


I was to leave the next day, so spent the morning trying to repack everything (+ yarn) and finally decided I would have two cabin bags, which doesn't seem to be a problem for the American authorities (as opposed to the British, who are a bit uptight about it). Ben dropped me off at the airport during his lunch break, so I had about three hours to kill before my short flight to LAX. I amused myself by buying books to read and taking photos of an airport under snow. This was also my first experience with de-icing a plane right before take-off. Since I was sitting right in the tail, I got the full experience!

At LAX, I finally boarded the plane to Melbourne near midnight, but after supper, managed to sleep for much of the 15 hour flight time, waking up with only 4.5 hours to go. Unfortunately, I celebrated too soon. Melbourne was fogged in, and with a maximum weight Boeing 747-400, we didn't have enough fuel to circle Melbourne while the weather cleared. So off the Sydney we went to re-fuel! We sat on the tarmac for about an hour while they refueled. I felt sorry for those people who had subsequent flights from Melbourne to Sydney and weren't allowed to get off the plane! At least I was going in the right direction. By this time the weather in Melbourne had cleared and we landed anyway, but I had missed my connecting flight to Adelaide and the next one. I managed to get a flight for a couple of hours later. By this time I really needed a drink, so off to the bar I went for a G&T. I kind of got distracted by free wine tastings and eventually got suckered into joining a wine club. So, I get a case of wine delivered next week! Yay. All to myself too, since mum and dad will be in New Zealand!

Anyway, that's my trip home. I'm just about over jetlag, which isn't nearly so bad as last year when I came home. The weather is sunny and warm, unlike cold, rainy, dark Dundee. Not had a chance to jump in the pool yet, but I'll let you all know when I do!