The Cactus Trip Diaries

It was the usual last day routine – take the rental car to the carwash while we had breakfast in the bakery opposite.

My back was twitching as we moved our luggage to the car for a weigh in at the local postoffice. It got no better as we switched bags from the rental car at the return to Eunice’s car for the last miles on US soil to Departures at LAX.  We were glad to drop off our hold luggage and made our way to Gate 101. At around 14:00 Angie made a toilet call and came back with the news that our gate had been switched to Gate 138 – right at the other end of the airport. By now my back had ceased up, but once again we shouldered the back pack and stopped off at a Pharmacy to get some painkillers and a bottle of water. No idea how I got to the Gate, but I must have gritted my teeth as a filling started to crumble and eventually came out. No problem – I was on pain killer’s already. Don’t remember much of the rest of the journey, other than that yet again I had a row of 4 to myself, while Angie could have had the one behind me, but decided to stay next to me on the other side of the isle. The seat next to her was empty too, so no space restrictions.

Due to the empty seats, the hostesses were handing out 2 bottles of wine when you asked for one – 281 ml each (standard full bottle is 750 ml) and Angie tells me that I had 4 on top of the pain, so slept well until breakfast was served somewhere over Ireland. I moved through immigration and luggage retrieval like a robot. Peter was waiting for us and I fell asleep as soon as my bum was on the seat of his car.

All souvenirs arrived home in tact.

Tomorrow I’ll start looking at the next trips – to Bolivia in November 2011 and a Pediocactus-athon for May 2012 – and preparing the second half of What I Saw Last Winter 2010-2011. Winter is officially over!