Day 9: Sydney
Nau Mai
Yesterday we flew to Sydney and played a show at the Roundhouse.
Brisbane Airport was determined to punish us yesterday morning. We arrived at the dropoff at 8am and I left everyone to shuttle the baggage inside, driving off in the rental car to fuel up and return it. It was a good half hour before I was back at the terminal and I was decidedly worried to find everyone at the oversize/group check-in area with a pile of equipment cases that should have already been on their way to the aircraft.
The classic punish at Brisbane Airport is the explosives material testing station. There is always a determined airport employee at oversize check-in who makes you open every single case, swabbing the inside with a plastic wand to take a sample back to his testing machine which can in mere seconds determine the presence of chemicals contained within explosives. This usually adds another fifteen minutes and a fair bit of extra baggage handling to your morning.
Yesterday the situation was worsened when coupled with an airline check-in employee who seemed like he was on his first day on the job. Printing a single bag tag was a battle that had to be fought against the computer and his computer was a fierce opponent.
After well over an hour spent at the oversize/group check-in desk we made through security and went to our gate. Thankfully we had arrived at the airport early and we didn’t have to run to our flight.
The punishment continued at the gate when Liz and Jon were approached by an airline employee and asked to weigh their carry-on baggage. Shockingly, their pieces of luggage were over the 8kg limit. The penalty for this infringement was a deep shaming, being forced to stand for fifteen minutes while the employee battled with his computer, trying to print bag tags so these heavy carry on suitcases could be sent down to the aircraft’s luggage bay.
I picked up breakfast from an anonymous terminal cafe close to our gate. It was an item called Ham, Cheese, & Tomato Sourdough, and it came heated and served on a paper plate.
Sydney welcomed us with a beautiful descent over the harbour and a few minutes later we touched down gently on the runway at Kingsford Smith Airport’s runway 16R, rolling up to the terminal and disembarking across the tarmac, enjoying the walk through an extremely moderate autumn temperature.
This airport also had a bit of bite and gave us some punishment in the form of having to push our overloaded luggage carts on a bumpy ten minute walk to get to the zone that was misleadingly labelled as “Express Pickup”.
Thankfully we didn’t have to wait long before Tristan pulled up in a pristine black Kia Carnival, driving it like he was shooting the TV ad for this great vehicle.
After a trying morning we decompressed with a pub lunch before diving back into the work day. We arrived at the Roundhouse in Kensington, a suburb southeast of the city centre. It turned out that this venue was part of the University of New South Wales, and the next generation of Australia’s leaders and innovators were enjoying their lunchtime at the venue bar which had a delightful beer garden bathed in afternoon sunlight.
The solar power endurance race car in the lab next to our venue. Perhaps an ancestor of this vehicle could replace the Kia Carnival as our perfect rental car.
Here is a petrol price I saw while I was out picking up dinner. Even cheaper than Brisbane! I’m not looking forward to returning to NZ petrol prices.
The room was very round. While it may not have housed a Victorian-era train turntable like the London venue of the same name, it still possessed a gentle curvature and a satisfying symmetry. It was acoustically challenging for us at soundcheck but later on that evening when the polished wooden floor was protected by the numerous dense sacks of bone and liquid that doubled as patrons of our band, the sound turned out to be very good.
Usually the final job of the pack down, folding the banner.
My pick had a good second outing. The shape of the tip has not changed notably and there seems to be only a bit of minor scuffing on the edges.
We had a very good end to our evening. Our hotel had a secure underground carpark and for the first time this tour we didn’t have to unload the Kia Carnival into the hotel luggage room before going to bed.