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There are some days that go off the plan so much, that the best you can do is to just motor on and try and reach your goal... perhaps cutting down that goal to just a single one of get to a bed before midnight somewhere in the city that I'm supposed to be in. Well, thankfully, this day wasn't a disaster in that sense, I reached the bed in the right city with an hour to spare before midnight... but it was a trickier day than I had hoped for!

The beginning

Actually, the day started off really nicely, spending a few hours with my kids and wife before needing to start the travel. The weather was good, and our oldest daughter had a friend over that she hadn't seen for ages, yet they started up like they had never been apart (they have known each other since they were about 1).

The first hint of trouble came when I looked up the first travel leg for day. Planned Trackwork? Well, that added an extra 45 minutes to my travel, which meant I needed to do some quick packing. Well, I guess this was a self inflicted speed bump due to me not checking the travel the night before... overconfidence! Luckily, this was going to be a short project, and so it was mostly just a matter of remembering what the dress code for the concert was. Plus, I always have a bag half packed with all the essentials like toiletry,emergency food and electronics!

Trains and trains

Well, I made it to the first main change with no problem, but here was where some things started to fall of the plan.

Today, the weather was quite nice in The Netherlands, but it was uncomfortably hot in Germany. I took this screenshot later, as my phone was giving me "warnings" of high heat (even dangerous) levels. Temperatures that were hitting 35 Celcius or above (roughly 1.5675432672345249657328526 thousand degrees Fahrenheit!), which wouldn't have been a problem in Australia, but were causing central Europe to go into transportation meltdown. Actually, to tell the truth, I think I've lost my Australian heat tolerance since living in Europe, and I was also getting quite worn down from the heat (probably carrying a violin, a messenger bag and towing a suitcase didn't help... or the long sleeved jumper that I forgot to take off...).

While you are travelling you start to learn words that you know spell trouble. Verspating... Delay. Well, delay is better than cancelled, I guess...

So, time to wait in a super hot train station. What to do, except eat some yummy wursten! Little did I know, that this would be one of the very few things that I would get to eat this day....

Arrival and Hotel

By the time I arrived at the destination train station, I just couldn't stomach a half hour walk to the hotel. So, Taxi it was... this was the best part of the travel! On time, air conditioning that worked, and no one sitting next to me! Pity the ride was so short....

So, when I arrived the reception was closed and I had to use the night safe. Which I managed, but there were a few keys in there, and so I had to call the night reception. Remember this post of my non-planning friend... Well, he didn't think it would be good to bother us with forwarding things like.... THE #@$^TWRT%$#$%^@@$ RESERVATION EMAIL FROM THE HOTEL!!! Which would not have been a problem, except the reception couldn't find my booking...

So, after calling him a few times before he picked up, I had the reception and him sort things out.... apparently, the booking wasn't done under my name, but the name of the concert organiser. Sure, that makes sense, I'm only the person that is going to show up and stay at the hotel....

I'm finally in a stinking hot room, I forgot to ask for the wifi code... and the note on the table is super helpful in saying that I just need to ask for it at the reception, which is closed. There is nothing open for food... I haven't eaten since that lovely little German hot dog! Luckily, I've played this starvation game before, and I always travel with a handful of pre-packed muesli bars for just this sort of situation. I'd prefer a nice cooked dinner and a nice cold beer, especially after this crap day of travel, but a bar and some water will have to suffice for tonight.

What sort of deranged evil genius would put a chocolate on a pillow in a stinking hot room... now I've got chocolate in my hair!