The audacity of travel

If I can help it

The lessons we learn from experience sometimes leads us to do the extreme in a determined effort to avoid reliving those moments again.

I finally switched on to holiday mode just under 24 hours before leaving home, the hours did not rush by as I did my own ironing and then packed my bags.

I can say I was able to pack only twice and I even eliminated a pair of trousers and a pair of shorts from my holiday fashion show, it still tipped the scales at 27kg and that for me is travelling light.

Sometimes, I am not able to separate the hotel booking from the charter flights, I really want the hotel but I would get their on my own steam. The experience I had of being delayed 6 hours, getting on a plane like I was getting on a bus full of football hooligans and doing a tour of all hotels in Playa del Ingles before dropped off last, I just was not going to risk anymore.

After confirming my booking, I phoned to let them know that I would not be flying with ArkeFly nor should they bother picking me up at the airport. I had to add one extra night to my holiday to have scheduled flights by KLM and Air Europa with a stopover in Madrid.

Up, out and there

Having gotten up at 4:30 this morning, I only had enough time for a shower and packing my ultraportable before the taxi arrived to take me to the airport, I was in Las Palmas at 13:35, just a little over 8 hours of having rights than the 4 and a half hours of suffering worse.

I also arrived an hour earlier than I would have and had a pickup which end up as a stretch limousine, I just wanted to avoid doing a tour of hotels but to end up like bling-king, well, I cannot complain for the comfort, I would not know if my street cred is intact.

The audacity of it all

The real audacity of travel still remains my fascination with the miracle of flight, much as it is so common as to be inconsequential, the whole concept and practice of putting all the bulk of metal with souls and their baggage in the air and safely touching down at a destination is still a wonder of human ingenuity to me.

As you would have noticed, my reading material included the Audacity of Hope by Barack Obama what I have already read of that book leaves in awe of that man, then the man sat behind me also had the book and before long we were on about the hopes of Barack and the fears of Obama – I have come down on the side of him being the man for these tough times.

The Financial Times also named him their Man of the Year and opined on how he would have to please some and disappoint some – I think he really is the Man of the Year and for all he has achieved, he is also my Man of the Year – my first ever.

The audacity to survive

And to show how the credit crunch might not hold much of a crunch to some, the Financial Times published a correction – “The Bulgari ring featured in Life & Arts on December 20 is not available to buy over Christmas as suggested. It will be available at Harrods from January and in all Bulgari stores from February.”

Now, that is the Audacity of Confidence and on that note, may you all have the audacity of hope for a merry Christmas and the audacity of travel that would take you through a prosperous and rewarding New Year and the audacity of confidence to be whatever you want to be despite that realities that surround us.

Merry Christmas