I Am the Road Warrior

In 24 hours I will have spent time in 5 different countries, Ireland, Great Britain, Slovakia, Austria and Turkey. Well it is really 25.5 hours for me to get 5 but it is close enough. I am looking forward to visiting Istanbul. I really can't wait.

I am tired, today started for me at 4:30, I wanted to make sure I had plenty of time to make my 6:30 flight to Bratislava. Let me tell you, Stansted Airport at 5:30 is a mad house, the place was packed. In typical Ryanair fashion the have one checking desk for each flight, so that was 30 minutes of waiting then security was faster this time than last it only to me about 12 minutes opposed to the 25 it took when I flew to Ireland. It was then a mad dash to the gate so I could try and get a good place in line for boarding, none of this sitting and relaxing waiting for them to call your flight, nope everyone starts to line up as soon s they get there. I was lucky and got to the gate with only about 100 people ahead of me, on the 737-800 as long as you're not 120th in line you shouldn't get stuck in a middle seat. The flight was uneventful and I was able to sleep for most of it, although when I woke up because of the way I had my head on the middle seat tray table, (the seats on Ryanair do not recline) my left leg had lost all circulation and it was 5 minutes of pins and needles.

When I landed in BA (Bratislava) the passport control officer keep looking at my photo then looking at me, I had forgotten that it is seven years old and I had hair back then, and I sometimes forget I'm bald. (So I am not ready to accept it, we all have our issues.) I grabbed a cab home and was excited to gt back to my flat even if only for 5 hours. I was a little shocked, my new flatmate's are not as into cleaning the flat as the last ones I had. But that will change, I will make sure of it. I swapped out luggage and went with a smaller bag, I still find I travel with too much stuff. I was able to transfer my photos over to the mac and I stitched together a few panoramas and was very happy with the two I did. I did no editing to the pictures yet but it gave me a good idea how things are going to look. I hope to have them finished in a week or so. It takes time to make sure they look as good as they can plus I am traveling without the mac so it is only when I am in BA that I will work on them, This Friday will be the first chance I get some free time but of course I will have photos from Istanbul to worry about. I really can't wait, but of course by the time I post this I will be there. (I am in the Vienna airport right now, my flight leaves in 20 minutes.)

So I had a new car service take me this time and the driver was great, he is a pissed off about the direction Slovakia Government is heading as I am about what has happened in the United States over the last seven years. Yes that is the main reason I am living over here, I don't like what has become of my once great nation, now just a democratically elected police state. Oh Sean, you are being overly dramatic, you may think but I don't thinks so. The man who gives up freedom for the sake of security deserves neither. (plane is boarding) OK now on board and Turkish Airlines has nice planes with very comfortable seats. This is the same type of plane Ryanair flies but on this pane 29 rows of seats, Ryanair has 33, so the legroom on this plane is much better, also the seats recline. It occurred to me I have been on the move for over a month now, it some how seems like months ago when camp ended but it was only 30 days, it's hard to believe. I am currently climbing to our cruising altitude of 38000ft somewhere over the southern part of Slovakia for the two hour flight, So far I am impressed with the airline, I will see how the food is to give you total coverage. They show a moving map of our flight and it is much better than any others I have seen on other airlines, it is done in 3D animation and my words don't do it justice. I am a geek when it comes to things like this, I enjoy seeing the speed and distance display and to know what city I am flying over. The food smells great and the flight attendants are easy on the eyes. (15 hours have passed) the food was very good.

So I landed and took a taxi to the hotel where I was meet by my friend Irem and two of her friends. I got to the hotel around 11:15 and I dropped my bags in the room and we went out for some drinks. We had a great time, we went walking down a main pedestrian street that even on a Monday night was packed with people, Irem said on the weekends it is hard to walk in this area because there are so many people going out. She said this was a small amount of people, i didn't look that way to me. I got back to the room round 2:30 and woke up this morning at 10:00am. I will wait for Irem to come to the hotel and take me around the city. This place is huge, there are something like 6 million people living in this city, that is more than all of Slovakia. I will try and post some photo tonight but don't hold me to it, Since I have limited time here I want to spend as much of it taking pictures as I can.