1. And so it begins … ready to go!

Well, the time has arrived … I’m departing this country to commence my new life as a mermaid and travelling adventurer. I’m officially (because I’ve decided that it’s the case) an ‘experienced’ traveller now, which is a relief because I imagine it means that nothing at all will go wrong, everything will go swimmingly (including me 🤿) and it will all be wonderful.

Previous mishaps from previous trips and holidays, which I have learnt from and intend not repeat, have left me with a wealth of experience and level of expertise which means it can only get better. They include:

• Entrusting my hold baggage to Heathrow airport and Quantas airways and then waiting OVER THREE WEEKS before I saw it again when it was finally delivered to Thailand. In that time while trying to find enough clothes and essentials to get on with it, I’d been fat shamed by a tiny Thai lady who used unnecessarily wide sweeping arm gestures across my body and horrified head shaking to say she had nothing in my size, managed to find the only pack of 5 pants for sale in the whole of Thailand and buy up most of the 7/11 supplies to keep me going!

• Being ganged up on, screeched at then chased by an actual pack of macaque monkeys in the rainforest in Borneo. I screamed so loudly that the nice safari man heard and had to come and throw stones at the monkeys to make them go away then rescue me!

• A tiny incident with a scooter, a kind but inexpert-driver foreign man and a dog that landed me in the medical centre having an X-ray, grit scrubbed out my shoulder and foot wounds and instructions to stay out the sea for a week, rest and tend my wounds. I followed the advice excellently by taking to a sun lounger and staying there!

Even as a youngster, I managed to get stung by a weaver fish while on holiday in France and thanks to my somewhat neglectful parents, total ignorance towards what had happened and increasingly worsening pain and swelling, I ended up with my mum trying and failing to help me up the beach and big sandy hill to the lifeguard hut. Subsequently, I, no doubt keeping the dramatics to a minimum, was pitied by a large hairy French man who arrived, picked me up and carried me up the hill to the medical attention I needed!

Anyway, As I sit and write this, on my favourite chair at Andrews HQ, the weather is reassuring ,e that I've chosen the best time to go!

This time around, my travels will all be fine. I know that because when I’ve discussed my plans and slight apprehensions, people have said ‘you’ll be fine’, ‘it’ll be grand’ and ‘you’re so brave’!  So, I’ve packed in work, packed up once to move to my parents’ house briefly, unpacked and repacked several times onto their front room floor, much to my mum’s delight, but am finally, hopefully, all ready to go. My case is all packed and by the front door; I refused to take it upstairs to my bedroom because it was too heavy to get up there, which bodes well. I had to get a case big enough to hold my dive gear as well as everything else I need (roughly 17 bikinis, a supply of tea bags and several pairs of flip flops). Turns out it really is huge. So much so, I can actually fit in it myself and my niece found she could get in it, while wearing a massive dressing gown and we could zip her in it!

My hand luggage is also packed up, with more belongings than ever before (after the great missing bag disaster of 2022), and a desperate hope that I can disguise it as a ‘small carry-on rucksack’ and none of the airlines attempt to weigh it! My case it all weighed and everything is packed. I'm sure it it is normal to take a case bigger than me and handluggage that weights around the size of a small child. What could possibly go wrong!

My train is booked for 5.20am tomorrow and I’ll be off …. London to Dubai with quick change in Dubai (not stopping there as that place is horrid; if you remember my last blog of 2018, you’ll know!). The change is so quick, I’m obviously full of disbelief that they’ll manage to get my luggage transferred from plane to the next in time - and then Dubai to Kuala Lumpur, Malaysia for my first stop!

I will be back in a couple of tales, full of tales of calm and success to let you know how it’s gone….