Saturday, April 24, 2010

Today is a different kind of ultra

It all started about 30 hours ago and its not over yet... no its not an ultra marathon but a work trip and this is just the getting there part.

I'm on my way to Hyderabad, India. On paper my flight looked simple, of course that's after we changed it to go via the Pacific vs Europe. My original route with a stop in London to see family but a new route was chosen via Bangkok, since political unrest seemed more predictable than volcanic ash and weather patterns.

My new route departed Los Angeles at 11:20pm on Thursday night, I arrived in Bangkok around 6am Saturday, then an 8:50 departure from Bangkok to Hyderabad.

Here's the part I didn't see, the 8:50 was PM, not AM, I released as I looked at my itinerary as we were landing. Now I had an almost 15 hour layover in Bangkok. Usually it wouldn't be an issue, but I checked my bags all the way through and wasn't sure if I could easily get them back.

Luckily Bangkok is a great airport with lounge with lasyboy chairs and even a dayhotel, great food court and fancy stores, all overpriced of course. I also realised on reviewing my itinerary I have a similar length layover on the return trip. Last news reports I saw referred some sort of grenade attack in Bangkok on Thursday, so I felt safer in the airport than traveling around with no plan.

Anyway in a little over an hour I'll be boarding my flight to Hyderabad, after the 3.5 hour flight and a 1 hour car trip my journey will be over.

Now the interesting part will be training for an ultra in India, with temperatures over 100F, in what I hear is a very different place to LA its going to be different.

Its a shame Mira couldn't join me for this trip, but she's here with me in spirit. Mira wrote me little sweet notes for every day I'm here, her last note said she hopes I'm having fun in India, little did she know I would be traveling for almost 2 days. I'm not as sweet and organized as Mira so I'll have to write blog notes instead...


Craig