Well Christmas morning arrived to the 4am sound of my daughter being sick and calling for me.
This is not supposed to be happening I thought to myself....we have a plane to catch this afternoon.
Father Christmas has left gifts and we can't even move her from the toilet bowl to open them.
No this is not supposed to be happening.
I pinch myself thinking it is some sort of nightmare that I am having...but no, hurts like hell and I am awake as can be.
It'll be ok said husband, she must have had a touch of heat stroke from the sun yesterday.... we will be getting on that flight at 6pm.
4 vomits later it is looking very unlikely.
I ring the older daughter and said you better not bring hubby and baby for breakfast as your sister is sick but no she wanted to see us and given the fact that we forewent an extra week in Bali so as we could share the little ones first Christmas....we agreed to them wanting to come.
And so began the worst Christmas day any of us have ever had.
A phone call to a friend in Newcastle was made and then a rushed breakfast was had whilst number 2 daughter was quarantined to her room and me dashing to the chemist begging with them to make it all go away as we had a flight to catch.
To cut a long story short...a huge Filipino lunch at the in-laws place 1 hour away that we were looking forward to was cancelled as we didn't want her in 40 + degree heat in a house with no air conditioning... and so at 2pm we drove the hours journey to the airport.
Daughter had stopped vomiting around 10am and was now keeping liquids down but we had to find a lounge for her to lay on and wait the 3 hours to depart. And what a good job getting there so early as there was a stack of people flying everywhere. So an airport coffee shop focaccia was our Christmas lunch and nothing for her..Such is life I thought, things could be worse...little did I know they were about to get much worse.
The flight was then delayed an hour so in hindsight I guess the extra hour on the airport coffee shop couch was a good thing as by the time she slept and we boarded and flew at 7pm, she was much chirpier.
We were pretty sure by now as no one else had gotten sick that it was heat stroke.
Daylight savings putting our watches back had us arriving to Bali for 9pm and as we put landing gear down ready to do so we had almost touched the ground and we took off again.
Yep Up Up and away we left Bali behind...
We had flown about ten mintes before anyone told us that the airport had closed as the weather was too bad to land and we were now going to Surabaya.
Not one to miss an opportunity I quickly decided that checking out Surabaya sounded pretty good as my husband had already been there many years prior...and I was quite looking forward to seeing a different place.
Shazperth was in Bali waiting to have Christmas drinks however so that had me concerned.
My Balinese friend Audrey was also waiting to pick us up at the airport so that worried me too although I hoped that she would go home..and I didn't have her number in my travel phone.
40 minutes later we landed in Surabaya and 2 hours later we were still sitting on the tarmac.
Not one person told us what was going on...left us on board like a pack of sheep.
The Pilot came out, retrieved his briefcase and left. Apparently he had now exceeded his flying time and they had to find us another pilot.
Apparently also Immigration at Surabaya refused to let us off the plane, as they didn't want the responsibility.
So the air con was off and it got stuffier.....the drinks ran dry and the toilets got smellier and smellier.
I marched down to the front of the plane and off onto the adjoining walkway and hung over the edge to spot a pilot coming towards us....asking him if he was our new pilot, when he replied yes, I told him I thought that 125 passengers would be very happy if he hurried up and got us out of there.
During this time we were not told anything unless we asked.
Meanwhile I texted Shaz and she said there was no way we could land in Bali as the telly could not be heard as the rain was so heavy....but off we took again anyway.
45 minutes later we attempted to land once again at Bali's Nugurai airport and once again the landing gear was down and we could see the ground...and once again we took off again.
Up Up and away............for the fourth time.
Still nothing was said and after about 15 minutes we turned and came in for another attempt. By this stage we were all very quiet with nerves and anticipation and as we came in for landing, the plane was out of control and we fishtailed down the runway.
All I could think of was the recent crash in Yogya....as did 124 others I think.
When the pilot finally gained control and we came to a final halt...the whole plane applauded.
And so we were in Bali once again.
When we got through the slowest line of Immigration and collected out very wet bags with very wet belongings.......we went outside to find a taxi and 'Oh my god' was all I could say...Audrey was still waiting for us 6 hours later......at 3am.
More to come.