I have been on the plane for about 3 hours now. It’s rather
interesting to see how everyone just mellows out on the plane when they know
they are in for the long haul. Its about 5:30 pm Vancouver time and the first
baby has started crying. Everyone else is absorbed in crosswords or the humour
of bad teacher on their seatback TV’s. It doesn’t appear that anyone is
sleeping although I am sure some are.
Efforts to establish an easier transition to time change has
fallen off my radar. I am basically in the state of do whatever keeps the mind
going. Its 10 am in Singapore at the moment and I should technically be
starting my day. But with 1492 miles down and 3282 miles to go, I have got
plenty of time to nap.
After finishing my first movie of the ride and dining on
some rather unattractive Dijon chicken, I peeped out the window and saw what I
least expected. Mountains! Covered in elegant layers of snow, these beautiful
works of rock sliced waves across the landscape. I was in awe. What I didn’t
expect that en route to Tokyo that we would not head directly across the ocean
but take the route north following the coast from Vancouver up to Anchorage.
Which a few moments ago I spotted a city below, which I can only assume, was
Anchorage.
Back to these mountains. I spent easily half an hour
admiring their beauty. All summer and all winter for that fact I try my best to
bask in their glory. This view is completely different from anything I have
seen before. With their permafrost conditions, the snow sparkled even from
34000 feet. When off in the distance something began to catch my eye. My
forehead pressed again the windowsill I saw her in all her beauty. For the
first time with my own eyes I could see one of my goals. Denali, it's the
pinnacle or North American. Flying past Mount McKinley I thought back about how
high she really is. Standing somewhere just over 21000 feet McKinley is the
highest point in North America.
Flabbergasted I reached into my bag and whipped out my
phone. I say phone because that will be my camera during these adventures. In
what seemed to be an eternity it booted up. The sides of my lips hit my ears I
was so excited to see this mountain. And snap! Here it is way off in the
distance. I am not exactly sure how far McKinley was at this point, but that
matters little, it was there. Bouncing back and forth between window and screen
of our location I was begging that we would get closer. And we did, but only to
be hidden by the unfortunate closing in of clouds and a ding followed by the
message “ The pilot has activated the fasten seat belt sign, please return to
your seats and ensure your seatbelts are securely fastened.
Whenever I hear this message, whenever that preflight safety
speech is being preformed, I think of one of my favourite movies. You got it
Fight Club. I can’t help but laugh at the images of smiling people as they put
on their oxygen masks or that the much a seatbelt would really save you from a
500 mph impact. Considering hitting a wall at 100 mph is enough to rattle all
your nuts loose. This is all meant in a rather amusing tone however. I like to
think positive and that kind of stuff will not happen.
After that quick post out of Vancouver, you know that my
delay in Calgary made me miss my flight to Hong Kong. So the reroute has sent
me to Japan. I am excited, although I won’t be able to set foot on their turf,
it is something awesome to experience.
I think in the Vancouver post I wrote about the wrong song.
I think I will edit that. As I write this post I am powering through one of my
favourite playlists closing my eyes periodically to grab rest and imagine
pulling sick lines of some of those mountains. Aha got it. You never know by
Heiroglyphics. One of the lyrics is “maneuvering through Vancouver and onto
Japan where they put majors grands in my hand” about 3 minutes in.
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