Sep 23: ... let the jet lag begin ...

A 14 hour flight, but not too bad as long haul flights go.  We cashed in our Frequent Flyer points for Premium Economy seats for this leg of our travels and well worth it too.  Not only is there more leg room and better food, but there's fast-tracking at the check-in counters and early boarding rights too.

The flight landed early in Jo-burg after a turbulence-free journey.  We got to our hotel room by 6pm, but our poor old bodies thought it was 2am and screamed: you can't eat food - go to sleep NOW.  We just couldn't fight it.  

At least there were no great culture shocks to contend with.  You can drink the tap water and they drive on the left hand side!  Very civilised!  It was reassuring too, to read the notice in the Hotel Lobby notifying us that firearms are not permitted in the premises and that the hotel provides gun storage lockers for the guests convenience.

There is a spanking new huge international airport, with good feeder roads, multi-laned highways, familiar modern cars and all sign posts in English.  Our hotel near the airport was set in a secured Casino complex - crisp white linen on a comfy king size bed and marble tiled bathroom.  Service everywhere has been very efficient and cheerful.  Can't fault anything.

We could almost be in Australia, apart from the accents!  The Afrikaans accent was difficult to dicipher over the airport loudspeakers.  In fact we could barely make any sense of a very long announcement, just managing to pick out the words: "loogages 6", so we at least could find our suitcases on luggage carousel number 6.