Day 1 - The Journey home from Bangalore to Sydney

As most of you know we were lucky enough to secure 4 seats on the Qantas repatriation flight from Chennai to Sydney on Friday 5th June. I say lucky, as these flights sold out in 5 minutes - thank goodness for my fast typing skills and complete desperation to get those tickets !!  In order for us to take that flight, we needed to make our way to Chennai with options of flying, private car or a consulate arranged bus from Bangalore.  With so much uncertainty with the domestic flights at the moment and many of the flights being cancelled with no rearrangements, we had to chose between private car or bus.  The private car situation had so many issues, the main one being that we had too much luggage for one car.  Also, it is not that easy to cross borders at the best of times in India, but during these strange Covid times, it is even harder, particularly travelling to Tamil Nadu, where there is a 14 day quarantine being enforced and we were worried this would mean not making our flight.  So, the bus it was !!

I have to start by saying that we ‘The Nairn family’ have been in lockdown since the 10th March. We have not been going anywhere outside of our gated community and have been incredibly safe during these times with deliveries and any exposure to other people.  Therefore, the last few days have been really weird - having the removalist’s in our house, staying in a hotel, now a bus ride and another hotel. We were very confident that we didn’t have any ‘virus’ before Monday but these last few days have exposed us to more than any of us wanted.  Let’s hope we get home without being infected.

We haven’t really done the ‘bus thing’ in our 4 years of living in India except for the boys having done school trips.  We were very nervous what the ‘bus’ would be like but as it was arrange by the consulate, it was fine and they have all the paper-work and passes required to cross the border etc.  We had our driver drop Jack and I and the luggage at the bus depot and then return to the hotel to get Mike and Max.  Our driver had no idea what was happen just dropping us off at a random bus depot in the middle of town…… I think he will be happy to see the back end of this ‘demanding’ Australian.  Jack and I were standing at the bus depot at 6.30am along with hundreds of Indians taking ‘local’ buses……. we did stand out just a bit !!!  As we stood there with our numerous large suitcases, a rat, yes a rat, scurried by scaring the shit of us !!!!!!! No, this could not be happening.  Then we had a guy walk by with his ‘tackle’ hanging out and then another spending about 3 minutes adjusting his ‘bits’…… not the way I thought my final hours in Bangalore would be………

Another 2 hours of hanging around and we were finally underway - we were the only ‘westerners’ in the 3 buses but plenty of social distancing on the bus and we had stocked up on snacks for the 8 hour ride. The ride itself was long with 6 stops for paperwork checks and 2 toilet breaks - thank goodness we didn't try and go by private car.  The 3 buses drove in convoy and at times they appeared to be racing each other.  I was green from carsickness by the time we reached Chennai !!!  The boys managed the ride really well - thank goodness for the social distancing and technology.

Then the long and painful process started of sanitation of our bags, more paperwork and then checking in to the hotel.  We tried to go for a walk around the hotel to stretch our legs and were promptly sent back to our room - would have been nice if someone had actually told us we had started our quarantine in Chennai !!!  Oh well.  It's all going to be ok in the end.  We have a night here and then start tomorrow with the trip from Chennai to Sydney to start our 14 day mandatory quarantine there.

Below are a few snaps taken in the last 2 days of Indian living …. enjoy. 

The Nairn crew on their way !

This was one of the check points - the men were busy !!??

I don't get it - do you???

I count 4 …….

Anyone for a game of Carrom ?  Just picked a board up on the way home.

Just a bit of 'traffic' on the main road in Bangalore

Only a small load of rubbish

shoes anyone ?

Jack waiting for the bus to arrive

Jack and I with our new mates at the bus stand

Our bus  - Incredible India alright !!

You can see why there were RATS !!!!

There were some monkeys at one of the toll booths !

I will NOT miss this daily sight !!

I was happy the chickens had their own truck and I wasn't having to nurse one on the bus to Chennai