Typing in Taipei

Hello from Taiwan! We landed in Taipei about an hour ago and we are now in the computer room/gym of our stopover hotel, which is actually INSIDE the airport! It's currently 6:30pm here and two hours later than that in Australia. Luckily I can remember the location of the "sign in", "new post" etc buttons on Blogspot, as the screen I am looking at has only got Chinese characters on all the buttons!!

Jim dropped us off at the airport this morning (thanks!), and Delle was there to wave us through to Customs (thanks!). Our flight went well - it was about 9 hours, and I even managed to sleep a bit on and off. Despite getting to the airport at 7am this morning and being the very FIRST people in line to check in for our flight, we managed to be the very LAST people to board the plane - we actually got paged over the speakers!! :S We were sitting at a gate that wasn't in use, as the seats were full at ours, and I guess we both got sidetracked talking to our mothers to try to use up the remainder of our prepaid mobile credit. :) Anyway, we did make it and they actually weren't waiting for us to be able to take off, so it was all ok!

Taiwan looked awesome from the air - so ordered and neat - lots of small rectangular green fields (rice paddies?), square-shaped dams, houses, industrial estates and highways. The airport is very spacious and clean, like Changi Airport in Singapore, and has lots of fancy shops that we haven't explored yet. It has an incredible high roof with metal support rods criss-crossing everywhere. It's also quite hot here - the captain said it was 31 degrees outside when we were landing!





Our room is on the fourth floor of the airport and has a double and single bed, bathroom, air con, and a view of a highway and some buildings... so we're all set, apart from the slightly annoying fact that our luggage got checked through to London and we don't have any clothes (not even PJs) in our carry-on baggage, which is all we've got with us for tonight and until we land at Heathrow after our 17 hour flight tomorrow! But at least we have toothbrushes and toothpaste. :)

Ben is feeling quite smug about the surprise we were met with at the Transit/Transfer Desk here - namely, that our hotel for tonight is INSIDE the airport, meaning that we are not able to leave the airport and I therefore cannot count Taiwan as a country I have visited (as per our previously agreed rule - which worked in my favour when I implemented it). We've got a bit of a tally happening and I'm two countries behind him, but since he's been to Taiwan before and I haven't, I thought I was going to catch up by one tonight!!! :P :) (The accommodation was arranged by the airline, which is why we didn't know where we were staying until we got here.)

Anyway, I think that's a pretty good summary of today's events! Our flight leaves at 9am tomorrow morning, and we arrive in London at 7:15pm tomorrow (Tuesday) night, their time. We'll be in touch - cheerio!