Dubai, from the little we saw of it, is an extraordinary place. We arrived at midnight - all these Glasgow voices, wee Glasgow types, in among the tall Arabs in white with the red and white headgear, or more ornately-draped affairs looking as if they might be held in place by hair gel. We had about 4 hours' sleep there, in the Millenium Hotel, before being wheeched back to the airport. The photo shows the main concourse past the duty-free shops, quite the biggest I've seen. There are tall palm trees with lights woudn round them, and people from everywhere you could imagine.
Thirteen hours after leaving Dubai, we were in Sydney. We'd had darkness from about 5pm Dubai time, and 6 hours later it was dawn over Eastern Australia.In Sydney I had my hand luggage searched and a nailfile removed - though I'd already flown halfway round the globe with it and hadn't aroused a flicker of interest. In Christchurch, New Zealand - three hours and another Bruce Willis movie later - I had to remove my hiking boots from my case for inspection in case there was any deadly Scottish mud on them. (There wasn't - we'd scrubbed them to such an extent that I was actually complimented on them)Everyone in the whole laborious process of entering NZ was incredibly friendly, however, which made it bearable. Just.
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