Home safely

Tuesday morning started off OK. I had breakfast at the normal bistrot over the road and said goodbye and thank you to the very pleasant young man . He always patiently waited while I ordered or asked questions  about Paris or whatever in very slow, bad French.  His English was good.  A few hours later , after I had packed up I went downstairs to order an Uber. Trouble was I could see the cars loitering ( a nearby hospital helps) but it would not connect to any of them, just dropped out. Maybe tall buildings are a problem. So I went over the road, less tall buildings. The bistrot owner was standing outside. He came over to help.  Finally I got connected to one. Sit down, he says, and I will get you a coffee while you wait. How nice, but  I couldnot because it was almost there. He disappeared and came running out as I was getting into the uber with a bottle of water for me. 

Charles de Gaulle airport was packed and disorganised. Maybe they had just bought in a new system,  whtever, I got conflicting advice,  went up, alonb, then back down to here i ws before etc, and the signage was very poor. For example, at one point, eu passport holders went in one queue, according to the flag on the sign, the next queue hd a sign with a UK, US and Canada flag on it and the next queue said ' Everyone else'. I got in this queue, but I was told to go into the US, UK, Canada queue. I get what they were trying to do but couldn't they do better than that?  I followed all the signs, carefully, i had hours to fill in, but still I ended up getting my passport stamped twice. I did stop and have some of my water at some point. The lounge was good. When I finally got to the departure gate there were a group of 4, all completely overcrowded, no seats, people sitting all over the floor. To get a good deal  ( thru Lufthanser) I had to fly through Frankfurt. So going into Frankfurt , the girl who was going to stamp my passport took ages looking at it. It was new for this trip, so not many stamps. She was puzzled by the 2 exit stamps from Paris. I carefully, politely,  not being critical,  told her. Frankfurt to Singapore, Singapore  to Melbourne all went smoothly. But the timing was very bad because I ended up having 2 nights, the first I slept a bit, but not the second, last night. The plane to Melbourne got in about 10 minute early at 5.30. I got through quickly, went straight to the Qantas domestic lady and asked if I could get on an earlier flight. After a phone call, her shepherding me through security, and me running through a fairly deserted terminal I got onto a plane that started  boarding just before I started to talk to her. At 6am.  It is going to be hard to stay awake today.