California Girl...

After leaving Toronto for Australia in late October, we had a "quick" stopover planned for LA. Little did we know that Qantas had locked out their employees and no plane was flying! This all unravelled as we sat on the runway in LA. The plane returned to the airport, we deplaned, collected our luggage and were assigned a hotel. We stayed at a Marriott in Irvine, about 1.5 hr south of LA and arrived at the check in desk around 5:00 AM. Initially, you would assume there would be many angry travellers. However, we were travelling with many Aussies and I love their attitude!! There was nothing we could do so why get the knickers in a knot. We had no idea how long the lock out would last so we made arrangements to fly to Sydney two days later on Virgin Air. California was beautiful! We had the hotel at our disposal, met wonderful people and tried to relax. I have included two incredible landmarks from Sydney that every day brought a smile to our faces. We climbed the bridge Nov 11, 2011 and were at the top to have a minute of silence at the 11th hour. How special that moment was!! Look at how the sunshine relects off the top of the Sydney Opera House!