What we do know is that we were not going to be the only ones that are going to the island. Winners from 19 different countries were selected to join us in this trip which would amount to approximately 60 winners from around the world that would be coming to this island.
[Our group from Malaysia!]
From Malaysia, 5 of us will be going to the island together, whom are the winners from the two competitions organised by Axe Malaysia through Facebook and Nuffnang respectively:
First up we have best friends David Chau and Shen Thuu Tay who I have to admit were two different yet fun personalities to have with for this trip! Both hailed from Malacca and David even took the drive all the way from there to come to the airport for this trip.
Next, we were joined by the ever beautiful (and fit!) Fay Hokulani who was one of the celebrity guest that we get to travel with on this trip. I have to admit that firstly we were rather intimidated with her status but she really does turn out to be an uber awesome person to travel and party with! More of this later...
And finally you have yours truly and Miss Ave T who are the blog winners from Nuffnang. I suppose I don't to elaborate on that here... :)
[Our rendezvous point at the airport]
AS we made our way to the airport, we introduced each other and started talking about what to expect during our trip there. One thing that we all have in common is that we are all dreading the flight that we are about to sit in. For some reason, we were about to take a REALLY long haul flight there by transiting in 4 airports which would amount to 34 to 36 hours of travelling in total for this trip...
If you have been reading this blog you would know that I should be used to long haul flights like this with my travels but this would be the longest amount of time that I would spend travelling to a place in my life. Even for my trip to the US back in 1995 (mind you back then we were still using the old Jumbo Jet 747) took me 24 hours with two transits to reach so this is a personal record.
As we boarded our flight, we were in it for an 8 hour flight to.....
[NARITA, JAPAN!]
At our stop here in Narita, it was a 6 hour stop which I suppose was not too bad. Problem was that we arrived in the wee hours of Japan timing which means that not much was opened in the airport then. So I took the opportunity to rent a shower area to freshen up and had a look around in the airport before jet setting to our next destination. It was a shame though that we didn't stay here longer which means that we could not leave the airport in between our transit.
[Found a very cute little Japanese hut to sit and wait]
[Ah yes, the beauty of tax free items in the airport]
[We found so many yummy cafes and restaurants to eat while we are here]
[Of course some labels did make me giggle a little bit...]
So while we wait around in the airport, we took some time to get to know the others in our group and chit chat a little bit about ourselves. Its amazing in situations like this we really do get to know new people and one thing for sure, with the number of people coming for this event we were bound to meet people from places we would never imagine to meet!
One of the things that we all have in common is that we would all be flying using American Airlines for the first time in our lives. I have to admit I do have my reservations as to using this airlines simply because it is very new to me and I am intrigued to find out how their services are like.
All I am hoping now is my luck on places (which usually suck) would fare better than my previous travels.
It did not. -.-'
[The shiny 777 plane for American Airlines!]
For some damn reason the airlines decided to book me and Miss Ave T to sit MILES apart in the plane and there was no way we could switch seats with the person next to us. We were going to have a 11 hour flight to Dallas, Texas seating apart from each other.
Now a lot of you would say that its just during the flight but I would say this again, I HAVE THE WORSE LUCK when it comes to the people that sits next to me and this flight was no different...
At the start of our flight I have this Japanese chap (who insisted that he didn't want to change seats with Ave because he wanted an aisle seat) who started drinking the minute they start serving drinks, which I have no problems with. However, the flight got VERY bumpy because of the turbulence and our friend here got super sick because of that. As a result, he stayed in the toilet for one hour and when he came back, I realized he didn't really make it to the toilet properly and got some on his pants or somewhere.
This resulted to a "oh-so-rosy" session of me sitting next to him for the next 10 hours enduring the smell of vomit with no where to go. Curse my crappy luck...
[Howdy Dallas!]
Nevertheless, I pulled through the flight and I was in Texas for the first time!
Being the fourth busiest airport in the world, we were greeted to a much livelier airport than what we saw in Japan. Once again we were there for another 6 hour transit which gave us ample time to check the airport out!
and boy we have so much things to see!
[They have BBQ shops that make this state famous!]
[Candy apples shops that made Ave squeal!]
[ I was watching my calories so I had to say no]
[even shop names that made all of us laugh. You figure out yourself why]
Really it was a marvel to see so many things happening in this airport and to compare with our own KLIA, which I believe is one of the best airports in Asia, this one really gave us a run for our money.
So once again we took some time to rest because of the long flight and had to mentally prepare ourselves to another 3 hour flight from Dallas to Belize, which was going to be our last destination!
[Sun was coming up as we arrived in Belize]
Thankfully that our flight to Belize was a shorter flight in comparison so I took the time to just sleep off the fatigue which I believe that the rest was doing the same as well (I would like to note here that Fay has the ability to sleep in the most uncomfortable situation and not have a problem with that. How the hell did she do that?)
As we came into Belize, we were greeted by some of the Axe Anarchy officials and was all set to hit the island itself. However, we were then told that we were only going to the island tomorrow and our package doesn't start til tomorrow, which is a bummer. Then we were told that we still need to take another flight from Belize to a place called Placencia which was where our party is at.
I figured it shouldn't be that bad considering that it was only an hour flight max. How bad can it be compared to our previous flights?
That was when I saw our plane...
[Behold our tiny chariot!]
What you are looking at is a Cessna 208 also known as the Caravan (wadahell???) which I also refer to as the "God Must Be Crazy plane" that sits about 14 people in maximum. Very light and is seriously going to the be the first time I am flying in a plane that small!
[Our flight ticket]
[Rather suspicious looking nuts]
[Believe me I gave the same face to Shen Thuu when we were about to take off]
As we boarded the flight, a few of the staff saw my worried face as I entered the aircraft and to make matters worse, they decided to put me right in the front of the plane because I was a bit big and it kinda make sense for me to sit there for balance.
I knew for a fact the real reason was to scare the living crap out of me.
[When I say in front, I mean RIGHT BEHIND THE PILOTS!]
[even took a shot at the controls for the plane!]
As we took off, I cling on to everything I can find in that plane and braced for the take off. To describe how this plane works, most commercial airplanes would be a little shaky during the thrust take off but would still be very steady. This little thing goes at the same speed but instead of going straight, IT SWAYS LEFT AND RIGHT ON THE RUNWAY WHILE SPEEDING because of the weight.
At this moment, I lost all my cool and started squealing like a girl that just saw a snake.
Not even a macho squeal.
Kinda like "ee-eeeEE-EEEYAAAAAAN!!!!" -.-'
But the best part of being in small plane like this was the view that we got to see while we were on air.
[Amazing natural beauty of Belize]
[Snaky jungle rivers]
An hour later, we landed in the village of Placencia where we were driven to our next stop.
[I damn near kissed the plane for taking us safely!]
We were then driven to another fishing resort that we would stay for the night before embarking our boat to our island. As we reached there, we saw the resort as a very dainty, small hotel that was literally in the middle of a village in Placencia.
This was the place that Ave, Fay and myself will be staying for the night, which we were very skeptical about the place...
[The view from our fishing resort!]
[the room for the night. Quite comfy to be honest]
It was then that we were told that the reason we have to stop over to wait is because we were the first group to arrive to Belize and they are expecting the rest of them to arrive tomorrow and be shipped to the Anarchy Island together.
So we decided to make the best of it and mingled around with the rest of the people that has arrived and party while we were there!
[Dinner time which was delish!]
[Even the Belizian cops came to check us out! Yayness!]
It was amazing as we had the guys from Thailand, Ecuador, Mexico, Colombia, Peru, Trinidad and Tobago and Chile joining us for the night and we basically exchanged stories on how we got here and how unreal this has been. And we haven't even reached the Anarchy Island yet! :D
So as we partied the night away, I decided to call in the night earlier than I expected as I was still feeling the pinch from the long haul flight we had to endure. At this point I really couldn't believe my eyes that I was in the middle of the Caribbean and we were about to embark on a journey that we would never forget.
So that basically concludes day 1 which I must admit was pretty mild.
