Off to Brazil

I'm heading for Brazil today. By the time I publish this I will probably be there.

At 6.30am the taxi picked me up from home and took me to the Swindon coach station to catch the 7.00am coach to Heathrow.

The coach made good progress down the M4 and by 9.15am I was checked in and ready for the flight.

As I type I'm just waiting to find out which gate I need to go to. My journey takes me via Lisbon, Portugal where I have to switch planes to travel onwards to Fortaleza in Brazil. This is my first time in Portugal and in South America so I am looking forward to the experience.

I purchased a Portuguese phrase book, and hope to learn some phrases during my very long journey. I'm expecting it to be very hot there on the northern end of Brazil as it's not that far off the equator. It will be good to be somewhere warm after the cold, damp grey winter we've had.

I'll miss everyone back home and can't wait to be back with all the stories and adventures. Its an action packed agenda for the next 10 days, culminating in a conference in Sao Paulo on 7th and 8th April.

I just had a fright a minute ago. I plugged my laptop into one of the power sockets available in departures. No power. I tried another again no power. So I put my phone charger in and that worked. Oh my goodness I thought. No power on my laptop - how will I do my work... thankfully it was just loose connections on the socket as I tried a third and that was OK. My heart raced and I broke into a sweat... All OK in the end.