Passing Through Toronto – The Climb #115

Tuesday 16^th May 2017

It’s gone 2am in the morning, which makes it some ungodly hour in the UK, and means that since Sunday morning, I’ve had a total of about 8 hours sleep.  As a result, my plan is to keep this edition fairly short and get some much needed sleep.
I had to wake early this morning.  Although my flight to Toronto wasn’t until 1:15pm,  I wanted to make sure I got there early (I.e. Before 9am) so that I didn’t turn up to find that I’d been kicked off the flight due to overbooking or the like.  This meant having breakfast and showering first, so I ended up setting my alarm for 6:30am, about 4 hours after I finally went to bed.
I thought there might be some complication when my passport wouldn’t scan but it turned out to be an admin issue rather than a flight / ticket issue and by about 9am I was through security and awaiting my flight.
I made a point of editing the first half of the vlog as I waited.  I’m glad I did as it saved me time  later on in the day.  It also proved to me that I can edit the vlog just sat in a corner with the laptop and my headphones.
Had some great views on my Toronto flight.  The clouds cleared as we crossed Greenland and I got some amazing video and pictures of the mountains.  Truly stunning.  Made up for most of the rest of the flight being cloudy.
Tornadoes pretty much cured me of my anxiety but it seems if there’s one thing guaranteed to bring it on, it’s missing a connecting flight.  Why do airlines insist on booking a connecting flight with ridiculously little amount of time spare?  Case in point: my flight to Toronto which due to delays meant I had about 30 mins to get off my plane, through customs, collect my bag, recheck my bag, go through security, find the departure terminal and get on the plane.  I somehow made it, but I did have to run part of the way.
I’ve managed to keep in touch with people all day thanks to Airline Internet.  It cost me about £8 and works quite well so that I was able to keep up with all the gossip from our storm chasing team and make plans for the evening.  I did keep thinking about the amount of technology and innovation needed just for me to be able to post to Facebook on the move.  It used to be that technological growth was driven by wars, now it’s driven by the need to post cat memes.
I got into Winnipeg around 9pm and got the shuttle bus to my hotel.  I then found out that our secret plans had been scrapped because of bad weather.  That’s bad as in the wrong type, not bad as in severe.
However, whilst I finished off the vlog, mt friend Kim said she’d come and see me.  Which she did.  We cruised around town in her car and got drive-thu Burger King.  We then came back to my hotel room and chatted, which was great but at some point I hit a wall of exhaustion.  Since Sunday I estimate I’ve had a total of about 8 hours sleep and after the stress of the cancelled flight and making my connection in Toronto, I think it all hit me.
So all things considerd, today was little more than a travel day.  Worry about the next stage of my journey meant that my mind was focused on that rather than thinking about the writing.  PLus, I’ve been in low power mode due to lack of sleep.
But, and this is the most important thing… The Climb has made it to Canada.  Tomorrow is a rest day for me…I plan to try and catch up on some sleep and do some shopping in the afternoon.  But I’m here now… finally.