On a hippie trail, head full of zombie

So, I’m going to Melbourne (well, Richmond really, but I suspect that’s like distinguishing between Toronto and North York) at the end of the month.

I will have one day free to exploreThat’s one crash night, five nights after work–which I suspect will go quite late each night, and then one whole Saturday, and really most of the Sunday, to explore., and that day also happens to be my birthday. While I suspect the guys from the Australian office will look after me, I am also looking for suggestions for Melbourne must-dos for that day. (Justine?)

Here’s some stuff I didn’t know before this week:

1. From Halifax it’s easier to go around to the east to get to Melbourne. So that’s Halifax-London-Hong Kong-Melbourne. Coming back is Melbourne-Singapore-London-Halifax. At least I don’t have to go through the US and deal with the annoying “international vagrant passing though” screenings.
2. It takes a really long time to get there. Outbound I have over 26 hours actually in the air, with a total travel time of over 31 hours. Coming back it’s over 28 in the air, with a total of 36 hour traveling. It seems kind of silly to spend 67 hours traveling to only be actually in Melbourne for seven days.
3. The company pays for business class on flights over 10 hours without any fuss. This trip is around $13,000 in US dollars. I think it was around $2000 for coach, so the airlines are really screwing the companies that send people on expense accounts. I’m totally OK with that, since it also subsidises the people traveling in coach.
4. My father-in-law can apparently come to Halifax on a whim… which is good since someone will need to be here with Trish and Sarah while I’m gone for ten days.
5. Offering to pay for your wife and child to go along in coach, while you ride up in the swank seats is not a funny joke. Repeat: not a funny joke.

Things I need to find out about:

1. Do I need a power adapter thing for my laptop, and the chargers for my various personal electronics?
2. Air miles. I better figure out how to get the most airline points from this trip–the Air Canada legs between Halifax and Heathrow is easy, but what about those monster Qantas legs? I should put my wife on figuring this out–she’s good like that.
3. What are the rules for knifey-spoony again?
4. Do stopovers in Hong Kong and Singapore mean two more cool stamps in my passport, or are they just holding pens without any interactions with immigrations/customs?
5. How much expensive Scotch can I buy in the Heathrow Scotch store without getting crucified on duty when I get home?
6. Where do I go to easily do something to balance out the ecological footprint of this kind of travel? I’m going to have to buy a lot of wind power or something… (Will?)