Well…what a year it’s been in the lead up to this trip. But after many, many hours of travel we made it to New York.

Let me back track…so we organised this trip sometime last year – it’s a Solid Sound year and regular readers know that this is a non negotiable for us. We simply must attend. So money scrimped and saved, tickets bought, hotels,cars,flights purchased we patiently awaited our trip whilst living off cabbage and beans due to a severely depleted bank account (it’s all worth it, right?)

Then at the start of 2026…random horrible shit starting happening in the world (just for a change) and the words “fuel crisis” starting being bandied about. Flights were getting cancelled and prices of everything were escalating- we hadn’t booked our return flight from Singapore yet! Will there still be one available? Will our flights be cancelled? Will we get stranded overseas? So many questions, not many answers. We could only wait and see happens…

Meanwhile, March-May were pretty much a write off due to a health scare on my behalf. Being the good little 50 year old I am, I went for my free mammogram at the end of last year. Well, that was all clear but they requested a follow up ultrasound which was not all clear. So it was suggested I either have a biopsy or wait a bit and have a follow up ultrasound in a few months, which is what I chose. Waiting for things like this is not my forte. STRESSFUL. In April I had the follow up and it wasn’t the news I had hoped for…so biopsy it was. More stressful waiting…good times here folks…on the day of the biopsy I had to have ANOTHER ultrasound- I had a brief glimmer of hope that they’d be like “oh you’re all right now off you go” but, no, instead I now had to have not one, but TWO biopsies. The rest of the day was a blur except let me tell you it was not a pleasant experience at all. Then the funnest of all fun bits – waiting a week for results. At least my job working with small children is very distracting and helps keep your mind off things, so that was something. A week later on Monday morning at 8:40am – just as we open the doors to let the kids in, my doctor phoned. I abandoned my class teacher and went and sat in the toilet in our classroom to answer. Expecting to hear the worst – when she told me my results were ok and I was going to be ok, I actually started to cry…but then I had to go back out in to the classroom to greet the parents and children! Omg, luckily I’m good at putting on a brave face and no one was none the wiser. Fuck. What a morning. What a relief.

The holiday is back on.

Oh but then, I went back to my doctor to ask about a persistent pain in my right side that I had been neglecting due to other concerns overpowering it. So an ultrasound on my side was ordered – gall bladder? Kidneys? Appendix? The holiday is in jeopardy once more.

Well the ultrasound came back clear but I had to have a course of antibiotics for a possible UTI which may or may not have been causing the pain – that’s ok I can live with that.

The holiday is back on again.

Although the mysterious pain still lingers. Mild but persistent is how I would explain it.

Ok, by now we are heading off in about 2 weeks and last minute preparations are underway (horse riding in Iceland anyone?)

The weekend before we leave I’m all set to pack and I come down with a nasty cold. Thanks kindergarten children. So I spent 4 days in bed instead.

And on the 5th day we flew to Singapore- I wasn’t feeling 100% but not too bad, still had a lingering cough. Virus be damned!

So that’s my 2026 so far in a nutshell. Sorry for over sharing but I think it’s all relevant.

* **TLDR – world events and health crises threatened to derail our holiday plans but it all worked out in the end***

We were up at 3:50am to catch an Uber to the airport for our 7:30am flight. Not sure what we were thinking when we booked this. I guess the price was right. We flew with Jetstar – they weren’t too bad! Although the lasagne was well…🤮

We had a 1 night stopover in Singapore which is always advisable when you have a 20 hour flight coming up.

Banh mi and Pho for lunch

We wandered around the shops at Jewel for a bit before it all got too much and we went back to our room and got room service for dinner before going to sleep.

The next day before our flight, we had room service breakfast (average) before packing up and heading to our gate.

Singapore airport is full of fun things.

We checked in, had a cup of peppermint tea and chilled for a bit, then walked to our gate, when through security in to the anti chamber, sat around for a short while then boarded. Quickest and smoothest boarding EVER.

Settled in for the next 20 hours…and we were off.

There was a brief moment about 10 hours in to the flight where I had a mini meltdown because I couldn’t sleep because I kept coughing, but otherwise it was a really smooth flight. I still can’t quite figure out the flight path. We flew up over Japan and then we were in Alaska.

Then we were in New York! Took us all of like 10 minutes (max) to get through immigration and pick up our bags. Walked to the Airtrain and caught it to Jamaica station where we transferred to the subway – brief confusion as Steve asked the attendant how to get to Broadway instead of Bowery station (even though we knew but were doubting ourselves) and my jet lagged brain couldn’t remember which one was correct. On to the subway and 40 mins later we were at our hotel. Incredibly efficient.

After checking in we made a mad dash to Whole Foods to get a quick snack before promptly passing out. Even the World Cup Soccer fans cheering on the roof top bar couldn’t keep us awake.

It’s good to be back.

Good night New York.