sleeping in seattle

allow me to give you a very intimate insight into a day in the life of a backpacker...a long term traveler....a vagabond....

TODAY

4am - woken by alarm clock owned by one of the 30 other people sleeping in hostel dorm room. 10 minutes later it goes off again....and again...and again...until every fellow hostelleer in the room is awake apart from the owner of the alarm. much muttering and cursing is heard throughout the room until someone goes and hits the guy's shoulder and tells him to turn the bloody thing off...

5am - 7am - light goes on and off, people move about, banging lockers and doors....sleep comes and goes

7am - give up trying to sleep even though i don't have to be awake for another hour

7 - 9.30 - shower in tiny, dirty cubicle...in a bathroom shared with at least 50 other women. breakfast of stale coffee and waffles - but it's free so whatever....check out of hostel.

9.30 - 2.30 - taxi to subway, subway to yet another airport, airtrain to terminal, check in, eat drink, fly

2.30 - another new city and no idea where to go...catch local bus (could get taxi or shuttle but we're cheapskate backpackers...). change buses....still have very little idea about where we're going....pray that we'll get off in the right place and not end up in Woop Woop...(or, worse, somewhere where people like to shoot backpackers with the arms they have the right to bear...)

4pm - jump off bus and walk, and walk....and walk, backpacks heavier by the minute, till we come to our hostel 20 mins later. luckily we have met a fellow traveler along the way who is also staying at the hostel and knows where to go....he explains that we have managed to book the hostel in Woop Woop after all...and that for all intents and purposes we're not even in Seattle...hey....it was cheap....and there's free breakfast and internet...what else could a backpacker ask for?

.....and tomorrow we do it all over again on our way to Vancouver....

it's not always glamorous.

it's not always fun.

it doesn't always feel like a holiday.

we are very very tired.

but it's a means to an end and as i've written before in this little literary masterpiece that is my blog (haha!!) it's days like these that make the fun, interesting and glamorous days possible. I hate them but they get us where we want be....and that's what matters.

tomorrow, you see, is halloween and we plan to celebrate it canada style with some fun and fabulous canadian friends....

stay tuned.....

xx