Three Days in Philadelphia

On Sunday morning I am boarding my first flight from Billy Bishop International airport in Toronto, also known as the City Island airport, found about five minutes on foot from my brother's place and separated from land by 120 meters of water. It is going to be the shortest ferry ride ever, and it's going to be freeeeee! The airport code for Billy Bishop is YTZ, in case this bit of info is somehow interesting. I will be flying Porter to New York City... well, to Newark, to be exact, but I'm not staying there even for a minute and heading to Manhattan the second I step off my plane.

From Manhattan, which undoubtedly is going to be all green and Irish (it's March 17, Saint Patrick's Day, after all), I will be taking a bus to Philadelphia, where, I heard, it is not always sunny, but many other wonderful things are found. Their art museum is supposedly exceptionally good. A quick Wikipedia read tells me that it houses Van Gogh's Sunflowers and Monet's Japanese Bridge and Water Lilies, which is good enough for me, even for $20. Another pleasant news is that the price of admission to Philadelphia Museum of Art covers two consecutive days, which means that I can visit Rodin Museum on Monday (while all the other buildings are closed) and continue with the main building and the Perelman building on Tuesday. Here is hoping that my hopefully light post-St. Paddies hangover will not interfere (or make an appearance at all).

Other random plans for Philly include cheesesteak, Liberty Bell, live music, and striking random conversations with people. After that, it's back to NYC for a few hours and then off I fly on Porter back to Billy Bishop!

I heard New Zealand was nice this time of year

Well, I've just memorized another airport code - AKL. The hard way, one may say, because it sure isn't easy to look at the price tags associated with the magic combinations of LAX→AKL, YVR→AKL or, god forbid, YYZ→AKL. The number next to the dollar sign with the last one is truly hair-raising. For this reason, I am not sure I will find companions for that trip, at least those who would join me outside of New Zealand. Who knows if this plan, which struck me as brilliantly stupid and therefore promptly planted itself in my mind, will come to fruition.

Still, I do believe that the world premiere of The Hobbit in Wellington on November 28th is an excellent excuse to travel there. The Lord of the Rings trilogy, both the films and the book, is important to me; probably not as important as it is to Kiwis and their tourism board, but important nonetheless. It is a very extravagant excuse, but this trip has a potential to be truly magical.

Just wanted to share. Now back I go to researching the destination and planning to buy a guidebook.

Airport codes

I am fascinated with airport codes, as the title of my blog would attest. They are such a handy way of identifying cities without having to type the full names up, and feeling like a boss at the same time. Who would write "Toronto" when you can just stomp on Y and Y and Z in the title of a document or a pictures folder? Not to mention that flight searches work out much faster this way. YYZ-BCN, boom! Instead of "Toronto" - "Please choose and airport" - Pearson... Ugh... Or take Moscow: DME is much shorter than Domodedovo, and SVO is easier to spell than Sheremetyevo, especially for foreigners. I will probably rant about Russian airports in a separate post, so here are a few memorable ones located elsewhere:

BCN - That's, of course, El Prat in Barcelona. I think by far the one with the most obvious connection between the city name and the code.

YYZ - My second favourite and my home base, Toronto Pearson Airport. Toronto has another cool airport right in the city centre (on the island right off downtown, to be precise), but I have never flown out of there. Billie Bishop City Airport is dominated by Porter and, consequently, is quite expensive.

MSY - That's the coolest place in the U.S. I've been to so far, New Orleans, Louisiana. The airport is newly renovated and hip, and very strangely quiet all the time.

EWR - Newark, New Jersey. Flown in and out of there a lot of times, mainly Europe-bound. The airport is decent, but its United Red Carpet lounge could use some serious work, like... Oh, I don't know, offering food, maybe?

JFK - Such a dull place.

LGW - London Gatwick. Such a long walk from the gate to passport control, up the stairs, down the stairs, moving walkway, left, right, welcome to London, now you have to take a train to the train station. Marvellous.

CDG  - Paris Charles de Gaulle. Since we are on the subject of marvellous... CDG is the airport I hate with a passion. I don't hate practically anything or anyone at all, but the airport in Paris I do. I literally go red in the face and white in the knuckles when I think about it. Its horrific domestic terminal is always crowded thanks to the idiot who designed it, there are no calm corners to be found because everything is laid out in the open, even if half-submerged to the lower level, and, well, I have yet to arrive or depart on time from there. CDG also happens to be located in the most optimal point between YYZ and BCN for me, so I can't avoid it. And it's especially pleasant to hate when I arrive to El Prat.