Also not too sure what I was doing above the South Pole.

from my journal:

Not really sure how many hours have passed, or even what day it is. The flight board says Monday, so I’ve been traveling for three days, but three days where and in what time zone? The large number of tranqs I’ve been downing as we keep hitting turbulence are making the memories a little soft at the edges. I’m about 10 time zones away from where I started, about an hour away, by fast boat, from the international dateline where you actually go a day into the past.

I’m beyond tired, a greasy Spanish looking guy that sat next to me on the plane from Joburg, had taken off his shoes and let the smell of his soaks permeate into the economy seating, the woman behind me kept kicking my chair (apparently its ok to do that in economy), and not even the tranqs I had taken had done anything for my sleep patterns.

I’ve been on steady diet of airline food, tranqs, so that I get on the plane and stay on it, and caffeine, so that I don’t get grumpy and annoy the immigration officials who are still beelining for me despite the fact that I’ve shaved off the goatee and covered up the tattoos. Today, biosecurity has made me unpack my bag and I’ve been selected for the random bag swab for explosives.

Its about 4am, local time, at the Christchurch airport and I’m gulping a large cappuccino that in my chronic jet lag I tried to pay for with a 10 pula note. There are people sleeping huddled on the airport floor. Some are in sleeping bags, some are wrapped in blankets and towels. Its freezing in here. They all seem to be huddled around the electrical outlets, laptops and ipods recharging. I contemplate finding a hotel for the night, but my flight leaves in four hours, I decide to join them. Only six more hours until I land in Queenstown. I’ll sleep then. The caffeine is slowly drip drip dripping into my veins. In a couple of hours I will be in a plane with propellers hitting serious turbulence, the guy next to me pulling out a book of Psalms and mumbling the words … this does nothing to alleviate my fear of flying.

The Oysterbox Hotel down in Umhlanga is not the kind of place that you would expect an Icelandic boy to be marrying his Greek princess, but these two brought the rock star swagger on a whole new level to their photography. Stefan had torn his achilles tendon and was being wheeled around in a wheelchair, he’d also just had a throat op and was still sounding a little Billy Holiday’ish. I would have been filled with painkillers, whiskey and ennui, not necessarily in that order. Not these two, sometimes the adrenaline and endorphins of being in love and being bound together for eternity kick in and … well, rock start swagger, killer bee photographs and serious weather. My best part of the evening was the Icelandic four liner poem, no translation necessary.

Its been a long three weeks. V and I are very private people we’ve pretty much kept to ourselves after getting the news. I just wanted to thank all our clients who were was supportive and understanding, and those that weren’t, well, it takes all kinds.
Again thank you, your well wishes touched us.
In other news, we got a nice mention on the My Eco Wedding in Africa blog. We also won a Profoto award in the Fine Art category (its a long story) and the pics will be featured in a photography book.
Don’t you hate it when magazines contact you and want to interview you, but only if you take out a full page ad?
If you’re looking to tempt, cajole, thank or bribe me – I’m currently very fond of this.

On my way back from a very crazy cool wedding in New Zealand – Frodo must have frozen his ass off out here. Give me a day or two to recover from jet lag and I’ll start replying to the emails.