First part of the journey has passed, as I am sitting here on Heathrow airport after a very short stay in London. It is 5 in the morning, and to be honest, this is not the proper time to be surfing the internet, after a very short night sleep. Stayed with some friends I met in Thailand last year. Lara and Renna, thanks for the hospitality and the short peak into your world :-)

Since I booked the trip, several things had to go wrong … of course. After a weekend in the swedish woods, everything seemed all right, but it was everything but. Tina and I realised that we could not find the key for the house we borrowed, and we sort of paniced, when we realised that we probably had to make a 1,5 hours drive up to the house again, to try to find the key. We suspected it to still be in the door, as I cleverly let it sit here when we cleaned the house. It seems that I have some sort of malfunction, when it comes to keys in doors … I do not seem to be able to remove them, despite my approximately 25 years of experience in the area. I have done this 2 times now during the last 3 months, and I do not like the development of this behaviour. Anyway … after searching through the entire car and flat, we made the decition to drive back to the house in Sweden. I really didn’t have the time, because I needed to pack my stuff for the trip, but when you are resposible for throwing a key away … what can you do? While parking the car in front of the flat in Copenhagen, I managed to make the worst possible parking … ever. Somehow, the pavement moved slightly towards the car as I pulled over, and with some sort of magic, it ruined the valve on the tire … and the tire started to loose air. Nice - desperately as we were, this was just what we needed. Facing a 3 hour trip in a car with a flat tire, was just not good. We made some phonecalls, and luckily, the neighbours in Sweden did us a huge favour, and located the key … still sitting in the keyhole. Stupid mistake.

I have done one big mistake allready on this trip, and thats bringing a big bird statue. The thing is, that the lads have an annual “sporting event” (the Rat Pack Games), where we compete in several exercises. This years exersices were Mini Golf, Dart, Sports betting and Air Hockey. During an intense match with Jamie (who has been winning the trophy for two running years), I said “if I win this year, I will bring the trophy with me around the world”. What I didn’t know, was that my golfing/betting/dart/airhockey abilities were so good, that I actually managed to win the (god damn) thing. The honor of winning might be slightly more desirable, than having the actual trophe. You see … the trophy is a 1,20 meter statue of a Crane - made of some sort of welded metal. It doesn’ weigh very much, but it is very unhandy. I will be surprised if it will survive the flight to Venezuela … but I am a man of my word, and I have promised the Crane a long trip. Despite the fact that it actually made friends in London, I brought it with me. I will post pictures of this amazing bird and its friends whenever I get to Venezuela.

I think this is my cue to leave. I have to run for the gate, and I am looking forward to a long flight to Venezuela. If anyone know of any nice places to stay please let me know. I have absolutely no idea of where to go when I arrive in Caracas … hopefully an honest (and not just the usual “very helpful” latino dude - who allways will help you after stealing a few punds) will come to my resque, and lead me to a place to stay, that is away from thiefs, robbers, rapists and roaming spanish looking vagabonds. I hope the 200 meter queue for the security check has dissapeared … I know I will soon. Frankfurt - here I come (and then, off course: Venezuela).