22-24 September; Freiberg, Dresden and Singapore

I had been expected to do the tour of the Wismut mines on Thursday but as it was going to be much th same as the tour we did in May from Gera I decided to miss it. Instead, after a leisurely breakfast Russ, Alex, Oleg and I  joined up to drive with Alex to Dresden where we had a meeting with Stefanie Hurst the head of radiation protection at the saxony Environment Ministry. That ended  at about lunchtime so we strolled around the old part of Dresden and had lunch before Oleg went for his train to Berlin and  Alex  drove Russ out to Leipzig Airport for his trip back to Vienna. A and  I then tried to find a hotel and ended up in the motel on the autobarn at Dresdenr Tor as all the hotels were full. The Pope was in Leipzig and so the overspill of tourists and pilgrims had fillled both cities!
Still the motel was fine and cheap enough.
next morning Alex and I went on a bit of sightseeing in Dresden  as I had never been inside the Frauenkirche. That was fantastic, we also took in a few of the other sites before meeting up with Stefanie for a farewell coffee after lunch and then i was of to Dresden airport with Alex.
Like Leipzig Dresden airport has  row upon row of last minute travel agents'offices offering cheap holidys to everywhere - seems a bit too last minute even for my planning style.
The airport is small but it worked OK and the Lufthansa Senator lounge was OK. the flight to Frankfurt was only 45 minutes or so in a B737-300 and then the usual marathon walk across FRA to get to the flight for SIN. NO upgrade and the plane was packed but we left on time and  all was well. I had seat 1K right at the front which is interesting. When we landed at SIN we pulled up at the gate and then teh APU failed and the cew had to wait fro ground power to be connectede before they could open the doors  and let us off. the ususal trail through immingation and customs and collecting one's luggage as you cannot interline bags onto Jetstar. Still I know the system and the route from T3 to t1 using the train and then the checkin for Jetstar. So now I am in the QANTAS first Class lounge with the good satay and lovely shrimp sarnies before the 4.5 hours horror ride  on Jetstar with my knees up around my ears that will put me back home into Darwin at 0430 Sunday morning