It cost me $2.25 and an hour exactly to get from home to the third best airport in the world by public transport (bus, train, bus).

Total = 1 man hour.

If someone had driven me it would have cost them an hour, me a half hour, put another vehicle on the congested Calgary roadways — and spewed extra pollutants possibly killing a cute baby seal.

Early at the airport, feeling well (as well as a guy leaving bleak, overcast Canadian arctic winter for Australia mid-summer), I was dumbfounded to learn that I needed a visa for Australia.

Surely not.

I made the same mistake once before. Not allowed to board a flight to Brazil because I had no visa. (Air Canada rerouted me to Canuck-friendly Chile.)

This time Air Canada sold me a visa for Australia ($25), the only national visa they are allowed to sell at the ticket counter.

Whew.

Travel agents are supposed to advise customers when visas are required. Right? (At least the stupid ones.)

And why didn’t Air Canada send me one of those “email reminders” confirming my flight? I get those from other airlines?

Even confirming my flight on line with Air Canada on-line was difficult. I finally had to phone them.

Next travelogue on this trip >> I could live in Melbourne