We booked a one-week trip to LHI many months ago - and even then we had difficulty getting a reservation at Capella Lodge. In the end we had to settle for 5 nights in one room then the last 2 in another (more expensive) room.
Saturday Dec 1
We left home at 6am for our 7:45am flight - a very early start. We had a big hassle on check-in - very rude agents and issues over the luggage - our flight docs said 23kg but the agent said only 14kg could be guaranteed to be on your flight and heavier bags would be sent on whichever flight in the future had space. She was so rude it almost spoiled our day.
As it came to pass the flight was not full and when the luggage came off at LHI - most bags were clearly more than 14kg but only ours had special yellow tags indicating they were overweight.
Then the second hiccup - Capella (all lodges meet their guests at the airport) left us behind through complete carelessness. After everyone had left and after waiting another 15 minutes we were pretty much stranded; fortunately we were able to get the QF agent to call the lodge - only then did they return for us. To add insult to injury they acted like it was some kind of joke.
Once at the lodge early arrivals are invited to have breakfast so in spite of having had breakfast at Sydney airport we had another breakfast but called it lunch.
After breakfast we competed the check-in and our room was ready which was great so I could unpack and try to re-gain my composure. We told them we would like to go hiking around mid-day and they said no problem they would drive us to the start of one of the hikes. When we went to reception to get our ride we had to wait 20+ minutes - looks like you need to get yourself on island time.
We we did a few hours of hiking and walked back to the lodge (an additional 4+ k’s) for a rest and showers before Happy Hour and dinner.
Happy Hour was fun - met another couple from Egypt who were on their honeymoon - dinner was excellent.
