the owl may have been pwned a couple times, but it always regained consciousness, it will be the guardian of that place for eternity, for prof. zei not a f**kin clue how he'll survive
for the first couple minutes of Journey to Ba Sing Se, we'll see the sandbenders and gaang coming out of the desert, then they'll leave gaang with info about Ba Sing Se going there via ferry ride, and they'll take off into the desert while aang and the gaang go off with refugees into Serpents Pass (they are incapable of crossing with the ferry)
if aang and the gang did go on the ferry, they would have run into- dun dun dun!! jet and zuko