Heading Out to New Zealand

December 13, 2014 - 6:00 p.m.

Auckland, New Zealand

It is 11:00 p.m. on December 12th right now in Missoula, Montana!  We left Missoula the morning of the 11th and arrived in Auckland this afternoon, which is the 13th as we have crossed the international date line.  From house to hotel, we have traveled 34 hours straight. 

When we left Missoula, I took a pic of David and the kids at the airport.

Our flight was delayed a half an hour, but it wasn't a problem as we had a two hour layover in Denver, so we had plenty of time to grab lunch before catching our connection to Los Angeles. We had a really nice meal in Denver at a place called the Woody Creek Bakery and Cafe.  The food was really fresh and delicious!

Then it was on to LAX where we had a 4 1/2 hour layover.  We did quite a bit of walking to pass the time.  This is when I saw the biggest plane I have ever seen in my life.  It was a British Airways Airbus 380 with 469 passenger capacity.  It was double decker windows the entire length of the plane.  I love how the wings curve upward as well.

Later a Qantas Airbus 380 showed up, so I took a picture of it as well.  You can see the double decker windows the entire length of the plane.

Finally it was time to fly to Fiji, which was on our way to Auckland as we were flying Fiji Airways.  It was a 12 hour flight, which wasn't bad, except that I couldn't sleep.  I ended up getting really nauseous the last hour of the flight and could barely hold it together when I got off the plane.  I had a splitting headache and upset stomach... I could barely function.  David went and bought me a Sprite and Danika gave me some crackers to settle my stomach.  Then Kiyomi Looney (Clay was also going to Auckland for the same Information Systems conference as David) gave me some ibuprofen for my headache.  I think it must have been due to lack of sleep. 

Three hours into our four hour layover, I finally started to feel better.  David and I had a cappuccino and latte, and they were incredibly good.  I love the locally roasted coffee!   The weather in Fiji was perfect, and the scenery beautiful.  If we had been thinking ahead, we would have stopped for a few days on our way back.  I snagged a picture of our aircraft before we left for the leg to Auckland.

Once we arrived in Auckland it was like someone was watching over us because everything went so smoothly.  We were ushered through passport control, then our bags were first off the carousel, and then we had the nicest guy at customs.  It was only 20 minutes from when the doors of the plane opened until we were in the taxi heading to our hotel.  We made it to our hotel by 2:00 p.m. having been wheels-on-the-tarmac a little after 1:00 p.m.

I have to say, it really isn't a hotel though.  We are staying at the Waldorf Stadium Apartments in downtown Auckland.  It is a darling little two bedroom apartment with kitchen and balcony.    When we arrived we were so happy to just settle in for a bit and enjoy our surroundings.  Here is a picture from the balcony...

After a bit we took the kids over to the swimming pool and let them play around.  It is a really long pool with two lanes.  One lane is shallow, while the other is deep. You can kind of see that in the picture on the right side where the kids are standing it is shallow and on the left it is deep.  You can really tell how long it is by looking toward the back where I am standing, quite a long way away.  The kids had a great time burning off some pent up energy while David and I went grocery shopping to get breakfast and lunch items for our little apartment. 

After unloading the groceries and the kids having changed clothes, we went for a walk around downtown. Snapped a picture of the Skytower as we were walking.

We wanted to go to the iSite which is the Tourist Information Center here, which is right near the base of the tower.  We picked up  a bunch of brochures on things to do in Auckland so we could look over them while we ate dinner.

Then we headed to Raviz, a local Indian food restaurant.  The food was amazing!  So good!  The naans were probably the freshest I have ever had.  The Chicken Tikka Marsala and the Chicken Korma were seasoned to perfection.  Danika had this incredible salad of onions, cabbage, cucumbers, and carrots in a light vinaigrette.  Yummy.

So, we were completely stuffed as we took the long walk back to our apartment.  It was raining, so I was a bit cold.  Luckily I had some fresh naan breads that we ordered to go.  The package was so hot because they had just come out of the oven.  I just held it against me to keep me warm!

Finally back at the apartment and we are all exhausted from walking the city and lack of sleep over the last 40 hours.  I think it shall be an early night tonight!