The 51 Day Adventure Begins

Greetings from New Zealand! We left Iowa on February 4th at 9:30AM and about 32 hours later, we arrived in Auckland. Something like 22 hours of those 32 were spent inside of airplanes (metal tubes hurtling through space––my very favorite thing). The longest flight was about 16 hours from Dallas to Sydney, and I must tell you we are extremely happy that we paid the extra $89 per seat for the Premium Economy class tickets. This gave us much roomier seating and legroom and a little extra in-flight service. This was a Qantas flight on an Airbus 380-800, which has two levels of seating. From Sydney to Auckland, we also had a 380-800 with Emirates Airlines, a Qantas partner. I got a picture of it after we deplaned. Saw a couple movies, finished two books, and started a third en route. I don't sleep very well on planes, but all-in-all, the trip was OK.

Here is the west coast of Auckland coming into view this afternoon. I traveled to New Zealand in 2004 for business, so some of this already feels familiar, but this time I get to be more of a tourist. Kathie is here for her first visit––a lovely green country.

I loved following flight progress on these legs. The Emirates flight even had options to view cameras mounted on the plane's tail or nose or looking straight down from the belly. Mostly, I like following the altitude, distances, outside temperatures and times to destination. This isn't a great picture, but you get the idea.

Last time I was here, The Lord of the Rings had just been filmed, and all the Air New Zealand planes and the Auckland airport were decked out with scenes and characters from the movies. This time, I saw one plane decorated with The Hobbit images. Fun!

We will relax now and catch up on sleep. Tomorrow, we plan to visit a museum on the Maori culture and other aspects of the country. Then on Sunday, we board a cruise ship for a 17-day trip around New Zealand and on to southern Australia. Eventually, we will also visit central Australia and see our good Australian friends, Margaret and Murray, for three weeks in Queensland. Stay tuned!