Feb 8th - Less Expensive

10 am

Yes, I have finally made it to this beautiful place.  After what turned out to be a 12 hour flight instead of the 13 hour flight because of a great tail wind went quite smoothly.   As we had been told by several veteran NZ travelers, Air New Zealand was all it was cracked up to me.  I can’t say the same thing for United however.  On our first flight out of Denver, Shelby sat between a couple with a crying, poopy pants baby and I sat next to a lady whose first words to me were “you’re probably going to be one of those people who gets up 4 or 5 times aren’t you?”  But we survived and it was a beautiful ride watching the US fades away behind us.  When we arrived in San Francisco, it was hot!!!!   We had the chance to watch the third quarter of the Super Bowl and talk to our friends and family one last time before we left thanks to free Wi-Fi in the airport and then we were on our way.  12 hours, two meals, 2 movies and no more than a few hours of sleep later, we were here. 

 Being here in Auckland is making me want to just fly to Christchurch, however.  Everyone we meet has told us how amazing the south island is and that that we should go there.  While I know there should be things to do in Auckland city, we don’t know what those things may be.  Hopefully we’ll find something soon as it would be a shame to waste any time while in New Zealand.

Six hours later.....

4 pm

So…. We found something to do in New Zealand today!!!! After searching the street shops , we decided to go to the Sky Tower. 

Although we did not actually go on the tour, we made our own tour.  It was on this tour that we created the Badge Challenge…. or at least that is what I am going to call it for now.  As some of you know, I brought my friend Pete to New Zealand with me.  This rainbow dragon made by Kyle and I has a small jean backpack I thought I was going to fill with small objects to represent each place I visited; I have now decided to attach a “badge”, very similar to a united states souvenir pin, to his backpack instead.  This is a cheap way to collect a trinket from the places I go.  Shelby has also decided to do this and will be decorating her new Kiwi bird’s bandana.

  Here’s Pete and his first badge.

After our self-guided tour of the Sky Tower, we decided to go to a nearby park that looked absolutely gorgeous to take pictures.  Of those pictures, here's a link to some of my favorite…….

Click me!
or me!
oh me me me!!!! click me!!!   

And then we decided that Pete needed to grab the tower!!!

And then….well…. The good news is my little sister will now be receiving two spare batteries and an extra battery charger for her camera and I now have wonderful brand new ocean blue Panasonic camera with a Lumix lenses; the bad news is my black camera that I knew how to use is no longer in service after it fell to a tragic death this afternoon just moments after taking this picture.  As Shelby was going to hand it to me to look at, she dropped it on the lenses and now a new lenses is the only way it would work (which I was told would cost more than a new camera).  Prior to arriving over here though, I had decided that if anything happened to my camera, I would replace it because that was far less expensive than losing those memories.

So, even though it has been a rough day, I AM EXCITED TO BE HERE!!!!  It's going to be a blast

Tomorrow’s plan:

-Not break anything else

-Not miss our bus

-Make it to Mrs. Aish’s home safely

Cheers!!!!