First entry new blog

Today is the start of the first day of my new blog. As I type this, I'm sitting in an email cafe in Nelson, NZ! Its a cafe I came to seven years ago with my cousin Dani (hey Dani). Much has changed in Nelson. It seems to be an entirely different town from what I remember. But before I go there, I'll go back in time to the start of this journey.

Rich and I left Portland on March 11th for a flight to LA. All was good in the world. We then caught a flight to Samoa. Why Samoa? Well when traveling on frequent flier miles, you often get screwing routing and that's what we got this trip. We had a seven-hour layover in Apia Samoa! We'd never been there, so it was an adventure. We had planned on sitting out our 7 hours in the airport lounge waiting for our plane. However, the airport is so small that it is only staffed when planes are coming or going! So we had to enter the country (new passport stamp)! We had to wait for the Samoans to figure out what to do with us, so there was much walking back and forth, but we were finally allowed entry. It was a humid morning with no breeze so we left the airport and walked out to the large fountain with lights and loud music. Welcome to Samoa it screamed! Since the sun was about to rise, we decided to walk towards it and see the sun come up. It was amazing. Bright colors and friendly people were around. Everyone we passed greeted us. (We will definitely visit in the future.) We headed back to the airport with 5 hours to go. We waited here and there. Rich found and internet cafe and I slept. We ate. We shopped at the one open store. And waited. Finally it was time to go! We checked in again--were assured we wouldn't have to pay an exit tax-since we were never really there and that our luggage had beat us to Auckland (key to the upcoming story). We then tried to exit and were told to head to the bank for the exit tax! We talked them into exempt status and went back through customs and security. Samoan security is stricter than ours! I had to explain why I had nasal spry for allergies! We got on the plane, ate and slept.

I forgot to mention that we were business class the whole way and it was the best trip ever! OMG it was great! I wish I was independently wealthy and could fly business class every where. The food is unbelievably good. The wine and drinks flow. You lay back to sleep (far back). They give you socks, eyemask, toothbrush, toothpaste, and more! It was lovely.

We arrived in Auckland, but our baggage did not. And Air New Zealand had no idea where it was or when we would get it! We had nothing on us. Okay, I had one clean pair of undies (thanks Mom for that lesson). So we took a taxi to our hotel (the Hilton Auckland-a winner in my book) and went shopping. Kathmandu here we come. Kathmandu is not sized for larger women. I found one t-shirt and socks and a waterproof anorak for our upcoming trip to Doubtful Sound! I was almost in tears, fearing the worst. I figured it was sitting on a runway in Tonga. Seriously. We ate and went to bed in exhaustion (after washing what clothes we had in the sink and scrubbing travel muck off).

We got up this morning and shopped at a local discount place (like K-mart). I found clothes that fit and happiness was had. We were heading into the hotel when I spotted Rich's bags! I almost did the happy dance in the lobby of the Hilton (they wouldn't have appreciated it), but I waited until we got to our room. While Rich re-packed, I returned our purchases (except my new pink Birkenstocks flip-flops Tudy!) We ran for our plane and landed in Nelson a bit later.

It is very warm here and sunny. So nice after our gray winter. We are staying in a backpacker's lodge that I thought Dani and I had stayed in during our last visit, but I was wrong. This one seems very nice-pool, hot tub, sauna, kitchen, and our own cabin. The toilet is technically in the shower, but for $52 kiwi per night, I can handle that. We're wandering around the center of Nelson. It is much bigger than I remember and I can't find any of the shops I recall. We'll explore more tomorrow at the artists' market.

Tomorrow we wander. Sunday we whine (okay we drink wine and beer) Yummm. I'll post more of our adventures. But I want all of you to take a moment, bow your heads, and thank whomever you want/need to for clean underwear. When you don't have it, you sure do miss it and the world is not a happy place.

Cheers