I woke up this morning
when my taxi rang me to say it was outside. I don’t know what happened, whether
my alarm hadn’t gone off or I had slept through it, but I was really panicking.
Luckily I was like mum and planned to get to the airport way earlier than I needed
to. The taxi company were really nice and agreed to come back in half an hour
while I manic packed everything away.
When I got to the airport
I realised I didn’t need to rush as I was practically the only one there. It
was absolutely tiny with only one security area and three gates behind the check in
desk. I spoke to mum for a bit and bought some breakfast. My flight was at
8.50am so I sat at the gate until it was time to board.
The plane was really
small and had propellers on the wings! It was around a hour and a half flight
all along the coast so I got some really good views. I was on the aisle seat so
couldn’t get any good photos, but it was still cool. I used the time of my
flight to plan a rough itinerary for the rest of my trip.
As soon as I got to
Sydney, I picked up my bags and transferred from the Quantas Domestic Terminal
to the International terminal. The line for check in to my flight to Auckland
was really long, and I was told because I didn’t have a visa for check in to
New Zealand, I couldn’t check in electronically.
My flight time was at
12.30pm, so I didn’t have too much time between flights. I got pulled out of
the queue to go to the front of the line when they realised which flight I was
on. My bag weighed exactly 23kg, which I was relieved about as I was convinced it would be too heavy! Once I got through security, I
managed to stop for a quick McDonalds breakfast and then got on the plane.
The flight was around 3
hours, so I watched the new Captain America film and some Ab Fab episodes.
There was another two hours’ time difference from Sydney to Auckland, so I
landed around 5.30pm New Zealand time. I had a bit of difficulty getting
through security carrying all my medication. They wanted proof of prescription
and a doctor’s letter and asked me loads of questions. Everyone had to go
through x-ray and quarantine zone, and I got checked for explosives twice. New
Zealand is a lot stricter than Australia, who didn’t even check my prescription.
Once I had got through
with all my bags, I got a sky bus to Queen Street in Central Auckland, where I
was picked up by Jenny and Andy. We drove to a graphics warehouse to look at
one of Maddie’s presents, which was a huge 2.5m x 1.5m canvas full of photos.
Even though they had hired a massive car, we realised there was no way it would
fit. There were some great pictures on their, and some really funny ones of us as teenagers.
We went back to their
apartment which Jenny had arranged with work. Maddie and her boyfriend Ian had
already arrived, so we got her friend Ben, who is also from the UK, to pretend
he needed to go out and get wine. We had to hide in the car park until Ben let
us know they had left and then we went upstairs. I hid my suitcases in Jenny
and Andy’s room and then waited for them to get back. I was really nervous!
I heard Maddie come back
and then Jenny and Andy told her they had a surprise present in the wardrobe.
She was really unsure about opening the door, but she was definitely surprised
when I jumped out. Ben managed to film the whole thing which was funny as she
literally screamed!
After we had both
recovered we hung out in the apartment together. I went with Andy to pick up an
Indian takeaway for us, and saw the Sky City Tower for the first time.
We had a few
drinks and watched some of the Olympics. Maddie was trying to guess some of her
surprises for her birthday. We stayed up chatting for most of the night and
then all went to bed around 12.30ish.
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