Auckland to Rotorua (and the beautiful countryside in between)

It was 5am and we were landing in Auckland. We were a bit tired, but knew we had a long day ahead of us and we were strictly told, no napping! (in order to adjust to the time change faster.) We headed down the escalator, video camera in hand, documenting every minute of our entrance to a new country...including customs.

OOPS! The guards called out at me several times and finally once I realized what I was doing, I stopped recording. They wanted to confiscate our brand new video camera, but I offered to just delete that part of the video (as if I knew how to do that!) The guard asked us to quickly delete the footage of the customs area and security guards. Pete fumbled through the pages pressing random buttons trying to delete the scene... I said to the guard "Oh, there, it's deleted." The guard responded, "Show me that it has been deleted." (Oh, crap, he called my bluff!) Pete continued to frantically jump from screen to screen to try and delete it and finally, phew!, "here sir, it has been deleted, see." Pete saves the day... and the camera... what was I thinking?!

Once we made it through customs, we found the food court and decided to grab a bite to eat while we waited for the car rental company to open at 6am. It was odd seeing Sbarro's pizza, KFC, and Subway at the airport. We found a couple cafes... neither had donuts, so we settled for one that had a yummy vegetarian quiche and delicious coffee! mmmm

We headed outside the airport terminal and ducked under a canopy to avoid the rain while we waited for our Ace Rental shuttle to arrive. A nice man picked us up and transported us with our luggage to the Ace Rental site just down the road from the airport. He gave us road maps and plenty of suggestions about what to see and which route to take to Rotorua. All we needed to do was settle in to our backwards car. That's right, steering wheel on the right, shifter on the driver's left, driving on the wrong, or left, side of the road. There's a nice sticker near the speedometer that reads "Keep Left" to remind drivers... it turned out to be quite helpful. We decided Pete should drive and I would help navigate and remind him to Keep Left as we made our way to Rotorua. We leave the parking lot and approach our first street. We make a right turn and I remind Pete it's the further lane of the two so we don't enter on-coming traffic! "Quick, look, a Dunkin Donuts! We have to stop!" Pete agrees but pays more attention to how we are going to physically get there and that's when he entered the first of many many roundabouts... in the left lane... going clockwise... which makes things even more interesting :)

We park in front of the Dunkin Donuts, I'm SOOOO excited, finally my yummy donut I've been waiting days to eat. Pete takes my picture in front of the shop, my grin stretching from ear to ear! We go inside, place our order, and then Pete points to a sign on the register... Noooooo! We hadn't yet changed any money and they required a $15 worth of coffee and donuts in order to use a charge/debit card. Shoot! So we left... donutless.

On to Rotorua! We jog back to the car to stay as dry as possible. Several more roundabouts later and we were leaving the city of Auckland. Pete makes a comment about how odd it is to see cows just outside the airport. The topography drastically changed within minutes, from flat and rocky to rolling hills with green grass and sheep...everywhere! Soon we found ourselves surrounded by green hills in every direction filled with sheep or cows or both. We passed a few towns just outside of Auckland and decided we needed a more hearty breakfast, so we picked an exit and followed it to the nearest town.

What seemed to have been a bad choice turned out to be one of our fondest memories of our trip. We ended up in a tiny little town with just a few shops, a cafe, pub, and a community center. It was too early for the bank to be open so we crossed our fingers and entered the cafe. The food and coffee was amazing! (I knew Pete was beginning to understand what I meant when I said everyone does coffee better than the U.S.) We had to wait a bit while the cook went across the street to buy some of the ingrediants, but it was well worth the wait. We thought it was pretty cool that it was a small town cafe that purchased there goods from, brace yourself, their own town market! (crazy concept, I know)

Did I mention the not-so-great car we got for the north island? It was okay sizewise, but it had an odd odor (so much we drove with the windows down) and didn't have a cd player. While we were at the restaurant, we decided to ask the gentleman what radio station we were listening to since we liked the music that was playing. At least now we can listen to some good local music while we drive, right?!

So we got back into the car, as Pete began driving back to the highway I started dialing in the new radio station we had just discovered. Crap! We hadn't realized the radio only worked for 88-90.0 Both channels the guy at the cafe suggested weren't going to come in on our crappy little radio. Bummer.

♫ ♫ On the road again...

Two hours later, and we pulled into Hamilton. It was raining pretty heavily, but we spotted a bank and wanted to take the opportunity to change some of our cash (that way if we stumbled upon another donut shop, we'd be ready for it!) The bank teller was excited we were on our honeymoon, so she grabbed us a bank pen. Pete and I thanked her, turned and smiled at each other. It was the first honeymoon perk... it was a pen, but who cares, how cool! :) We decided to grab a quick snack at a deli that came highly recommended by Lonely Planet. All the salads looked delicious and a lot of them were veggie, so we actually had to make a choice... I chose one of the salads and Pete and I decided to have some yummy mac and cheese to warm us up. We sat in front of a window that went from the floor to the ceiling facing the street. We pulled up a couple of goofy looking stools and watched as folks crossed the street and walked on the sidewalks, dodging the rain as best they could. Pete and I talked about how nice the rain was since we hardly ever get any rain in Southern California, we were happy to finally get caught in a bit of a down pour on our way back to the car. It was fun running in the rain... it was warm rain, which helped.

Another hour in the car and we arrived in Rotorua!

17 hours on the plane

After we got settled in, the plane took off and we were on our way. A nice lady who lives in the U.S. but is originally from New Zealand sat next to Pete. We told her our travel plans and talked to her a bit about where she grew up and the differences between the north and south islands. The plane was nice, a bit tight, but there were so many movies to choose from... we were easily distracted. Besides, we didn't mind snuggling up close together on the plane ;)

We watched a couple movies together, then pete watched some crazy action movies while I watched some chick flicks. After about 3 or 4 movies, Pete started dozing off. I of course was restless, so I poked Pete, had him reach for the tylenol pm from his back pack, took a couple, and we were both asleep in no time. Although it wasn't a straight seven hours of sleep, (the seats weren't *that* comfortable) we still felt pretty rested when we woke up for breakfast. We watched a couple more movies and a show or two and before we knew it we were landing in Auckland!

And We're Off!

We had every intention to pack our suitcases on Friday, but as predicted, Friday was filled with wedding preparations, last minute errands, and visiting with family. Monday morning we woke up at the hotel, gathered our things, and headed home to frantically pull together food for the brunch that was to start in an hour... and we still hadn't packed. Brad volunteered running out to the grocery store for bagels and cream cheese, not ideal, but I think everyone was just happy to get together one more time before we all headed off to different corners of the country.

Pete and I took turns attending the brunch and running last minute errands before finally rendezvousing in our bedroom to pack our bags... in 60 minutes or less!

Jon helped us pile our things into his car and drove us down the 5 to San Diego International Airport where we would catch a flight to San Francisco only to sit for 3 hours. We hopped out of his car, said our thanks and good byes and then headed off into the sunset err the airport terminal. No line! So we quickly checked our bags, got our boarding passes and headed to security. Once we found our gate, Pete and I settled down in a pair of comfy chairs and realized we hadn't brought any playing cards for the trip. We headed over to the gift shop and grabbed a tiny deck of cards. Now that the dress was of no concern, I had a hankerin' for a donut, so we moseyed on over to the Starbucks and got ourselves a couple coffees and ... oh, shoot, no donuts.

A couple games of Sudoku and a crossword puzzle later and we were arriving in San Francisco. We headed straight for the international terminal, checked in to see if there were any possible upgrades for honeymooners, no such luck... so we headed up the escalator to a sushi restaurant where the chef was talkative and the fish was ehh. What should we have expected... in an airport, right? We headed back down to the gate after dinner and boarded the plane soon after.

While waiting to board, Pete was worried everyone was staring at us standing in line, since we were kissin' and smoochin' and huggin' standing there all lost in each other's eyes ...too bad, after all, we were starting our honeymoon!!!!