I've arrived in New Zealand. It was quite an experience with the airlines, but we made it here as scheduled; consider it a miracle! First, Pat and I waited for 1.5 hours at the check-in because American Airlines gave us shit over our Visas; we missed our flight out of O'Hare, caught the next one and then landed in LAX 1 hour before our flight to Auckland was to depart. Ches went on without us and we intended to meet up with him in NZ because Pat and I gave up hope of catching our flight. But we still tried; got our bags, got the attention of a Qantas agent who put us in the front of the line and processed our tickets (without the controversy that American Airlines gave us, those sons of bitches!). Pat and I then sprinted through the airport (big time movie style), went through the security check point that pilots and flight attendants go through, pushed our way through and continued to sprint to our gate and make it with a few minutes to spare. It was crazy; but in typical fashion like other trips we've had.
Got out of the airport at 5am, met with our Kiwi friend Kate at her flat and got a start to the day. Walked around downtown to get some essentials and made our way to the backpackers car market and bought a van. Its pretty sweet; a nice Maori paint job, in really good condition and got it for $3500 NZ, including all fees. So it was a sweet deal and now we're psyched to get out in the country... in style of course.
