Day 7 Leaving New Zealand
Up very early this morning, charged the phones and cameras, downloaded pictures – completed packing and woke the girls at 6am.
It was raining again – we made the drive to the airport with no missteps and returned the car – I was supposed to fill up the gas – oops -at least the gas light was on when they rape me with the fill-up charge.
The walk from the rental return to the international terminal must have been km – and not pleasant in the rain. A shuttle would have been nice – but every step made me happier that we had packed lightly – I shared this with thought the girls when we finally arrived at the terminal – they just stared at me and Aria wished for a pair of jeans.
During the walk I had the thought that NZ was spitting us out - funny.
I really enjoyed the country and wish we had not had to skip the Bay of Islands but considering the time we spent I am very happy that we got a fair flavor of the country.
So we dragged ourselves through the airport wet and a little cold I am sure we were quite the sight. We got checked in and found we had to check our main bags as they were too heavy. For some reason this really threw Pam for a loop – it took here a good hour to recover. We hit up a small café and bought a breakfast Panini which Pam and I split and the girls each had a small pastry. No coffee but with an orange juice it was 16.20 – leaving me with exactly .20 cents New Zealand – awesome.
We paid our exit fees and were about to enter customs when I saw that we needed an exit card – we grabbed those filled them out – hit the toilets and breezed through security.
The flight was about 3.5 hours so I was able to get some work done it was quite nice. Pam read the travel guide.
We landed and breezed through customs again (the passport examination agent looked relieved as most of the other people were not English speakers and were having trouble with the forms)– I was "randomly" selected to be waved down with a wand – the customs agent explained that Americans were less resistant to this. We chatted for about 5 minutes – actually listened for 5 minutes as the customs agent told us of his travels to the States.
We picked up a SIM card and Pam found us a room in downtown Sydney – The Menzies - for two nights. We grabbed a cab checked in and got upgraded to the 11th floor – a fine room with everything within walking distance.
We tried calling the Car rental company with no luck – a little frustrating – the Alamo in the phone book did not have our reservation – it would have been helpful if the travel agent had included the contact information or at least the location of the car.
We walked around the town, the harbor, had lunch at the first hotel in Sydney. Wow – what a beautiful city – not very organized and terrible traffic but tons of sites – the botanical garden, Hyde park, the library, the government house, the Opera House where tried to get tickets to the Nutcracker – the ticket seller nearly laughed in our face – she said it has been sold out for months. If we really were insistent she said come 1.5 hours before the show bring cash - $136 each and there is no guarantee but if someone does not show up we might get in - fat chance I am spending my time doing that.
Sydney seems quite expensive. We are trying to carefully select the best value for our activities – it looks like tomorrow we might get a family pass to a Wildlife Park, Aquarium and the Sky tower – just need to figure out transportation – perhaps a ferry day pass.
I still want to read about the history of Australia but have not had a chance.
I am going to have to pay for Internet access – trying to pick the best option - the most bang for the buck.
I also want to go to Bondi beach while we are here.
We walked a lot today, even went by a hertz car place just in case. The hertz attendant said Alamo is the same as national but we could not find the National Office either. We will have to sort this car thing out tomorrow – try calling National and f that does not work hire a car from Hertz – the rate was the same.
Everybody's feet were so tired we hailed a cab to get back to the Hotel to prepare for dinner – it was expensive as we hit terrible rush hour traffic – but my knees and feet were aching and I know Aria and Allysha were also hurting.
Got a recommendation for Dinner and the girls are getting ready.
I need to blog bout my overall impressions of NZ while they are still fresh – perhaps tomorrow morning since I was able to blog early today.
I am going to shave my beard before dinner. ….. Ouch – that was painful – I have not used a razor in years.
We had dinner at an Italian restaurant Giovanni's which was a short walk from the hotel – it was nice but the pace felt unusual to us – it took quite a while to place our order and our drinks were actually delivered after the food. I got a chance to read the guide but lesson learned (don't wait until we are starving to head for a restaurant). Allysha nearly fell asleep in her food – so we ate quickly and returned to the room and fell asleep nearly immediately around 9:30pm. We lost 2 hours on the flight so it felt much later.
One thing I noticed today was that during our wanders it seemed that a lot of people were staring – I try not to look the part of the tourist but obviously it is not working.
Also, it seems that women outnumber the men here and they are the Australians seem a very fit and attractive people.
