The flight of a lifetime... Or something. We got a good deal on tickets from Bali to Christchurch with one down fall. A 13 hour lay over in Australia, making the whole trip to New Zealand 30 hours. As some of you know, Australia is one of the three countries in the world I'm not allowed in.
Getting out of the country proved a bit tricky. When we arrived to the airport around 9 pm we found out that the flight was delayed 6 hours. With a 2:30 am departure time we decided to leave the airport and find some computers to waste some time on. That we did. We returned back to the airport a few hours later to check in. For some reason or another Zoeys work visa number and information was attached to her passport number but mine was not. New Zealand requires a visa (pre-approved) or a ticket out of the country upon departure from foreign airports. It was around one am when we got this horrible news, with the plane leaving shortly. We ran back out side and tried to call my New Zealand visa correspondent, but of course no answer. Even worse I spent the evening blowing through our Indonesian calling card because we were sure we didn't need the minutes any longer. There were a few shops still open at the airport, but none of them sold minutes for our sim card. We hailed a cab, and told him the situation, but because it was so late, no internet cafes were open that had printers. Well shit. Awwe. I should add here, that I did in fact have a visa just the same as Zoey. We approached the front counter again, and received even worse news. The only way I was getting on that plane was by purchasing a ticket out of New Zealand. So they looked up the cheapest ticket they could find and it was a flight from Christchurch NZ to Sydney Australia for the low price of 500 bucks. Well shit. After thinking the situation over, with the possibility of me staying in Bali for another few days, until we could get me out of there cheaper, we opted for the ticket.
So it cost an extra $500 for me to leave, and the tickets to New Zealand weren't cheap to begin with. The tickets we got are in fact refund able, and that's why they were so expensive.
So there we are waiting at 2:00 am for the plane to leave, dead tired, when over the intercom that the plane has been delayed to 5:45 am. Everyone ready to board the plane was crushed.
The good thing about the original delayed departure was less time in the Melbourne airport. Now even there less time in Australia. Great.
The flight was good. We had great customer service and tons of apologies from the pilots. We also got 200 bucks back from the airline.
Melbourne airport turned out to be no problem. Because we were coming in internationally, with an international connection, I dint have to do customs, or passport control
We arrived to Christchurch around 1am and got a ride to the camping hostel we booked. We slept in the tent for a few nights there and bought a car our third day in town.
The car is a 95 Suburu Legacy AWD. We love it. We can now get out of paying for accommodations and we can travel freely out here.
Jobs to come soon hopefully...
Here are some pictures of New Zealand.
