an almost complete tour of New Zealand in 2 days
I used to fly a lot about NZ during my time as a government spy on fishing boats (Observer) and have many fab stories of pain on flights, but this one was pretty fun. Started with a normal 1 hr flight from Auckland to Wellington to report in to work at the fishery headquarters. We tried to land in Welly twice in a nail biting fashion as the winds were up to 150 miles per hour, (or something stupid) pulling up at what seemed to be the very last minute and causing some terror and pukeage amongst the passengers. So it was announced that we were going to Christchurch instead (about another hr away) and had to stay the night there. I wasn't too bothered by this as I'd planned to stay the night on my cousins floor before heading to work the next day anyway and a hotel was considerably fancier. So the next day on the plane again off to Wellington, comforting a lady who was still freaked out by the last nights flight. I arrived fine and dandy and head to work where I'm told the boat I'll be getting on is leaving from Bluff (the arse end of the south island) so we (me and another spy) are flown from Welly down to the nearest airport (Invercargill) via Christchurch, where we have to jump in a cab for a 1/2 hr drive out. Once in sunny beautiful Bluff (ahem) we soon discover that our boat isn't around, and making inquiries we find its actually in NELSON (ah only at the complete other end of the south island) there aren't any more flights out of Invercargill so we have to hoon to a rental car agency rent a car and drive 2 1/2 hrs to Dunedin where we then jump on yet another plane which takes us to Christchurch (hello again!) and then finally to Nelson, where we finally arrive at the boat having pissed off a whole boat load of fishermen who we have to spend a whole month with. Hurrah. Not to mention the Harbour Pilot who was pissed cause he was going to miss coronation street or something. And this was just after they'd stopped feeding you on domestic flights so I spent the whole day starving as we'd had to race around so much and couldn't stop to eat. Still I earned a nice bunch of frequent flier miles for that lot.
(toffee pop, Wed 8 Mar 2006, 17:22, Reply)