Sunday 5 March and Monday 6 March 2000
Highlights:  Family hugs at the airport, Auckland Air New Zealand Lounge

I guess plane trips like this make you miss home even more.  Three flights, 30 hours in the air with two 3 hour stopovers in between.

I did learn something while at the Auckland Airport, my work Ansett Golden Wings let’s my an a guest into any Star Alliance airline lounge if I’m travelling with them which was all our flights, DOH!  At least both Jon and me got to use the Auckland lounge and take much needed showers.  Sitting in the lounge after enjoying free cereal and later free beer at 6 am local time I decided not to let Jon know we could have been doing this when stuck at all those airports 🙂

At the airport both Jon and my families meet us. It seemed like another life the last time I had seen them (well for Kara is was only 100 days earlier!).  We looked like unkept, with beards and crazy hair and I much say hyper energy was about 30 minutes before the crash.

This was my first trip outside the country without my family. I left as a 25 year old and return as a 26 year old who experienced the millennium party in Times Square, who visited the birthplaces and execution sites of Kings and Queens, who experienced the land of a Shakespeare, I fell in love with Ireland, I stood in awe of the Grand Canynon and Niagara Falls, I watched a drug deal go down on the Greyhound overnight bus, visited Elvis grave, saw Mt Rushmore, I stood inside the Alamo, walked down Bourbon street and experience soul lifting jazz at its finest.

I think I have the travel bug.  I don’t know when I’ll be back on the road but it’s already calling despite the happy feelings seeing you family again bring and how tired 2 days of air travel bring.  I want to experience more.