South Pacific 2002: 1

South Pacific 1 Our getaway was very pleasant, considering the history we have had of airline problems when leaving for a trip. The security procedures in Costa Rica have lightened up considerably, and there was no line up to check in for our 1:10 PM flight. The late departure hour had permitted a leisurely morning as a bonus.

To make things perfect, I received a free first class upgrade on both the San Jose to Houston, and Houston to Los Angeles flights due to the Elite status I currently have with Continental Airlines. This left Marilynn on her own in economy, but she did get the isle seat she requested. I was very lucky on the upgrade from San Jose, as Continental's 8 AM departure had been cancelled due to mechanical problems, and all those passengers were on our flight. There were no empty seats!

We had to clear customs and baggage in Houston, and we were then assured we would not have to worry about our baggage again until we reached Auckland. By the time everything was done, we went to the departure gate and walked right onto the plane, which was boarding for LA. The flight was uneventful.

In LA, it seems they have done some improvements in an effort to drag the airport up from its deserved reputation as one of the world's worst, and we were able to walk to the United Airlines boarding gate while remaining inside the building. After a short wait we boarded for our business class seats, an upgrade that was arranged for only 8,000 miles each from my frequent flyer account.

The flight passed smoothly in spite of Marilynn's discomfort from sitting and her allergy to air conditioning. The business class seats reclined almost to horizontal, and so were comfortable for resting during the 12 ½ hour flight. During the flight we changed from Tuesday, October 8 to Thursday, October 10 as we crossed the International Date Line, completely losing Wednesday, October 9. We arrived in Auckland on time at about 6:40 AM; however our baggage did not arrive at all. This was more of a disaster for Marilynn than me, as she had absolutely no cloths with her other than what she was wearing. They were all in her suitcase.

After completing the baggage claim process, we took the shuttle to the Auckland Sheraton Hotel, where I had arranged an early check in. Auckland was larger than I had expected - about 1.3 million people, and it seemed we went through miles of suburbs in rush hour traffic before arriving at the hotel. There is no main street to get to the airport! The city is very clean and green, with many nice homes and areas with historic buildings.

Once checked in and cleaned up we headed off on foot to see about buying Marilynn some cloths, as we were to leave the next morning for three days in the Chatham Islands. The weather was sunny and relatively warm - about 19 degrees. After a stroll down Queen Street, the main street of Auckland, and a visit to what seemed like no less that two dozen shops, Marilynn had the basics required, and also a book and instructional CD on how to run her new photo editing software on the computer at home. One nice thing about Queen St. are the frequent benches along the street where I could sit while Marilynn shopped.

We found a pub for lunch, and then discovered a circular bus service which is absolutely free, so we hopped aboard. Several stops later and we were at the Sky Tower, which at 328 meters is billed as the tallest building in the Southern Hemisphere. It is built along the lines of the CN Tower in Toronto, with a revolving restaurant and observing areas. An interesting diversion is the bungee jumping station at the 200 meter level! Although tempted, I decided to pass on it. That is a long way down!

We then caught the bus again, and walked from the closest stop to the hotel where we settled for awhile in the outdoor pool area for a drink and to ease Marilynn's sore feet. All her walking shoes were in the lost baggage and the high heeled ones she was wearing killed her feet! The cold got to us pretty quickly once the sun went down, so we retreated back to the room, where I tried to get started on this dispatch.

Here my being plagued with electronic problems continued. My laptop would not operate on its battery, and there was no where I could plug it in. While I have a number of converter plugs with me, New Zealand uses a three prong type unlike anything I had, so I could not plug in. Earlier in the day, when trying to take some video of the city, I discovered by digital video camera had packed it in. To add to the electronic series of problems, the GPS would not pick up any satellites and so would give me no reading. That is why no position updates on my travel web site. (www.talisphere.com/travel)

Hoping that most of the problems had now been faced in this one day; we had a good lamb dinner in the hotel restaurant and headed for bed.

The new day, Friday Oct 11, seemed to work out better. Our first phone call of the morning was from the United Baggage Service people, who said they had our suitcases, and that we should leave immediately for the airport to collect them. We leapt out of bed and got organized to leave.

Marilynn headed down to check out while I got the last of our goods together and checked the room. She had a taxi waiting and we headed for the airport. On the way, she informed me that the hotel had charged for a full additional night because we checked in early. That did nothing for my sense of humour, and you can be assured that there will be some discussion about that with the powers to be when we return!

At the airport the baggage people agreed to send one suitcase to the hotel, and we took one with us as we headed off to check in for the flight to Wellington, where we would catch the plane to Chatham. Qantas would not allow us to take our carry on bags onto the plane - they had a weight limit of 7 kg per person for carry on. Not being one to have any faith in airlines at all, I unloaded my shaving/medical kit, computer and accessories, unworkable video camera and accessories, and stacks of other stuff into a plastic duty free bag and another small cloth bag before giving them my carry on suitcase to check. We then boarded without further difficulty.

We were required to pick up our bags in Wellington to transfer to the Chatham Islands flight. Marilynn's carry on bag and the suitcase with which we had recently been reunited with showed up. Mine did not. Off we went again to find baggage services.

A very helpful fellow there went checking around with no success. He thought it might have gone on the Qantas flight to Christchurch which had left within five minutes of our flight to Wellington, a thought which was reinforced when he found the suitcase of someone who was on the Christchurch flight while looking for my bag. He tried to phone the baggage people in Christchurch, but they had their answering machine on. He assured us he'd do his best to reunite us with my suitcase, so now it was me who was left with only the cloths on my back! I was very glad of the unpacking job I'd done when they insisted I check my case!

NOTE: The above part was written while plugged into a razor plug in the bathroom of our hotel on the Chatham Islands - while sitting on the toilet seat, actually.. However, the computer died after the last paragraph and from then on refused to reboot more than half way before dying again. As a result, I am now in a hotel on Norfolk Island trying to get caught up!

So on with the story! Just as we were about to board the plane for Chatham, I received a page, and the fellow from baggage met me by the departure gate. He'd done a thorough search of the entire baggage area, and found my missing suitcase, which he'd personally put onto the plane for Chatham, and had also personally checked that our other two were on the flight as well.

The flight was comfortable, in a twin turbo prop plane owned by Chatham Airways. On route we had a good talk with two Smithsonian entomologists from Washington who were there after some rare species of fly and their New Zealand guide who knew the islands quite well.

There is a time change between New Zealand and the Chathams. I thought the time change going to Newfoundland was strange at half an hour, but this one has them beat. It is a 45 minute time change! The people here claim this is the first place in the world the sun rises each morning, something they promoted for the millennium - first sunrise of the millennium. The International Date Line actually jogs around the islands to keep them on the same day at the rest of New Zealand.

Once on the islands we were met by the girl of all trades, Sarah, from the Chatham Islands Lodge, and we were transported to the hotel. It was all very casual right from Wellington, where there was no security checks or X-ray machines, just straight onto the plane. We were the only guests in the hotel, so were given a quick tour and shown the bar, where if you want something you mix it up and make a note of what you took on the sheet provided for that purpose.

We went for a beautiful walk along the sea coast, and though some fantastically wind shaped limestone rocks before returning to the hotel through a quite dense wooded area. The island is mostly pasture for cattle and sheep, scrub grass and short trees in the wooded areas which are still left. SD, the hotel's small dog, escorted us on our hour and a half hike, which definitely worked up enough of a thirst to try the serve yourself bar.

The next morning we were picked up by a local guide, Ken, who used the hotel van to take us on a tour of the island. The weather had turned cold, rainy and windy but we pressed on regardless - the rain was on and off and not constant. Of course, the coat that I brought specifically for this area was in the suitcase which had been sent to the hotel in Auckland!

There are fabulous white sand beaches all over the island, but the water is never swimming temperature for any but the very brave due to the current from Antarctica. There are some very beautiful places to see. Lunch was a picnic made by the hotel, eaten at a tiny fishing village, where the local pub manager opened up to allow us to purchase a couple of beer, We visited a sheep station where they were docking the tails of sheep, plus giving them shots, castrating them and drenching them at that same time. Drenching is done by injecting fluid down the throat against worms. Not a happy day for the lambs, but the people doing it did care about them with pats and cuddles during the process. I'm not certain how much better that kindness made the lambs feel!

We also visited the site of an old Moriori village, where they had carved what in stone would be petroglyphs in many of the old, old trees in the woods near where the village was. The Moriori were very peaceful Polynesians who had lived on the islands for centuries, until invaded and enslaved by the Maoris in 1835. The first Europeans to the island arrived in 1791, so they had become accustomed to Europeans by this time.

The Maori invasion was an interesting one. The Maori had been much in contact with Europeans at that time, crewing on whaling boats as well as trading and working together. It was whalers that came back with news of the Chatham Islands and its peaceful inhabitants. Some 900 Maori then chartered two European ships and crews for their invasion, arriving with wives, children, livestock and war canoes. They killed about 300 Moriori to make their point and enslaved the rest. The last of the full blooded Moriori died some years ago.

We had decided to go and hit the local put in Waitangi, the principal town on the islands, that night. It is about half an hour from the hotel by car, so we were informed that the keys were in the hotel van in the parking lot and to just help ourselves to it. It was a good meal and a fun night as we watched Australia come from behind to beat New Zealand at rugby. This was not popular with the locals but apparently happens often enough that they didn't allow it to dampen their spirits!

Our last day on the island was spent quietly getting laundry done, reading and walking through the fields around the hotel area. It was a beautiful sunny day. Dinner that night was with the owners of the hotel.

On the morning of Monday, October 14 we headed back at the Chatham airport for our return flight. There was no one there when we arrived, so Sarah turned on the furnace in the airport building and got our baggage onto the scale to be weighted in.

It turned out that her mother was working at the airport that day, and was our stewardess on the flight as well. Her pre-flight duties included checking everyone in, making the tea and coffee, loading the food for the flight, and pretty much anything else required. They did have another fellow to load the baggage. The flight was smooth enough, but the temperature on the plane would have been perfect for a shipment of frozen sides of beef! We were frozen on arrival in Wellington.

The plane change in Wellington went smoothly, and after getting over the shock of having our baggage all arrive in Auckland we took the shuttle back to the Sheraton. I got my video camera and computer into the Sony repair depot, and then we had a superb meal at the restaurant across from the hotel. They bring in specialty wines from many small vineyards in New Zealand, and the food quality was amazing. Our table was comfortably situated in front of a fireplace with a roaring wood fire in it.

Tuesday morning we booked for a sail in the afternoon. First thing, though, I met with the sales manager about the extra nights charge on the hotel bill for early check in, and was informed that their policy was to charge a night for guaranteed early check in. After some discussion they agreed to reverse the charge. We then walked from the hotel, taking our time down Queens Street again, picking up odds and sods that we needed - including more computer instructional books which Marilynn is having great fun reading. I also acquired a conversion plug for my computer. The day was glorious - blue skies and sunshine.

After a good lunch at a restaurant with a balcony right over the harbour we headed for the sail boat. Instead of taking the comfortable sailing cruises available from various places, we opted to get out on a 12 meter racing yacht. The preliminaries to the America's cup were well underway, so it was fun to get out on one of these boats. The one we went out on was the NZL 40, which had been built for the French team in the previous America's Cup. They ran out of funds and never actually raced it.

The day continued to be beautifully sunny, and a stiff breeze came up making the cruise perfect. This was no simple tourist cruise, though. We were expected to man the "grinders" which are cranks turned by hand - two people to a crank. This is what gives the boat the power for the winches for raising sails, tightening stays, and even for running one of the crew up the mast to undo a jammed line. It was good fun, and great exercise even when heeled over at a 45 degree angle, but it did screw up my bad shoulder somewhat. These boats are amazing - and they are certainly very fast as the huge sails capture a tremendous amount of wind.

On Wednesday we had an afternoon flight to Norfolk, so went by the Sony repair place in the cab we were taking to the airport on the way. As you can see, my laptop is back to working on mains power, but the battery is shot. They are going to try to get me one by the time we leave on the 22nd. The video camera requires almost $1,000 NZ dollars in repairs ($US 520) and so I've asked them to reassemble it so it will hopefully still work to play the videos I've already taken. It was due for replacement anyhow, so there is no way I'm spending that much on repairs. There will be no video of this trip!

Getting out of New Zealand for our flight to Norfolk was a complete pain in the ass. We went through the line-up at Air New Zealand to find that in spite of everything we had read or been told by travel people, we would need a visa for the Australian Island. We could purchase these in a different part of the airport. Once we had visas, it was back to the check in to get boarding passes, then off to the Bank of New Zealand to pay departure tax of $NZ 22 each. Finally we went through all the normal customs, immigration and security checks to get to the plane. It reminded me of leaving some Africa countries! I'm glad our next departure will be by ship and not through the airport.

The flight on a Boeing 737 was fine - after two hours on the plane, a hot meal and a time change the other way of 1 ½ hours we arrived at Norfolk. People in this part of the world don't seem to believe in even hour time changes! We got a ride to the hotel and checked in. The South Pacific resort is a sprawling hotel of one story buildings connected by covered walkways. There are about 70 rooms, all of which are full. Our room is a suite, actually, with a living room, bedroom, bathroom, kitchenette and walk in closets. There is also a balcony accessed by sliding doors from either the bedroom or the living room. It is really very nice.

We had dinner in the hotel. They had an English Music Hall cabaret on, which made for a fun night and a good beginning here. This morning is beautifully sunny with blue skies, so we'll be out for the day enjoying the much warmer weather here than we have had either in Auckland or the Chathams. I'm told of the possibility of email connections in the hotel, so shall venture forth to see if I can get this off.