Not so much a day of travel but 36 hours of travel.
4 hours at Manchester airport, an 8 hour flight to Dubai, 2 hours in Dubai airport and then 18-hour flight to Auckland New Zealand. The last flight should have been 16 hours but as we reached the runway a medical emergency was declared and we had to return to the peer. We were two and a half hours taking off.
The Emirates A380-800 was very comfortable indeed. Though in economy there's a lot more leg space than in European flights and the food and service was excellent.
With such a long series of flights there was a feeling of detachment from any time zone made even more so by the blinds being kept down for most of the flights. I presume this is to help people manage adjustment when they get to the far end.
Such long time periods in a plane seat certainly can't be described as comfortable but at least it was big enough to shift around and I was able to spend some time occasionally walking and standing around at the back to stretch and straighten up. I tried to watch films and TV but had no attention span and kept just playing on screen games or trying to snooze. The lighting levels were too low for reading but time passed. I think I managed about 3 separate 1 hour dozes in the whole journey.
When we landed in New Zealand everything was very efficient and welcoming. The attention to bio-security was very obvious and the agent was clearly very satisfied we able to say that our walking gear have been thoroughly cleaned prior to departure. Sadly I had to throw away a hardy used but open box of Schar Curves* but a couple of nut bars in their original sealed packages were okay.
It's odd in it doesn't feel particularly like a foreign holiday yet. Normally if we were on holiday we'd have flown from summer at home to summer at the destination, but we've gone from winter at home to summer here which is a bit freaky. The half hour drive from the airport to the centre of Auckland on the left-hand side of the motorway with familiar signage seemed very familiar apart from the vegetation around including many palms succulents and grasses.
Wine finished we explored some of the shopping
areas on the way
back to the hotel picking up a takeaway pizza and a bottle of wine which were happily consumed in our large and comfortable room.
On the way back we were both tired and by the time we'd eaten I was shutting down mentally and physically. Apparently, I fell so deeply asleep in front of the TV I wasn't responding even to a gentle shake.
A happy introduction to New Zealand and time to go to sleep properly.
* Schar Curves: a gluten free equivalent to Pringles. Potato based and very nice.
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