Greetings from Middle Earth!!!!!

OMFG and shut up, I am here!  Yes I am!  And at this exact moment it is 5am on Thursday 14th March and I have completed my first day of my Big Fat Kiwi Adventure! An what a first day it was.  So, get a cuppa and some matchsticks for your eyes, sit down and prepare for the start of my tales......

I begin where I left off, in the transit lounge of LA Airport with the entire contents of 3 American nursing homes.....

Air New Zealand lived up to expectations again on the second leg, fab new crew and the same 4 seats for Doris and I to enjoy.  It was a night flight and I was dead on my feet my expectation was a good sleep to wake up refreshed and ready to go.  And true to that I was asleep before take off, then awake as soon as we were up level, lured by the smell of the airline food trolley thinking 'ooo that must be the breakfast before we land'.  Not.  We'd only been up for 40 mins.  So food eaten, 2 night nurse tablets, a diazepam and 2 glasses of non-too shabby NZ merlot taken, 4 hours of sleep followed and that was to be my lot.  So I spent the time snoozing, talking to the lovely crew and wandering the plane.

Then came the time to fill in the landing card.  Now I have watched endless episodes of NZ border force where you get fined or put in prison for having dirt on your shoes or for forgetting to declare the half a mars bar in your bag.  I was so nervous that I had to try 4 times.  Are cream eggs food?  Do I delclare my walking boots even though they are new?  I erred on the side of caution and delcared everything!

So then the time came and we made out decent into Auckland.  Finally I had made it and with a huge grin on may face and joy in my heart, I craned my neck to see round the rather large and sweaty American tourist sitting opposite to see this amazing country coming into view.

And so it begins...........