Going to the South Island

Dec. 23

John was up early, ready to set out on his South Island adventure. The motel office had ordered a taxi for 6:45 but John was outside waiting at 6:30. The taxi was ahead of time and the driver had planned on doing some paperwork waiting for John. So, John waited while he finished the work and they set out for the airport. John had a great conversation with the driver, a highly educated man from Ethipia. It is the same for immigrants in both Canada and New Zealand that new immigrants, especially of colour, have to do jobs for which they are overqualified. The driver told John of the same problems that taxi drivers face everywhere, squeezed income from increasing costs while fares are held low.

At the airport, everything went tickety boo. The fight was on time. We landed in Wellington that had wind gusts up to 30 knots and they made the 737 shake a wee bit. It reminded John of bumping around in a little Cessna 152. However, the rest of the trip was glorious. They flew just off the east coast of the South Island and John swore he could see the west coast past the sparkling white Southern Alps. He did not take video of it because the crew didn't seem to like it. However, on the trip, John did get breakfast, muesli and yogurt, with tea. John had bought himself an Egg McMuffin at the airport in case Air New Zealand did not serve anything.

Air Canada, please take note - Air New Zealand knows how to bring customers back again and again with good service and good meals!

Upon landing he was met by Cath of NZ Impressions who took him to pick up his rental car and drove him into Dunedin, giving him a quick orientation tour of the place. They then went to get John checked into his motel, a very nice one that is part of a chain, Bella Vista. John was shown to his room - small but with all the conveniences. John was pleased with the room. Cath then went through all the components of his package, from how to use the cell phone, her suggestions for places to see and places to eat.

After she left, John decided to take a walk around the downtown to get oriented before he went out onto the road. He walked and walked and took some video. he also bought some muesli to make his own breakfast and some Sprite Zero to take on his trip. He tried to use the Internet and it took hours to find out how to get connected and when he finally did get connected, the speed was so slow that he had no hope of uploading videos. He thought that this might have to wait until, he gets home and that is just too late. He had high hopes that maybe in Australia....



After going to an Indian restaurnat down the road for supper, he took the car out for a spin when the traffic was light and so was the sky. He didn't have any trouble getting used to driving again.

He was so tired he fell off to sleep at 9pm.

TRB