Auckland

We finally arrived in Auckland at 6:30 this morning after a 13 hour flight. The plane was as ever very nice with the usual blankets, eye mask etc... the only problem was that Sam couldn't get to sleep. It was one of those awful nights when you really want to sleep, know you should be sleeping, but it eludes you and so you sit feeling more and more fed up, knowing the next day will be hell because you haven't managed to sleep a wink... poor Sam sat wide eyed and fidgety as he went past being tired and eventually burst into tears! And I of course, feeling equally as tired managed to fight back the tears and tell him it was fine that he couldn't sleep and it would be ok... meanwhile Will snored on oblivious. At about 3am Sam finally managed to sleep, lying with his head on me and his legs stretched across Will, it was great that he managed to sleep, but I could feel my legs going numb and kept having to wiggle my toes and stretch my legs to alleviate deep vein thrombosis! Sam slept for about 6 hours and then watched a film and shortly after we landed in NZ.

I can't tell you much about the airport (although it all went smoothly) and we caught a taxi/bus to the hotel which is really nice. We arrived at about 8:30 and were informed that the room wouldn't be ready until 2pm!! Dead on our feet we tramped off into Auckland knowing somewhere inside that it was for the best as sleeping would through us off completely. We found a pie shop and the boys ate award winning pies whilst I tried not to be sick. It was shortly after this that we rounded a corner and there was a gigantic father christmas on the side of a department store...suddenly I felt a little better... then we had a starbucks (with christmas music playing)... and a little better... and we bought a couple of books... and then I felt fine, tired but at least the shaking had stopped and I didn't feel like all the cells in my body were trying to pull apart.

So it's now 6:30pm NZ time (about 1:30 am yesterday in our heads) and we have made the day without sleep, Sam is ok but a bit tired, I'm fine and Will has a headache...but we have had a surprisingly nice day. Auckland is lovely, the sun is shining, people speak English, the food is really tasty, the green man on the traffic lights does the moonwalk and the best thing of all is that you can put toilet paper in the bin... ah the luxury.

Tomorrow we are going to try and buy a car and we are going to watch Harry Potter 7 at the cinema, we are going to climb to the top of the tallest building in Auckland (the sky tower) and then we will work out how to get to Mangaunuahni Mountain (or whatever it's called) Goodnight all... or is it good morning??!!**