Auckland then home
I'm now home after the most hideously long flight!
Auckland was nice and relaxing. The tour of the city wasn't overly good - the panoramic views were kind of spoilt by cloud! The aquarium was good fun with underwater glass tunnels and lots of fish and sharks to see. We spent most of the time doing some souvineer shopping and on our last night we met up with my friend Fiona who is from Auckland but spent one semester on my course in Nottingham. We went for hot chocolate and cake with a couple of her friends and it was great to catch up.
Our journey home took us 28 hours - yuck. Our second flight from Sydney was interesting in that the plane aborted take-off just as it was about to leave the runway as the pilot had noticed a problem. Apparently the reverse thrusts were malfunctioning so after spending several minutes on the runway trying to recreate the situation and check it was playing up we headed back to the terminal where they simply disconnected the reverse thrust. The pilot's words were "we don't need it... it's more of a luxury than anything". Very comforting.
The plane we were on was a bit old and the entertainment system hadn't been upgraded to their super dooper ones. The movies were pretty terrible so this made the flight seem to last even longer... but it did mean that I got some sleep! We were sat next to the most miserable Australian Girl and her unfortunate boyfriend who were on their way to Europe for a few weeks of travel and she thought it was going to be the worst experience ever. She huffed in disappointment at the fact it was only 16*C in the UK at 6.30am!!!
So we got back on Thursday but didn't have much time to rest as we had to go to a wedding on the Saturday down in Surrey! Friday was spent rushing around to buy an outfit! Traffic was absolutly disgusting and I am now even more convinced that living in the South of England is a bad bad idea because of it!
I start work next week so this week is a rush of tasks to get done before then!