Traveling to Auckland

We usually leave early in the morning on trips, so leaving at 8pm is a new experience for us. We had the whole day to pack, to plan, to relax and prepare for what we expected to be a very difficult trip—13 hours straight on a plane with a baby who hates being held.

Due to Murphy's law, our van wouldn't start on the day of leaving, so we canceled on our good friends offer to drop us off, and instead hopped a bus to BART. Having made this trip hundreds of times for work, the path was old hat and we made it with time to spare. If we hadn't had a snafu with terminal I vs terminal 1 in SFO, we'd have been perfect. As it was we showed up with lots of time to spare, so we we're okay anyway.

Air New Zealand has an option on their non stop flights called a skycouch. Three seats together with special footrests that lift all the way up and make the seat super wide with no footroom. We got on the plane, got into the air, and got settled with in flight entertainment for the kids.

The couch was pretty awesome for little kids. They laid down next to me on 2 of the seats and passed out for most of the flight. The baby hung out in the baby carrier with Eli for a long time and eventually woke up hungry and sad. More milk, some soothing from Dad, and more sleep for all. Despite the weird environs and lack of sleep, everyone was in good spirits and we did pretty well getting off the plane at 5am local time.

A shuttle ride later, we got to our neighborhood, Google provided directions to the hotel, and they even gave us a room to lounge in at 7am. We're napping now after grabbing bagels and salmon from a local shop, satisfied and excited to see more of the area later today and over the next few days as well.