Was a great day (never really ended actually). Woke up late and called Brooke. She had to quickly do a running workout, so I went for a walk downtown. About 15 minutes before I was supposed to meet her, I thought I'd catch a bus back to the hostel (since I was running behind schedule). I saw a free bus coming down the road. I thought that was sweet luck, so I hopped it thinking that it would continue to head down the same street. Was wrong! It ended up turning and taking me out to the Auckland University. I got off there and quickly ran back down to the road where I got on the bus. From there I couldn't see any buses, so I booked it back to the hostel. Got there at 11:30 on the dot!
Brooke came and picked me up. We drove up a winding road that was surrounded with lots of lush green vegetation. At the top of the road, we pulled over to a lookout over the entire city. Was an amazing view!
We got back into the car and continued on to Piha beach. It was the first black sand beach I've ever been to. After setting up camp on the beach, Brooke booked it to the water for a swim while I soaked up the hot sun rays (as many as I could before I had to head back home later that day). Brooke's boyfriend showed up later on; nice guy, a physiotherapist like her. He brought his surf board to ride the waves.
The wind picked up after a bit. Blew quite a bit of sand over us. It looked as if I had been peppered. I had sand in everyplace! In my ears, belly button, my nose...
We left the beach in the late afternoon so that I could catch the air bus to the airport. Once back in Auckland, we went out for coffee before I headed up to the hostel for a quick shower.
I caught the air bus and got to the airport later than I planned. Quickly rushed through all the security to get to the terminal. Actually had to go through security twice since the USA has thier own security screening at the airport (first time through was NZ security). Got to the gate just in time. Yay! This time I flew the big leg of the flight on Air New Zealand (from Auckland to San Francisco). I have to say that it's now one of my favorites.
The take-off was beautiful. It was at sunset and we flew out over the ocean. Once we were up in the sky the plane turned and headed back over New Zealand.
The plane was about half full, so I ended up having 3 seats to myself. Stuffed 5 pillows behind my back and stretched my legs out over the seats. Covered myself with 3 blankets, super cozy (built a little nest). All of the seats had tvs in the back of them. You could watch any movie you wanted to. Since the 3rd seat in my row had no seat infront of it, a tv popped up from under the armrest. Perfect! I had a tv right at the end of my feet! After going through the guide, there was 8 movies I wanted to see (but couldn't because it was only a 12 hour flight). I actually only ended up watching 3 of them: Open Season (hilarious), Marie Antoinette (not that great) and The Guardian (good). My dinner was lamb and potatoes (until I spilt it on the floor; was trying to plug headphones in without moving too much, oops). I ended up getting in a descent 5 hours of sleep (yikes, should of just watched 2). I bought some homeopathic jet-lag pills back in New Zealand and I seriously think they've hugely reduced my jet-leg (feeling pretty great; well heaps better than I did when I arrived in Sydney).
The plane landed in San Francisco and I got to relive Feb. 13th again (I guess it's my groundhog day :)).
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