Home again, home again, jiggity jig.
Our last day in Wellington was Sunday the 16th. We had to check out by 10am so we put our luggage into storage for the day. We walked downtown, stopping briefly at an Internet cafe. Most shops and buildings were locked up tight because it was Easter Sunday, but a few were open, including the tram.
We caught the tram up the hill to the Botanical Gardens and spent over two hours walking through the gardens. There were very few flowers but you could tell that in the spring and summer the gardens would be a delight of colors and scents. We stopped at a cafe for lunch, then hiked uphill for 15 minutes until we were back at the tram stop. Mom did quite well on the uphill walk, and only started to feel some pain in her leg near the top of the hill. We sat for a few minutes at the tram stop to rest up before catching the tram down to Lambton Quay.
From the tram station we walked to Queen's Wharf. One of New Zealand's two naval ships was at the dock, completely unguarded and with a ramp down and the doors open. LOL. In one of the wharf buildings was something called Plimmer's Ark-Gallery. I was curious so I dragged Mom inside. It turned out to be a display of an sailing vessel from the 1830's that they found in the sands below the wharf during construction of new wharf facilities. They excavated the ship (mostly just the keel and lower planks) and put the ship on display (in water-filled preservation chambers) in the wharf building.
As we exited the Plimmer's Ark-Gallery building I noticed a walkway along the water. We followed it all the way past Te Papa Museum and Oriental Bay, and turned around just short of Evans Bay. We must have walked for three hours along the water, admiring the sea views as well as the quirky mix of old and modern architecture in the buildings along the walkway.
We returned to the hostel around 3pm and had something to eat, then watched a movie on my laptop. We caught the airport shuttle at 5:30pm and easily caught our 7pm flight to Auckland.
The fellow sitting next to us on the flight, James, was quite chatty. We learned that he had been a famous Bollywood bad guy for several years, but when he found God he left the business and moved to New Zealand where he became a successful businessman. He currently runs two Bond+Bond stores in Wellington. It also turned out that he was on the same flight from Auckland to Singapore. He kindly helped us find the international terminal and the Singapore Airlines desk so we could get our seats. He then showed us where we could pay the airport improvement fee, and we spent the rest of our layover chatting about politics, religion, and culture. He had some interesting opinions, and was well-informed about New Zealand and Indian politics.
We were dog-tired when we boarded the plane at midnight. As soon as we reached cruising altitude the Singapore Airlines crew started serving dinner. I passed on the dinner and spent the entire flight watching movies. The only problem was that I had watched most of the new releases on the flight over to New Zealand, so I ended up watching some movies for the second time.
We arrived in Singapore early, around 6am. The airport was already humming with thousands of passengers, flight crews, and airport staff. I visited one of their free Internet kiosks to check my mail then we found a coffee shop and had some breakfast. After breakfast we walked around the shopping area, marvelling at the designer fashions and high-end beauty products that were for sale. They even had three electronics stores.
We boarded our flight to Incheon (Korea) at 10am, had lunch on the plane, and again settled in to watching movies. Mom was having problems with her TV set and remote control and I tried to solve them but she became really frustrated and gave up.
We had another two-hour layover in Incheon so airport staff could clean the airplane, restock it, and we could continue the flight with new crew. At Incheon we once again had to take all of our possessions off the plane, pass through security, then sit in a waiting area for all of 20 minutes until re-boarding the plane.
The flight from Incheon to Vancouver was a killer. We were hurting from sitting so long, plus we were battling dual desires to stay awake and sleep. We tried to get some sleep but there was a baby who wasn't enjoying the flight and was crying constantly. Also, no matter how we sat it was uncomfortable.
With about two hours left in the flight Mom started to feel nauseous. She went to the bathroom and threw up. She felt better afterwards, but over time she started to get the hot and cold sweats again. A stewardess was coming around to distribute drinks so I ordered two glasses of apple juice for Mom and asked if they had any anti-nauseants in their medical supplies. She brought back a chewy anti-nauseant and was about to leave to continue her drink-distribution when Mom got very quiet and hunched over in her seat. I said "Mom, are you alright!?!?" and the stewardess came back immediately. Mom tried to leave her seat to go to the bathroom but it was too late. Luckily the stewardess had quick reflexes; she grabbed a travel sickness bag and shoved it under Mom's chin just as she threw up.
I had been struggling to open the travel sickness bag for several seconds, but the damned thing was sealed at the top and you had to pull the top off along a perforated line. We were lucky the stewardess knew how to open it because we couldn't. You'd think they'd have a bag that was designed to be easily opened, eh?
Mom filled two bags but felt immensely better afterwards. The woman sitting next to Mom was quite nice about it and didn't seem to be affected by Mom's sickness because she tucked into breakfast when it was served a few minutes later. We got talked and found out she was a teacher and worked in Nunavut. She'd been to Bali, I think, and was actually planning to move there after she retired.
We were so very, very glad to arrive in Vancouver and get off the damned plane. Mom was very disoriented and when we turned down the hall to get to the departure gate for our flight to Victoria she thought we were going to walk onto the tarmac.
The flight to Victoria was uneventful but when we arrived our luggage was nowhere to be seen. It turns out that the agent in Auckland put us on an earlier flight than our luggage. Thankfully the airline offered to deliver our luggage to us when it arrived later that day. So, we left and our luggage did indeed arrive in the early evening.
It was absolute bliss to arrive home. We were exhausted but wired, and stayed awake as long as we could. I slept deeply that night but, as anyone who is long overdue on sleep will tell you, I didn't wake up feeling full of energy. It took a few more days to "get right".
So, that was our Singapore/New Zealand adventure. I had a wonderful time and look forward to returning to explore those countries again.
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