With Tropical Cyclone Gabriel bearing down on Auckland we had some hard choices to make. Plan A would be "stick to the plan". We would have stayed in Christchurch on Saturday, flown to Auckland Sunday and stayed at the beach. The problem with this plan was that flights into Auckland would be halted as soon as the wind gets too high. If the later flights get backed up we may not get a seat on a plane right away and causing us to miss our flight on Thursday. Also staying on the beachfront during a cyclone was not optimal. So we came up with Plan B. Get to Christchurch early Saturday and instantly fly to Auckland. Stay int he city until we fly to Dubai and then on to Spain. We knew that if we missed our Dubai flight then who knows when we would be able get another seat, much less a first class seat. We got up early despite a rough night (crab dip?) and drove the three hours to Christchurch. The rain was light and only two mountain passes to negotiate. There were also a very quaint town that we drove through, Geraldine, where they were setting up the Saturday markets. Once we got to Auckland we unloaded the car at the rental agency and got a shuttle to the airport. We were able to change our flight from 5 PM to the 1 PM flight and got into Auckland at 2:30. Leslie went out and grabbed the only van-taxi in the line. I waited for the checked in baggage counting 142 bags until our first bag emerged. The other bags showed up soon after and we were off to the Mini Storage to get the bags we left there a month earlier. By 4 PM we were in our room, all our luggage was with us and we could relax and let the storm come when it will.
This was the type of road, lots of curves but not the 25 km/hr types
A funky old car that was loaded with market goods
It is a Ford Cortina from the UK
Cheese Louise!
Geraldine is small so we are out
We drove behind this car with the big dog in it. The dog would go from side to side and lean way out
The old train station
Lots of fine buildings
The fancy exterior of the Sky Tower
Some buildings are not so pretty
