Whoever said that didn't have to spend 15+ hours on a plane and another half a day sitting in an airport. That said, our trip to New Zealand went off almost without a hitch. We made it to our gate in Seattle with plenty of time, despite a mix up that sent myself walking from one end of the airport to the other, and then back again. Our flight to LAX took off and landed without incident, Maria and I slept through most of it. At one point Maria woke up and said that the plane was shaking violently, but I didn't notice. We landed in L.A. with no idea where to go but found the employees to be extremely helpful. The first person we talked to was a cleaning lady and she asked where we were going. I told her that we were flying Quantas and that our flight was going to Auckland.
"Ohhh, Oakland (at least that's what it sounded like)," she replied. "Go outside and take a left."
Maria and I were left a bit puzzled, as we certainly did not want to go outside and find ourselves walking to Oakland. It turned out that the woman had pointed us in the right direction, whether she intended to or not. We found our gate, ate a quick dinner, and headed through security. While in line, a rather plump and happy looking man turned to us and asked us where we were going in almost undecipherable English. Maria and I both assumed that he was mentally handicapped, but later found out that he was actually from Georgia. He was also going to New Zealand with his family for six months to visit his mother.
While sitting in the plane waiting to disembark, the pilot informed us that there was a problem loading the luggage, and that it would take several minutes to fix. Several minutes turned out to be half an hour, and Maria and I were now dangerously close to missing our connection in Auckland. When the luggage loading was finally complete everyone on the plane looked relieved. Unfortunately, in the time that it had taken to load the luggage, the fuel in the plane had become unbalanced. A fuel truck was called for to right the problem. The fuel truck was delayed when it had to stop to get gas.
We took off an hour later than scheduled, meaning that we would for sure miss our connection. Other than that worry, our flight was uneventful and Maria and I once again slept through most of it.
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