traveldiary.stracke.us

Our first impressions of Samoa were received in complete pitch-black darkness. The wild and crazy cab ride from the airport to downtown Apia: few lights, numerous small and big churches, locals on bikes or on foot in the street, with our driver swerving around them. The dogs, sleeping in the street, have to look out for themselves. Then one scary moment: all of a sudden, our cab driver pulls into a dirt path. Are we going to get robbed now? No, he pulls up to his ramshackle “house” and gets one of his business cards to give us, so that we can call him for all our transportation needs during our stay on Upolu. Now we know our first Samoan :
Alefaio Faasoa of Samoa.
(more…)

It is Tuesday, June 26 and we leave Auckland on Air New Zealand 26 at 4:30 PM. We are sitting in 2A and 2B and are having more champagne, food and ice cream, while watching a sunset and deep red sky over the Tasman Sea. It is a great sight!
We have a stop-over in Tonga and the landing is at night during a tropical downpour. The landing is a little bouncy and a crew member is announcing over the PA : “Welcome to Tonga. Sorry about the landing, I hate when it (the runway) creeps up on you like this”. A little British understatement.
(more…)

After only 5 hours of sleep the rude alarm woke us yesterday at 4:30 AM. Lothar, as usual booked the earliest flight possible, so not to get caught into the quagmire of delayed flights, that could occur over the course of a day. Actually on the news the other day, it said that only about 50% of flights in the US arrive on time; so maybe he’s right. The day before the flight,Sonja inquired
as to what time she would have to shuttle us to the Albany International Airport (Canada is still a foreign country and Mexico has not yet been fully annexed) . Lothar at first is always vague about an exact departure time comittment, but we do notice that as the pre-flight day commences, the time seems to get earlier and earlier, usually in 15 min increments. I don’t think he likes to hit us with the reality until the last possible moment. He has become better in that I now know my real departure time, the evening before, instead of the day of. the flight. Each time, there is a reason why we should arrive early. This time…….school vacation started yesterday and there could be horrendous lines since many people go on vacation as soon as school is out. I don’t know about many people, but we sure seem to.
So we were out the door at 5:30AM, one of the first to check in for our 7 something flight. As we are going up the escalator to the security check, Lothar points out, that “the lines are getting longer”. I hate to admit it…..they were.

(more…)

We are south of the Equator. At latitude 36 degrees 52 South and 174 degrees 45′ East in Auckland, New Zealand. It is sunny and cool, about 6 degrees Celsius. We just flew on Air New Zealand 1 from Los Angeles to Auckland, flying time 12 hours and 20 minutes. We were traveling on a 747-400 on the upper deck in Premium Economy Class. The service was great and the attendants very friendly and resourceful. We toasted to the beginning of our journey to the South Pacific with Mumm Champagne, while the plane was stuck in traffic on the taxiway at LAX. It was dark for the whole duration of the flight and I slept for more than 8 hours. We were sitting at the upper deck’s exit door with plenty of legroom. The only problem was that the footrest did not come up high enough, for my legs to be comfortable. The flight attendant just took one of his catering containers from the kitchen and placed it in front of our seats, with a fat pillow on top. Now Gabi and I had very comfortable seats with legs horizontal, same as in Business for 1/3 of the price. We crossed the equator, still snoozing.
(more…)

The time is finally here. We had planned this trip for the last 9 months, the ticket for the Air New Zealand flights were purchased already in January of this year. Today is June 23rd and we are flying from Albany to Los Angeles. Up at 4:30 AM and Sonja drops us off at the airport. Our flight actually leaves the gate in Albany 10 minutes early and I had planned an extra day stop-over in Los Angeles, in order to make sure that we would not miss the next flights. That’s how it goes.
(more…)