San Fran and Off We Go!

Mark and I have been saving our annual leave as much as we could all year, and for good reason: we just spent two weeks in New Zealand!

We flew out of Philly but had a 5+ hour layover in San Francisco. One of our friends from high school lives out there now and offered to give us a whirlwind tour of the city while we were there! We started with some super tasty lunch at Fisherman's Wharf. This was the view from the restaurant; you can just make out the Golden Gate Bridge in the back rising up out of the fog. (Also, I had one of the best meals of the trip here: clam chowder in a bread bowl. I could have eaten that all day long!)

We went down to the marina after lunch. The fog was pretty thick but every once in a while it would drift away and you could see Alcatraz.

That's the most we saw of the bridge the whole time! It was really neat with the fog rolling around, though.

We would have loved to stay longer, but we had a plane to catch! A very big plane, as it turns out. We were flying Air New Zealand direct to Auckland...a mere twelve-hour nonstop flight. In economy. Eep.

Turns out we had nothing to worry about! The seats were comfy (well, as comfy as airline seats can be), each seat had its own little movie screen with all sorts of movies, TV, music, and games, and they fed us. REAL food! I had a chicken noodle bake with veggies, a couscous salad thing, a warm dinner roll, cheese and crackers, and a tasty chocolate cake for dessert. I was impressed! I spent the next few hours trying to sleep to help pass the time.

Before I knew it, the captain was announcing it was time for breakfast. Two meals?! Mmm...cheese omelette with tomatoes and hash browns, a fresh fruit cup, some yogurt, OJ, and coffee. I wish these guys offered domestic flights in the US! By the time we finished, we didn't have much longer to go before landing in Auckland...at 5:30am. Oh well...more time for (sleepy) adventuring!