Sunnyvale, Auckland

So about a month ago while checking in for our flight in India, after having our boarding passes issued and bags taken away with the appropriate bag tags, we were told "oh by the way you need a return ticket out of Bali in order to prove to immigration that you plan on leaving, otherwise you will not be let in(the 30 day or less visa is actually free)! So we sat frantically looking at flights and at the superficial level we booked some really good flights.....However the time came to depart Denpasar in order to proceed to Auckland via Sydney, along with it a harsh reality of not getting any sleep for 1 whole night and having to stay up for 2 days straight. A 6 hour flight leaving at 10:30pm sounds good right? No problem I'll just sleep for like 5 hours and be fine right? No that didn't happen at all. A large part of the reason was the fact that we spent all day in Bali heat drenched in sweat and were unable to shower before our flight, along with all of the bright lights and excitement of flying. The gate for our delayed flight was literally changed 3 times and had even the security confused as to what was happening. We arrived in Sydney at our Bali time 4am, and it was 7am Sydney local time with the beaming sun gleaming away without a trace of clouds in the sky. We then had a 4 hour layover in Sydney.....which turned into a 7 hour layover, again this flight also changed gates twice. We then finally arrived at 7pm local Auckland time and then took an uber to our airbnb place. Extreme excitement alongside exhaustion was very conflicting for me but wow what an experience that I will never forget. We finally took a long shower and slept for 13 hours straight. Waking up recovered the next day went to pickup our transportation/home for the next 4.5 weeks. A 2010 Toyota Prius! Turning our chins up at everyone who wasn't driving a hybrid vehicle we went dancing and prancing along searching for some brunch at a local cafe...and spent 44$ for two coffees and two entrees! Yikes! Eyebrows furrowed we immediately took out our pad and paper and revised our budget for the next 2 months. The Canadian dollar and the New Zealand dollar are almost on par with each other however the minimum wage here is much higher, as is gas too being anywhere from 1.80-2$ a litre. Our plan is to drive around the North and South Islands camping mostly in a tent with some stop overs in Auckland visiting some friends. So far the locals we have met here are so amazingly friendly and laid back it's incredible.Read more