Day 1 of Our Adventures! AKA Travel day! (29/4/11)

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So after having a teary but excited goodbye to friends and family at the airport, we left Auckland at 1.05pm Fri. Arrived in LA after enduring a long and movieless flight (the sound and picture didn’t work for the whole 12.5 hours!) at 6.20am to start Fri all over again! LA airport officially sucked! Empty, no wifi, no couches, very little food (NO LOLLIES!) and completely deserted! But to be fair El’s muffin was the size of her head and lasted her 5 hours! So we slept a few hours sprawled on the hard floor with El waking up to 2 men staring at us! After Rach’s realisation that Airo Lineas wasn’t an actual airline and her eyes had failed her again while attempting to read the word ‘airlines’ in a foreign way, after already informing family that this was in fact the name of the airline we were travelling, we boarded our LAN Chile Airline flight. Very unexcited at the thought of another 8 hour flight after waiting 7 hours in LA airport, we have settled in to watch movies on this flight! Incredible! Sooo, currently we have been awake 28 hours with 2 hours max dozing time included! We look and feel amazing as you can imagine! We have 4 hours 40 left of our last flight today, and counting down. We have used the word ‘gracias’ as practice when receiving our meals so we are ready to rock in Peru when we arrive! 😊 hopefully we won’t have any probs locating and surviving a taxi ride to our hotel when we get there. We will post a message and let you all know if we make it!
Memorable Snippets:
- Rach being randomly searched (again!) at Akld airport while on the phone to Mum!
- Us both getting our names recorded for apparently not declaring 30mL bottles with a grumpy as guy snapping at us! Great start!
- The intense new x-ray process at LA airport as you get your whole body x-rayed with your hands above your head, crossed over at the top – “exactly like the picture please.”
- Paying $1US for 2min 51 secs of internet to make sure our lovely parents knew we were safe as Rach left her phone on for the whole flight from Akld so it was completely dead, and no free Wifi anywhere! (I mean cummmon!). We got exactly one email sent that consisted of 2 lines!
- As pictured, toe socks and jandals have proved to be a sensational flying mix! Highly recommended!

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Photos

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The beginning of our plane travels while still fresh faced and alert!

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The best idea of the day! Toe socks and jandals!

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waiting at akld airport

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catherine and elle

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El and min :)

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Some of our crowd waaving down to us from the viewing platform

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Arriving at LA - El

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and again - Rach

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Rach and Kay :)

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The akld family and Rach

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Again...

Comments

[Des]

Sounds good
makes me want to go back again,

[Flaminio Oliveira]

Enjoy every moment of your trip.
I really like the beginning of your trip, guys. Welcome to my world. Hehehe. I know, HAVAIANAS are maiden in Brasil and they make us feel at home. (Laughs). This airports are crazy. Do you think they don't know that we are traveling for a time that seems to be a life? We need a rest and a good place to lay. Elle and Rachel, anywhere you are, if you want to see anything about gymnastics (visit gymnasiums, etc) just tell me and I will try to contact my friends. Tell me where you are and let's keep in touch, OK? Enjoy your trip and have a great time.

[Jan]

Goodbye
Haha - your photo better than mine - look you two you would have been proud of us - we had all stopped crying by then