South for Summer

Garry and I have flown across the Tasman for this year’s annual Summer vacation. We kicked off our time away with five days in Mount Maunganui. Here we enjoyed some quality time (and quality wines) with my brothers and their families after spending last weekend with Garry’s family in Sydney.

Sadly Mum was unable to enjoy us for our family Christmas lunch. Her rest home is in the midst of a COVID outbreak and has been locked down for several weeks. Mum tested positive the day before we flew out which automatically reset the lockdown clock for a further ten days.

On Boxing Day we flew to Queenstown via Auckland where we’ll spend the next 14 days exploring some of the South Island’s scenic highlights. Our itinerary includes two nights at Milford Sound and two nights at Mount Cook. However, our first stop involves five days of doing “bugger all” at a lakeside apartment in Queenstown. Click on the stunning panorama below for a taste of our spectacular location.

 

Our trip south was a rather stressful start to our southern adventure. We had a tight connection in Auckland that subsequently grew even tighter when our Connecting flight to Auckland departed 20 minutes late. We had less than 15 minutes to make the transfer. Fortunately, there were nine passengers on our flight from Tauranga making the same change so Air New Zealand held the flight for us.

While we made the connection our bags did not. However, they arrived 90 minutes later on the next flight. Garry and I spent the intervening time at the supermarket stocking our apartment larder for days of wining and dining on the balcony. The rental car company has also upgraded us to a full-size SUV. We’ll be traveling in style with room enough for a family of seven.