Ward Family Vacations

New Zealand 2005

Last Day / Opoutere

It is hard to believe how fast two weeks went by or that one day I was at the Pacific Ocean in the beautiful surroundings of New Zealand and the next day flying back into a Hurricane (Katrina)! To make a long story short, my flight leaving Auckland was delayed due to a baggage handling problem where the flight originated in Brisbane, Australia. I only had a two hour layover in LA so knew that I would miss my connecting flight. Northwest put me up at the Marriot in Los Angeles when I arrived on Monday and rather than flying into Memphis at 6:30 p.m. during the height of the hurricane Monday night I was scheduled on two connecting flights. I left after midnight Tuesday morning flying into Minneapolis and from Minneapolis took a short flight into Memphis and arrived around 6:30 a.m.. In some respects I was kind of glad that I was not flying into Memphis during Hurricane Katrina! It was good to get a home but was a fantastic trip.  I can't wait to go back. I had such a good time and was so pleased to get to see Jessica and really get to know my son-in-law.