The Amazing Race: New Zealand Edition

Episode 1: The Adventure Begins

I’m baaaaaaaaack.

As you can see, I wasn’t able to find the internet access I had hoped for while I was gone, so I have a lot of catching up to do. It’s hard to believe that the trip ended only a few days ago, just as it was impossible then to imagine that I would be returning to the white mass I’m seeing outside now. I wish I could have written when things were more fresh in my mind, but since many details are now rolled into one big New Zealand chunk, I’ll let the pictures speak for themselves. (Regrettably, a portion of the photos from the first leg of The Amazing Race: New Zealand Edition were lost due to a technical malfunction, ie. bonehead move on my part. Luckily, Tania’s little blue digicam captured much of the same footage. I hereby give her photographic credit for some of the following pictures.)

The first phase of the trip began with a death defying escape from the snow banks of Fukui, as our hero Akiko bravely delivered us to the bus terminal when all the trains were down. There was some genuine concern that the busses would stop running too, but they powered through and we made it to Nagoya, where we were staying in a hotel in order to catch an early flight the next day. Our troubles weren’t over yet though.

Despite the fact that Nagoya had a little over three inches of snow on the ground, compared with Ono’s three meters, the city, unaccustomed to any snow at all, didn’t know what to do with itself. After four hours sleep, first we found that the busses to the airport had been cancelled. This meant we needed to get to the train station, which meant we needed to take a taxi. But of course the taxis were nowhere to be seen, because what kind of crazy person would drive around in three inches of snow? Which meant we were making the 45+ minute trek to the train station with our luggage through piles of slushy muck that had been thrown from the road to the sidewalks, worrying that we’d miss our flight.

Obviously we didn’t, and about 30 hours and 4 airports later, we finally landed in Nelson.

We were still in the race! Find out next time if we get eliminated...

30 minute flight to Nelson from Wellington. Kind of windy.

Bailey runs out to greet us. He's quite advanced for a 5 month old.