Traveling

We left Utah last Tuesday evening at about 5:00. Nathan, Andy’s friend from the MSW program who’s also a therapist at Coral Reef, flew over with us and had to leave his wife, Suzie and son Kye behind for 4 weeks before they’ll join us here. I wished that they were coming too but I was also so glad to have Nathan because he’s been such a big help throughout the whole process. We flew from Salt Lake to L.A. first.

After we collected all 6 of our bags (not including Nathan’s and the car seat and stroller) from the baggage claim we met Rodney, a Coral Reef owner, by the Air New Zealand check in. We had a 5 hour layover there in L.A. so Rodney took us to a restaurant at the Marriot nearby. It was my birthday so it was nice to have some small celebration. By about 10:00 at night we made our way up to the VIP room and Tyler promptly fell asleep and pretty much stayed asleep until about 2 hours before the flight landed. As we boarded the air plane I think I had my first “We’re not in Kansas anymore” feeling. After walking past most of the New Zealanders in first class and back into the coach cabin I realized the feeling of being a minority and how soon this would become the norm. The plane was landing in Upolu and was then on to Tonga and then New Zealand so the coach cabin was filled with islanders of all kinds. We had a pretty nice set up though because Andy and I had a seat in between us and then there was a fold down basinet for Tyler to sleep in. This helped all of us get some better sleep on the flight. It made the time go by faster as well.

We arrived around 5 in the morning local time in Upolu. Coming off of the plane the humidity hit us like a fog. Its so thick here. I prefer the heat over the cold but it can still be suffocating sometimes here. The whole rest of the day I really think was a dream, partly because it all seemed so surreal and partly because I was half asleep. The airport was extremely tiny and had no air conditioning. Just fans. The company picked us up and drove us to the houses we’re staying in temporarily until they move the boys out of our homes.

The house we stayed in for 3 weeks before moving into our house now. Not bad eh?