Our Trip Down Under

We are undertaking our longest international trip which is mostly for pleasure, but contains a work component. 

Our travels started on Monday February 2nd, the morning after the Super Bowl and the Phoenix (Waste Management) professional golf tournament. Fearing a crowded airport, we were up at 4:00 AM and left the house by 5:45. We were to the airport by 6:00. Thank you Anne.  The crush of crowds which the media warned us about was not a problem at that hour and we were to our gate easily before 7:00 for our 8:00 flight. I guess all of the travelers were out late drinking and had no interest in an early flight. 

The flight to Hawaii, though long was uneventful, but crowded. So happy to each have our new tablets well-loaded with movies to occupy the 6 plus hour flight. We bought a mophie to keep them partially charged in flight, but still spent time during our 3 hour layover in Honolulu charging them for our even longer second flight. To our surprise and happiness, the second plane had a USB port at each seat so power was not a problem.Three hours in Honolulu gave us only enough time to snack and enjoy the balmy weather between gates. 

The flight to Auckland was fairly crowded  but my seat was in the middle section on the aisle and the two seats to my left were wide open. The flight to Auckland was about twenty minutes short of ten hours; thank you again movies and all the help we received in getting the tablets and movies. The food and drinks on the flight, though frequent, were just okay. About four hours short of our destination, I was just sure we were going to have our flight extended with an unplanned stop in Pago Pago when a man started screaming at his wife. And he wouldn't stop. I was not looking forward another take off and landing and thankful the flight attendant finally calmed him down.

When we landed  in Auckland  we were informed that we were to be in a sort of quarantine so we should not leave our seats. The flight attendants then proceeded to open all of the overhead bins and used a bug spray that was allowed to seep in for five minutes . Apparently the chance of infestation is high so they take it very seriously. After the requisite waiting period we were allowed to collect our bags and head to the terminal. So our 10:20 PM local time landing got us to the terminal at 11:00 PM. Then it was to immigration and a long line. Once through we headed to our luggage and waited as it was still not on the belt. Finally it was collected when the fourth piece showed up and we didn't have a recurrence of our Venice luggage delay. Now we were off to customs where we became concerned that the turkey sandwich that we had left in our carry-on might violate their import policy so we we were sent to another room to explain what we had. The turkey sandwich was confiscated and we were told we were lucky as we avoided a 400 NZ fine. After them x-raying all of our stuff to prove we had no more contraband it was off to find Super Shuttle. Service was excellent and we arrived at the hotel in thirty minutes. Check in went well and we were in the room at 12:30 AM (Wednesday morning). So from touchdown to the room was 2 hours. Of course, we had been up at that point 24 plus hours. No way to sleep on the plane at least not for me.

In Auckland, we were 20 hours ahead of MST because we crossed the International Date Line. 

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/International_Date_Line 

It still confuses me, but I am sure we missed Tuesday as we left Monday morning and hit the hotel after midnight Wednesday morning. We missed Groundhog Day. Oh well.

So we tried to sleep in, but only made it to 8:30 AM, but that was okay. We had a nice breakfast at Café Melba   and then did a casual self guided walking tour of Auckland. The weather was drizzly all day, but we did not breakdown and buy an umbrella.  A casual dinner was planned at a Chinese restaurant to empower us as a plan was hatched to hit Auckland hard.

Additional thoughts

While international travel certainly is sexy, frankly, traveling in the US holds a certain appeal. The US has a first class highway system that is well-marked and has many well-appointed rest stops. When rest stops are not available, there are plenty of fast food restaurants and truck stops for use. There are 59 national parks which are part of 401 units (including US monuments) that are included in the jursidiction of the National Park System. They are great to go to, unless of course the government is in shutdown, which it was during our trip. The smart phone makes traveling so much easier, although obtaining maps and guide books from AAA was instrumental in planning and effecting our trip. While the Google-maps application was fairly reliable, it was good to be able to look at a map to reconfirm directions. The guide books help in finding hotels and give information about various attractions. There are great websites to give detail input about attractions and restaurants. While we focused on going to hotel chains to ensure consistency in our night stays, when it came to restaurants, we wanted to sample the local cuisine. We used the smart phone applications to find the best restaurants in the area we were in. We were never disappointed. While our trip was a little bit like the movie, "If its Tuesday, it must be Belgium," with us running from town to town, for us it was a good sampler of the south. We did get to go to Crystal Bridges Museum, The Clinton Library, Graceland, and The Grand Ole Opry, while offering us the opportunity to see family in Texas and Florida. I think that in the future we will probably focus on a smaller geographical area as during our trip we hit 11 states including New Mexico, Texas, Oklahoma, Arkansas, Tennessee, South Carolina, Georgia, Florida, Alabama, Mississippi, and Louisiana. That is 20% of the country (yeah I am analytical). One thing that our travels did show us is that most cities have started to look alike. Similar malls and people are very similar. Obviously in the south, the homes are older and their economics and the Civil War have had a significant affect on their culture. It seems that while we live in the very transient west, the people of the south have many areas where they tend to stay in the same communities and seem to have more extended families. In Natchez, MS for example, it seemed like a lot of folks were related to each other and everyone seemed to know everyone. We feel blessed to know a few of our neighbors here in Mesa, which is 180 degrees from what we found in Natchez. We live in a great country where we are free to travel and have very few limits on us. Every once in awhile we have a chance to realize it. Thanks to all that helped us during our trip including Eric, Lindsey and Sydney, Stuart and Jane, Janet and Ralph and Marty in providing us a place to stay or keeping an eye on our place during our absence. Gary and Felice

The last few days

After our stay in Natchez, MS, we headed home. Any sane person would have looked at a trip of 1,450 miles and about 20 1/2 hours as one that should take three days of driving about 500 miles a day. We were motivated to get home a little quicker as there was nothing between Natchez and Mesa for us to do. Also, we were "fleeing" the potential hurricane in Louisiana/Mississippi and had some concern about the bad weather and tornados in the midwest which at the time were predicted to go as far south as Oklahoma. So we headed out of Mississippi and up through Louisiana to Shreveport. Louisiana is a very green and wet area. Lots of lakes all over. Then we hit Texas and Texas is a big state. We tried to get through Dallas/Fort Worth before the rush hour. We were successful at first, hitting Dallas around 3:30, but did get caught in a traffic jam in Fort Worth. Once through, we found the area of Texas west of of Dallas/Fort Worth on I-20 and I-10 to be pretty stark. Lots of dirt and signs indicating that "zero visibility may exist" on the road. We made it all the way to Midland, which was about 700 miles and we were on the road close to 12 hours. While exhausting, once there we knew we were in striking distance of Arizona and at a minimum able to get to Tucson, if not home to Mesa. We doubted getting to Mesa, but then a wonderful thing happened. The speed limit went up to 80 miles per hour. You see, Texas does have some redeeming qualities. The trip was 750 miles and took us about 9 hours, even though we hit some very strange traffic in El Paso at noon on a Saturday. We were also aided by the fact that we picked up two time zones so were were able to finish in daylight. Unfortunately, the prior day we traveled right into the sun and then had to fight through dusk. We were taken with the beauty of New Mexico, which is much like Arizona and enjoyed the sights although they were not particularly beautiful.

Travel statistics

As you may know, I am a very analytical person so there are certain aspects of the trip that I tracked closely. As Felice can attest to, all during each day's trip I calculated our average speed, how far away we were and what time we would arrive. What makes it particularly frustrating for her is that I usually provide a level of precision that she feels is unneccesary. For example, I may say that that we will be somewhere at 2:25 and she can't understand why I don't say 2:30. In deference to her, these statistics are rounded so that she can't claim I am being overally precise.
Total miles driven 5,600
Miles per gallon 23.50
Gallons of gas purchased 240
Average price per gallon of gas $3.19

Average speed traveled between cities 71 As I briefly mentioned, our travel plans included hotels that Felice would seek out a few hours before our arrival in a city. She would call many hotels, usually at least a half dozen in the city to get the best value. Our criteria was that we wanted a three star hotel, that had free wi-fi and served a free, warm breakfast. We didn't want to pay for parking and would not stay at any place that was offensive. A couple of times we actually made sure to see the room before we registered to stay in the hotel. We only stayed at chains as we felt that the consistency and national reputation would give us a better chance of not having a disappointing stay. A rundown of the hotels and the number of nights follows:
Best Western 3
Comfort Inn 2
Hyatt Place 1
Fairfield 2
Hampton Inn 1
La Quinta 1
For the most part, there is no corrrelation between the hotel name and its looks or service. It seems that hotels change name plates so often that something that was a Comfort Inn last year became a Fairfield Inn this year. In fact, that was the case with a hotel for us in Charleston. The Fairfield Inn by far was the nicest one we stayed in. Now there is one chain that we have had a different experience with and it was Hyatt Place. All of their hotels look the same and have the same layout. It seems like they are all situated in shopping centers. Perhaps it is because they are a new chain. Frankly, if I could stay at a Hyatt Place every night, I would love it. Our worst experience was at a Comfort Inn in Conyers, Georgia. There was nothing "wrong" with it, but it was tired. The bedspread and wallpaper was dated. The cigarette burn in the bedspread of our "non-smoking' room was tacky and there were very few electrical plugs. Most of the rooms had refrigerators, which was a nice touch. The breakfasts fell into two categories. Real eggs (and sausage)and carbohydrates and no eggs (and sausage) and carbohydrates. Since we are watching the carbohydrates, we didn't like the latter. Usually there were make your own waffles stations and fresh pastries. A few of the hotels had plastic sealed pastries and little real appetizing food. In fact, in Pensacola, the food was so bad, we didn't eat there, but walked over to a Denny's and actually paid for a breakfast. Can you imagine that? And Denny's was a big step up. The breakfast food highlight was definitely Hyatt Place. They had better eggs, offered omelets and it just felt good. Pricing of the hotels ran from a low of $45 in Tucamcari (price before taxes) to a high of $111 in Savannah. Price seems to be dictated not by nameplate but by the marketplace which considers number of hotels, market conditions and night of the week. For example, the only city we had trouble finding a room was Midland, Tx and there was only one hotel with a room for us. The cost was $105 and they really didn't seem to want to offer discounts. Seems like the oil boom has made housing in west-Texas scarce and hotels are used for oil-workers. Oh, the Hyatt Place in a Memphis suburb was $65. Here are some hotel statistics:
Average hotel price $85
Median price $89
Mode price $103
High price $111
Low price $45

Overall, the cost of our trip, which was 17 nights was very reasonable and best of all the trip provided Felice and I the opportunity to see if traveling by car would work. It did and I think this opens up a lot of different opportunities for future travel. We will keep you posted.

Riverboat and duck update

Above is a picture of a Mississippi River riverboat which I think is docked and actually being used as a gambling casino. Felice and I were mortified when we saw part of a television report that the Peabody ducks were being discontinued. I researched a little and found that this didn't pertain to the Memphis Peabody ducks, but the ones in Orlando at the Peabody Hotel. We breathed a sigh of relief.

Natchez

Today we left Pensacola on our way to Natchez, Mississippi for the antebellum home pilgramage. As we left, we realized that we are racing away from the gulf coast which is looking out for a tropical storm which might turn into a hurricane. We passed through Mobile, Biloxi, and Gulfport and the weather was just perfect. Okay, it was a little humid. While we are now still just a couple hours away from the gulf coast, we have been told by locals that this area has not really had significant adverse affects from hurricanes. We were attracted to Natchez as we were told that they have tours of private, antebellum homes and thought that it would be very interesting. We toured two houses and it was fascinating. This wasn't like going through the Hearst Castle, but more like going through a person's house and seeing all of their family's history for the last 150 years laid out in front of you. The tour was conducted by the owner of the home and one of the owner's asked us to send regards to the other since they are cousins. After the tours, we had dinner at a local restaurant called Pig Out and guess what we had? Yes, that is right, more ribs. It was very good. I could get very used to southern barbeque. We then drove around the city, which took about 15 minutes. I have attached a picture of the view of the bridge over the Mississippi River to Louisiana at sunset. It is beautiful.

Tomorrow we are heading north and west through Louisiana and Texas. That should take us further away from the potential hurricane. Today we had our first significant travel on a non-interstate roadway. While it was fine, with a little lower speed limit, it helped me recognize how wonderful our interstate roadway system is. It is incredible how many different interstates there are in the country. We have had so many choices of roads to go west as an example. We have already used I-10, I-20 and I40. It is funny that when we drove to Arizona in 1963 it seemed like there were very few alternatives and now it seems like there are a bunch. In this time of government shutdown, I for one am thankful for the interstate freeway system started during the Eisenhower administration. We are still looking for things to do between Dallas and Mesa. I had been considering Carlsbad Caverns, but it is shut down as it is a part of the National Park System. If anyone has a suggestion, please email us. Gary and Felice

Westward Ho!

Tuesday was a day to recharge our batteries. After another hour walk on the beach we restocked our supplies at the general store (okay, the Publix supermarket) and prepared our stuff for the trip back. We had a fantastic dinner with Uncle Stuart and Aunt Jane at the Malibu Beach restaurant and then took another walk on the beach to say goodbye to the warm Atlantic Ocean. This morning we headed up A1A, which is the equivalent to the Pacific Coast Highway, running next to the Atlantic Ocean. After about 65 miles we arrived in St. Augestine, the oldest city in the US. We did a self-guided tour, but unfortunately the fort, which is really the highlight of the city was closed because it is part of the national park system. Damn you Federal government shutdown. After a fun walk around the old-town section we headed west towards Pensacola, home of the Blue Angels, the United States Air Force acrobatic team. The trip was a very easy one, with very few trucks. We did hit some rain, but overall not a bad trip. Our total milage for the day was close to 500 miles with a cumulative of almost 3,750 miles. Pensacola is a pretty small city and unfortunately most of the restaurants are chains. We did find one called The Shrimp Basket, which was pretty casual, but the food was good. Of course we both had shrimp. The plan is to head to Natchez tomorrow and then make a beeline home to Arizona. Be well.