The Boys Arrive in Kerikeri

I used to love the joke about the day when Big Ears was going across town to see Noddy. [Does anyone remember “Weetbix” jokes?] Anyway, Tuesday was the day we were going across town to meet Michael and Andrew at the airport. They were up in Dunedin much earlier than us to catch their first plane to Christchurch. It is so cool to be able to follow the flights these days on the internet via the arrival/departure page on Air NZ’s web site. I am sure that the information there is as up-to-date as the arrival/departure boards in the airports. By the time I started checking they’d already arrived in Christchurch on time and would have been boarding their flight to Auckland – also on time. It was a lovely morning in Kerikeri – no thoughts of airport closure today. The outside temperature was only 6 degrees at 7am – with hope for a better day.

Air travel is impressive these days or maybe it was just a very good day; most flights were either on time or a couple of minutes early. Only one that I saw was more than a few minutes late. This was reassuring because the boys had to make two connections. Before long they were on their way on the last leg to Kerikeri – a final 40 minutes. About 20 minutes before their expected arrival we headed off to the airport; it took us 6 minutes to get there. It is a lovely little airport although – at the risk of repeating myself – they really do need to make up their minds what the name is. This is the airport with 4 names; Kerikeri, Bay of Islands, Kerikeri/Bay of Islands, or Bay of Islands/Kerikeri. It is the constant interchange of the first two that must cause a lot of confusion. By this I mean interchange on booking systems, tickets and boarding passes! It is one of the stupidest things I’ve ever seen.

Anyway, it was a lovely morning to watch the plane fly in. It’s a weird layout with the airport opposite the end of the runway. When the plane is landing from the south it hurtles past the airport still up in the air; you might wonder if it is really landing or maybe is in two minds about the whole process. But land they do, rapidly heading off into the distance – eventually to taxi the long way back to the terminal. Since it is always the only plane, it pulls up right outside the building – we joked that if it was raining it would probably stop under the veranda.

It was great to greet Michael and Andrew, and we were soon back at the holiday park in Kerikeri and settling in. So was Harry, the camp cat who called by and stayed. Harry was taken with the metal Pukeko on the wall, with a brief attack before curling up and going to sleep. It was a nice day with lunch outdoors. With the boys having a bit of turbo-prop lag (like jet lag only slower) we had a leisurely sort of afternoon. We paid a visit to the Stone Store and Mission House and the nearby pa site. Plus we visited the New World for more supplies and picked up Wyn’s bike from the bike shop. Later all the boys watched the movie Kenny while Wyn caught up on Coro Street.

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2 Responses to The Boys Arrive in Kerikeri

  1. Wendy says:

    I like the sound of turbo-prop lag, I think I might be suffering from a bit of that, excepting its not from travel, its from finishing work and selling houses etc. I kinda like it, regards Wendy

  2. Julia Davies says:

    I had that once on some small plane chugging from Dunedin to Hamilton – it took forever. My sympathies…

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