Houston TX - New Zealand

Sadly it's come to our last day in Houston for this adventure, we fly out tonight at 9.25 pm.  Our bags are packed and we can leave them in the hotel office.  Glad I took the opportunity to make waffles for brekkie the other day, 'cos today it is crazy in here, large families have overtaken the area and they all want waffles. And the toasters are all being used to toast bagels - another mental note - avoid weekends at these airport hotels.

Anyway us girls today are doing a last power shop at the Cypress Outlets Stores and the boys are doing more RV shopping etc.  We spend a successful and enjoyable couple of hours at the outlets, surprisingly we are not totally shopped out yet!

Once we rejoin with the boys we find a ‘Rooms To Go’ store, I’ve been wanting to check one of these out for ages, they advertise a room full of matching furniture for one single price.  However we find the furniture is all quite heavy and dark, not at all suitable for an apartment, nor a mobile home!  The kids furniture is awesome though!

None of us had time for lunch yet and we are getting pretty hungry by the time we collect our bags from the hotel, return the rental car and take the shuttle to the terminal.  We are a bit too early to check in, but we had to get the car back on time, so we sit around the airport patiently waiting for the Air NZ team to turn up and open ‘ticketing’.  It only takes about 45 minutes so not too long but we are still hungry - nothing to eat on this side.  We get ticketed fairly promptly and through the queues to an extremely thorough security screening, ie shoes off (even jandals??) and absolutely nothing in your pockets, not even a hanky eh Kim, and then into the departure area to find a place to eat.  Came across Ruby’s Diner, which was great!  The wait staff were dressed in old American candy stripe shirts and aprons - picture Happy Days - and the music was all good the old rock and roll songs, those you know the words to.  And they had beer – and wine : )  It was a very pleasant place to sit and wait for our flight to be called.

We took off as scheduled, at 9.25 pm and arrived in Auckland early, after approx. 14 hours in the air.  The time seemed to go fast though - had some supper, watched two movies, took a pill and slept most of the way with my eye mask on, ear plugs in and snuggled up in the blankie - zzzz’z.

PS  Watch this space for our blog on the Cruise.  We weren't easily able to blog from the ship but I did make notes and we have lots of photos.  I will post something in a day or two!