VictoriaJune 2
Kia Ora.
Our plane home from NZ did not divert to Siberia nor did we decide to go for an impromptu side trip to Tahiti, much to Mitch’s disappointment. Our reason for the delay in sending this last blog is we’ve simply been sucked back into our humdrum, ordinary American lives.
We’ve been home almost two weeks and we’re finally feeling like we’ve beaten the jet lag. It was long and ugly and we spent way too many nights staring at the ceiling, tossing and turning, desperately trying and miserably failing to fall asleep. Just as the sun was starting to rise, we fell into our deepest sleep and awoke several hours later to a late morning start to our day.
Lest you all think we’re not happy to be home, we definitely are. It’s been wonderful to see our family and friends and also our fur baby, who, initially confused at our reemergence into his space, has re-embraced us as his favorite people and has not left our sides.
We thought it would be fun to add up all the miles we drove around NZ and it’s more than 6,300 (10,000+ kilometers)! That’s like driving from NY to San Francisco and back again. The 6,300 were the miles we drove on our own and don’t even include the tour bus miles.
We plotted out on the map our general itinerary and looking at it this way, it’s hard to believe we covered so much ground. Even so, there’s still so much we didn’t see!
Our trip was far more than a bucket list item checked off. I cannot simply put a check mark next to NZ and move on to the next destination. That would minimize my time there, my experiences, my connections to the land and my new found friendships. NZ is a country that embraced me and stole my heart.
So what’s the moral of the blog, the gist from 120 days of our adventures? If you’ve been wanting to travel somewhere, just do it. Stop dreaming and start planning. We promise you won’t regret it and we hope we’re one of the first people to hear all about how it changed your life.
Ka Kite Ano (Goodbye) and thanks for reading about our NZ adventures!
Victoria and Mitch
