Interesting Flight to Auckland

I was lucky enough to travel to New Zealand over the mid-semester break to visit friends and family. The flight from Brisbane to Auckland is only 3 hours, which is peanuts in comparison to a flight from anywhere else in the world to New Zealand! Turns out my flight ended up being not that short… but we’ll get to that.

I was a bit embarrassed when I was travelling, as I had this bruise on my nose. I can’t say it was from a really cool story or anything, because it really just wasn’t. Here’s what had happened: I was sitting in my bed a couple nights before, typing on my laptop. My laptop was on my thighs, with my knees bent. I went to adjust my pillow and ended up throwing my knees forward, and the laptop smoked me in the face. Try telling people you have a bruise because you hit yourself in the face with your laptop – not cool. Anyways, I arrived early at the airport. Gave myself enough time to grab a hot chocolate and take a peek around duty-free. It was a beautiful morning and I was so excited to be travelling!

So now for the interesting part: A man in the first row on my flight had a heart attack about an hour into the flight (flight is 3 hours long). So, technically, we were closer to Brisbane than to Auckland. It was pretty serious and people on board were pretty worried. We ended up having to turn around and fly back to Brisbane. Considering it would only be an extra half an hour to fly to New Zealand than to return, it was a pretty serious situation because they chose to turn around. Can’t say I’ve ever busted a u-turn in a plane before. The funny thing was that I was doing my homework and reading an article on the medical prescription of heroin for heroin addicts… when the intercom asked everyone on board if there was anyone who was a doctor/nurse/involved in the medical profession. The lady (who was annoyingly reading over my shoulder for the last hour) gave me a sort of nod… as if I was involved in medicine in some way due to my heroin article. It was flattering, but not a chance!  Anyways, we ended up flying back to Brissy, staying on the plane while it refueled, and heading back. I was starving by the time we got there!

I ended up arriving in Auckland 6 hours later… so much for peanuts. It was so nice to be picked up by family. We went out for a delicious thai dinner and headed back to their place on the “North Shore” (crazy because that’s the name of where I live in Vancouver!!) I felt right at home. After a nice cup of tea, I slept like a baby after all of my airplane drama.