Day 1 - Wellington to Portland

I joined Bev in Auckland.   She had arrived an hour before me and was waiting patiently for my arrival.  I just had time to fill my water bottle before we were called for our flight to San Francisco. 

It was a long walk to Gate 15.  When we got there we found there was another layer of security to go through and then we were ready to board.  We got to the place where you show your passport and boarding pass again, and my one beeped.  I was shuffled sideways to another desk where they printed out a Business Premier ticket for me.  I asked whether Bev and had been upgraded but no she was not.  Poor girl she was very upset.  It would have been chivalrous of me to offer my seat but I quite liked the idea of putting my feet up so I organised for her to have my seat on the aisle.  I told one of the cabin crew about Bev being separated from me and she offered to take her a glass of champagne (as compensation) to drink before take off.  I hoped that might put a smile on her face.

The best thing about being on Business Class, apart from the bed, was the wine selection.  I got to try Trinity Hill’s Homage 2014, a Syrah, which was superb.  It was big, peppery and rather unctuous.  I took a glass of it to Bev for her enjoyment. 

We arrived in San Francisco on time, but on disembarking we were confronted with a queue to get into the country.  We patiently stayed in the queue until it was suggested that we join another one and use their automated system but in the end Bev still had to go through the manual process.  Finally an hour later we were through only to then be confronted by another long queue for the domestic flight.  That required stripping belts and shoes off and traipsing through a mandatory body scanner to then have the backpack examined yet again.  Another hour later we were through. 

When we got the United Airlines lounge we discovered that our plane was going to be delayed by an hour and a half. 

We finally arrived in Portland at about 8pm, two hours later than scheduled.  To get some information about how to get Uber we  asked a bloke at the information desk.  He was a talkative delight.  His wife came from Tasmania so they visited Australia on an annual basis, and they had also visited New Zealand on several occasions and liked both places. 

Finally we got into an Uber with another talkative, friendly man who did stand-up comedy as a sideline and suggested if we had time we go to the Helium - a comedy club.

After getting our bags into the Loft AirBnb, Bev decided she was hungry.  We decided on a pizza place that was not too far away.  We would have got to it faster if the algorithm hadn't taken us on a very circuitous route.  The pizza was ok but not as good as an Italian one.   

It was quite late Portland time when we got to bed but still early by NZ or Australian time. Friday was one very long day being about 43 hours long.