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Up early for the 9:30 flight to Auckland. When there we decided that we had a little time to spare so walked over to the shopping centre and got some essentials then went to the Golden Arches for a bite to eat prior to take-off. We had a departure time of 1310 so I felt that we had plenty of time. After all we were checked in all the way to Sri Lanka so no baggage to worry about. Well…….how wrong could one be. We decided to go through customs and saw the massive queue to get through!! I quickly checked the ticket and realised at that stage that the checkin time had passed by 25 minutes! Panic! Told some kind official of our predicament who said "Well you had better come through then" phew.
Off we went trying to find our gate that was apparently quite a way away. We got there with about 15 minutes to spare thankfully but had expended a lot of energy with the rushing and panic. Not the best start, however things got better after that minor hiccup.
On the plane heading for Singapore. Yeah! It's happening. 'Singapore Girl you're a great way to fly' . We were both really impressed with Singapore airline. Very attentive staff and the food was great as well. What we were not so impressed with was the the flight itself. We were apparently in a slipstream that was causing a large amount of turbulence. Well, I have never felt anything like it in my life. The plane was lurching up and down it seemed like a few stories at a time. People were screaming and yelling. (Note from Jenny - no, I wasn't screaming! I was so terrified...there was no sound coming out of me at all!!). Was this a terrorist slipstream? Had the captain left the cockpit and the autopilot been turned off?? Turns out neither. It all settled down until the landing which I have to say was the most scary one I have ever had the pleasure of experiencing. We had been asked to do a holding pattern around Singapore due to congestion and bad weather. We were all ready to land after flying around Singapore for an extra 20 minutes but when we did land it was equally as terrifying as the turbulence. The plane came down heavily and without a word of a lie it felt like we were heading down the runway sideways and then back the other side! (I too have never experienced a 'sideways' landing until then…..both Rich and I were scared witless!!) I am a seasoned Wellington airport lander but I have never felt this before! We managed to walk off in one piece however into the very large and nicely air conditioned Changi airport.
The next leg to Sri Lanka was meant to be 3:50 minutes which we did in a little less than that. We checked in one hour early to make up for the time we were late in Auckland lol. We had an uneventful flight to Colombo on which we tried to get some shut eye (Rich found this much easier to manage than Jen).
At immigration we were reminded, in case we had forgotten, that New Zealand had lost the world cup match with Australia. We fear we will never be allowed to forget this as everyone we meet, on finding out we are from NZ...mention the cricket!!! They are cricket mad here!! Walking out of the airport was literally like walking into and oven. About 30 degrees. Walked straight to the road and WE were hailed down by a taxi who gave us a ride to Negombo to stay at the Paradise Beach Hotel.
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Glenda Wow- what a flight! A bit scary. You would have been pleased to get off the plane! Great to see a few pics in FB. Thinking of you all the time. X