New Zealand Bound!

Well the “Shannon Thomas North American Tour 2006” has officially ended. Hitting San Francisco, Pittsburgh, Tampa, San Diego, and San Jose in only 3 weeks, my relaxing month off turned out to be a lot more strenuous then I had thought. Though after all was said and done, in that month, I successfully accomplished all I needed to. I acquired my Visa, sold my car and most of my belongings, and moved out of my apt, all with only a few hours to spare actually. But finally the day that seemed would never come, had arrived. It finally hit me.

Day 1:

I wasn’t dreading the 13 ½ hour flight because I knew I could sleep through most of it since it was at night. Despite a little bump in the road when I checked in at LAX, (thanks again Jess and Anna), everything went really smoothly. On the 450 passenger 747 Qantas Airbus, I got a lovely window seat and the seat next to me was actually empty, bonus. They also had a large selection of movies and shows to watch for the in flight entertainment so that made the trip a lot more enjoyable. I slept for about 6-8 hours after the dinner meal, I had the penne pasta. In the morning, when I woke up, they served breakfast and after that we landed in Aukland, in all it really wasn’t bad at all. Lastly, there was a very short 1 hour flight to Wellington.

Again I got a window seat and got to actually see New Zealand since the sun was now up. From above the first thing I noticed was how green it was, secondly was how it was barely populated. Although I’ve never been to either, I think it looks like a combination of Hawaii and Ireland.

Once I arrived at the Wellington airport a runner form Weta picked me up and drove me to my hotel. He gave me a quick little intro to the area and it all sounds great. The Duxton Hotel is by far the nicest hotel I’ve ever stayed in, and I’ve been in a lot of them. It is a 2 room suite with an amazing view of the peninsula bay and mountains. I took a few hours and walked around the city here at lunch and noticed there were a lot of people running and eating outside, though compared to the states there are very few people in general. It is extremely clean and the air is perfect. I loved that I didn’t see one homeless person or a single Starbucks, there is however a MacDonald’s, Burger King’s, and SUBWAY. The cars driving on the other side of the road is pretty weird cause in some places they don’t have the double yellow line and it looks like its just one-way but it isn’t. So far though, the best thing is just how nice everyone is. It’s like they’re all in the best mood, very un-American, more like the way it should be, extremely approachable.

Well, that’s about it for now. I’m gonna meet up with my buddy Simon in a little bit here, grab some dinner and then tomorrow I head into Weta for my first day. No modeling yet though, just paperwork, HR formalities, and getting my bank account set up. Thanks for checking in, more later...

-Cheers.