Saying that our New Zealand honeymoon was fantastic is an understatement. We drove around both islands. We met a lot of nice people. We saw a lot of wildlife. We went on some great hikes. We explored varying landscapes. We ate some great food. We did a lot.
When we returned home and friends and family asked us how our trip went, of course I was retelling how we saw dolphins while kayaking, or about the cutest sheep in the world.
And, as these conversations go, someone would always ask if anything bad or unexpected happened.
Two bad things did happen but they occurred before and after the trip. Also, in the moment they were both annoying but they end result turned out fine.
Before New Zealand
When we were checking into our flight to Auckland, the ticket agent asked me to place my rolling suitcase on the scale to be weighed. We told her that this was my carry-on luggage. (It was regulation, I checked the size beforehand!) However, she replied that there is a weight limit for carry-on items so she needed to weigh.
I placed my suitcase on the scale and she immediately told us it was over the weight limit. I forget exactly how much in kilograms is the maximum but it was equivalent to about 7 pounds. Next she weighed Bryce’s carry-on, and it was the same situation: over the weight limit. When we asked how much it would cost to check a bag she typed something into her computer, looked up at us and said it would be $150 — PER BAG!
She looked back down at her computer and I stood closer to Bryce and whispered in his ear, “Is now the time to tell people that we’re on our honeymoon so that we can get free stuff?” He shook his head.
We left the ticketing desk to hover outside of the line to “reorganize our belongings.”
I’ll just wear all my clothes! I exclaimed as I started unpacking.
Our plan was to stuff as much of my belongings into Bryce’s duffel bag and check his bag, and hopefully not check mine. Sure, we may have been going on our honeymoon but since our original plan was to pay for no checked luggage, we weren’t about to pay for two at such an exorbitant price!
Finally, we felt ready to face the scale again. We got back in line and waited for the verdict. This time around we ended up going to a different ticket agent. She still had me weigh my suitcase — and it passed “the test!” Then Bryce put his bag down and told her we’d be checking it.
She began typing on her computer and printed out a luggage tag. She placed the tag around the handle of Bryce’s bag and off it went down the conveyor belt. There goes $150, I thought to myself.
She checked our passports and gave us our boarding passes. Maybe she asked us a few other questions? I started zoning out a bit while Bryce answered. I was still mad about our luggage situation! Who knew there was a weight limit for carry-ons?? (Well, apparently it’s pretty standard to have a weight limit for carry-ons but most airlines do not check or enforce it).
As we walked away and headed towards TSA, I asked Bryce if it really cost $150 or if the first ticket agent got the price wrong.
“We didn’t get charged!” he said.
“WHAT?” I replied.
“The second woman never brought it up that it would cost anything so I didn’t bring it up. She didn’t ask for my credit card so there is no way we will get charged now.”
Did this second agent just not know the rules? Did she forget to charge us? Was the first agent just full of bogus?
Later on when we were at the gate waiting for our plane to board, Bryce checked the fine print of our flight reservation in his email.
We had one free checked bag each!
We went through that whole scramble of repacking for nothing! But, it all ended up being fine in the end. At least we hadn’t gone back to that first agent who probably would have charged us.
Coming back home
When you’re returning home after a three-week vacation, the last thing you want is a delayed flight, or, to get locked out of your apartment. The latter happened to us.
We arrived back to (snowy!) Seattle late on a Sunday night. It was when Seattle was facing its second or third big snow hit of the season, just within a week! My parents kindly picked us up from the airport in my dad’s all-wheel drive car. The city was covered in a sheet of white. Sidewalks were ankle-deep with fluffy powder. My mom had about four bags of groceries for us claiming, “You guys aren’t going anywhere for a week!”
Was Seattle Snowmageddon 2019 really this bad?
As we were unpacking our belongings and all the groceries from the car and headed to the front door of our apartment, I was thinking how I was ready to just fall asleep. Bryce was taking a long time to unlock the door to our apartment building. He then turned to me and said, “They changed the locks.”
While we were on our honeymoon, the front doors to our building had been completely replaced and with that, the locks too!
It was past midnight. We felt bad to call our apartment manager, who is older in age, to wake him in the middle of the night.
So, our honeymoon ended with my parents driving us back to their house where we crashed in their basement.
But, hey, it could have been worse. At least we had a place to stay the night! It’s not like an Uber dropped us off and we had no where to go.
So, like I said from the start, the two “bad things” didn’t end up so bad. And, they were both before and after the trip — it was all smooth sailing during our actual honeymoon!
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