Friday 4 December 2009

Group 2 Arrival in Auckland [updated]

On the front left is Mrs Van Roon wearing Carl's medals and holding his best overall cup. Carl is still in South America.

We were greeted by family and friends plus TV ONE cameras and the press. Master Bhana and other TKD enthusiasts were also there to welcome our contingent of the team home.

We were delayed about an hour, arriving at 8.35am instead of scheduled 7.40am which meant a few of those with connecting flights were scrambling to get through to the domestic terminal in time for the flights to Tauranga, Wellington, Palmerston North and the like. Only one hour late wasn't too bad though compared with the guys flying home on Wednesday who had a 5 hour delay.

You can see from the photos that there are were a lot of the team returning separately.

Mark and Carolina are off to Peru to visit family and are back in late January. Carl, Richy and Amanda are all touring South America for the next month or so. There's another group of kiwis staying on and returning on next Wednesday's flight (I think there are direct flights from BA to Auckland on Wednesdays and Fridays). Mean time, many of them are staying in a Youth Hostel like place a few blocks from our luxury Marriott Plaza Hotel. We wish you all to have a lot of fun, safe travels and we look forward to seeing you back in NZ.

Here's a few more photos of our arrival (10)...