Hello! This is my very first blog, so please bear with me as I explore the minutia of what these popular on-line journals have to offer. It is a bit embarrassing to admit that I have never blogged before, especially since it is such a highly sought after attribute in the field that I work in (IT Services / Software Engineering).

My experience with blogs began with friends traveling abroad for long periods of time and coworkers blogging on all types of industry specific ideas and knowledge management.

The purpose of this blog will be for Shawn and me to share stories, experiences, pictures, and pretty much whatever motivates us to write about. Another great benefit that this blog will (hopefully) bring is detailed accuracy on experiences in New Zealand and everything surrounding it. I can testify that my recollection of the details is average at best, so it is my goal to provide details of our 2 weeks in New Zealand so that everyone can follow while we are away.

Here is a little background…

Shawn was gracious enough to invite me to go to New Zealand with him about a month ago and the planning has just begun. Before beginning to research for this trip, I knew the bare minimum about New Zealand: NZ is an island a far plane ride away, they have a rugby team named the All Blacks, they drive on the opposite side of the road, they love extreme activities/sports, and there always seems to be a reference to Kiwi when speaking about NZ (I would later find out that the Kiwi is the national symbol of NZ).

Our flights got booked today and despite knowing the flight was going to be long, I was still amazed at the time difference between departure from Baltimore (BWI) at 11:34 AM on Thursday, February 7th and the arrival in Queenstown, NZ at 11:50 AM on Saturday, February 9th. Taking only the dates and times into account, that’s over48 hours; however we lose a day traveling to NZ because we are on a plane for 21 hours and 9 minutes AND we cross the International Date Line. Traveling the way home is even more interesting because we leave Auckland, NZ on Saturday (23rd) at 7:15 PM and arrive in Baltimore at 11:45 PM on the same day.

That is all that we have set for now; however all suggestions on places to visit or comments to make regarding the information that we write about are welcome.

(Next blog: Activity planning phase 1, rugby match)