An early start to finish the last bits of packing, sort everything in the house and get to the airport. We arrived in good time and found a porter to help with our luggage as there were no trolleys and no way we could lug everything ourselves.
We had to pay for 2 additional bags at check in and got charged NZ rates, basically double what we should have paid so we will be following that up when we get home. At least on Air NZ those two bags are covered as part of our Koru membership.
Check in was otherwise painless and we had prebooked a time with security so that didn’t take too long either. A quick train ride to the departure gates and we found a seat, although according to TJ, Mark made him “steal a seat” so we had 5.
We found something to eat and settled in for the couple of hours until our flight boarded.
On arrival into Houston we collected our bags and our vehicle with relative ease and headed to the Galleria shopping center, the largest mall in Texas which even has an ice-skating rink. We had needed to change our hotel from the Westin as they couldn’t provide us with connecting rooms but found a Sonder not far away. We had already sent a few packages to the Westin so we went to collect them and had a look around the mall. Dinner was at the Cheesecake Factory, an old favorite and family friendly.
The Sonder was not far away and once we found our way in and managed to squeeze into a very tight park due to some decidedly dodgy parking we found our apartment. It was spacious, even for a 2 bedroom with lots of space to store our bags. The only issue being they hadn’t provided any bedding for the sofa bed so we contacted them and then headed out to the local HEB (supermarket) for some water and breakfast supplies. Check out the picture of the Dallas Cowboys Super Bowl cheese platter! On our return they had already delivered the bedding, so we finished settling in and the boys watched the football.
