The trip back was a long one: Portland to Boston to Dallas to Los Angeles to Auckland. Fortunately, I'm a member of the QANTAS Club so I was able to while away the hours between flights in the American Airlines lounges which are very comfortable. In one sense the QANTAS lounge in Los Angeles is even better since they have fruit juices and munchies to keep one occupied, but they also don't have anywhere you can use for e-mail which is a bother.

I arrived in NZ at 4:40 a.m. on 7 August and after a shower at the QANTAS Club went down to retrieve my baggage. My bike box was there, missing a corner, and my second box with my panniers and clothes was nowhere to be found. I joined a queue of about 20 people who were missing their bags to report it missing and to have them note the damage to my bike box. In all my years of travelling I had not had so much damage to the box. Fortunately, the contents inside were still there, although the bike itself may have been damaged.

Since I had camping gear and a bike the Ministry of Agriculture wanted to have a close look at things. They took my tent for fumigation and had me remove my bike from the box to look at the tyres. I bundled my bike onto the trolley and dragged the box outside since it was too much of a bother to get the bike into the box again.

Lis was nowhere in sight and I couldn't raise her on the phone. She had been confused about my arrival time and I had left a message on the answerphone that I was here. While I was waiting to sort out my baggage I got a message from the airport operator to call her, but since there was no way of doing so before I exited the QANTAS representative kindly called her on my behalf. Eventually she arrived and took me home.

A visit was made to the doctor later that morning and after an X-ray was taken it was confirmed that I had fractured my clavicle (i.e. shoulder) in my crash. Fortunately, it was a clean fracture and it should heal in about eight weeks. A real bother as Lis and I were going mountain biking on trails the next weekend in Rotorua and it definitely puts a halt to any kyaking. Bother. But at least it explains why it wasn't getting any better!

It was great to be home and it didn't feel like I had been gone for so long. The trip is now a memory, but one that I will cherish for the rest of my life. It was the ultimate birthday present, one that has changed me and my perspective on America forever.