Christchurch
Just under 13 hours means that SFO-CHC is not a particularly long flight by United's standards, but it was more than long enough for most people to catch a decent bit of sleep, and as the flight was not full, even people in economy had a bit of space to stretch out. Turns out the flight attendants in the aft galley nibbled on a special cake for the flight, while up-front we had Maison Alyzee chocolates for all the passengers. A little over 90 minutes out from Christchurch, the pre-arrival meal was not as good as dinner. To its credit, the fruit plate is actually decent looking now, and the chicken sausage/egg whites combo was more than serviceable. The sad croissant is still awful, though.
12 hours and 59 minutes / 6,998 miles later per Flightaware (6,933 miles direct), we arrived to great fanfare in Christchurch. Several airplane viewing areas at the airport were packed with AVgeeks, there was a water cannon salute, and very unusually, there two helicopters recording the arrival (at least from what I was told, I did not have a window seat-- window seat photos courtesy of Jay Etzenbach). Snapped more photos and video on arrival, including some with Michael Covey (aka MileagePlus Mike) and his United ugly Christmas sweater, before winding our way through immigration, baggage claim, and agricultural screening. Not only traditional New Zealand dancers awaited us after all of that, but also more cake cutting, another stuffed animal (a kiwi), and another round of celebratory speeches. Alex Marren (COO, Air New Zealand), Justin Watson (CEO, Christchurch Airport), Tim Swan (General Manager Global Sales, Air New Zealand), David Gehrenbeck (Deputy Chief of Mission, US Embassy to New Zealand), Phil Mauger (Mayor of Christchurch), and Patrick Quayle (Senior Vice President, Global Network Planning and Alliances, United Airlines). The New Zealand Herald business team showed up as well, making special effort to interview Carl Brothers, one of United's most frequent fliers in addition to their more business-focused coverage of the new route.
The morning rain lead the way to a mostly overcast afternoon that was perfect for a long run, and the combination of Hagley Park and the Avon River was quite nice. As the second largest city in New Zealand with a population around 400,000, Christchurch is small enough that a 10 or 11 mile run quickly gets you out of the city center and into the suburbs, and then into areas still damaged by the 2011 earthquake, many of which are partially returned to nature.
Inaugural flight after-party was next, with only a few speeches and then a lot of socializing with everyone-- VIPs, flight crew, local operations people, passengers, and media. It wasn't quite the level of party that Dubai was, but it was definitely up there. Turns out Lindsay, Eric, and Mary (from United's social media team) were starting a roadtrip of the South Island the next day, quite a few of us were staying in town, a handful were doing tours of the nearby Akaroa Harbour/Banks Peninsula, and it turns out the Air New Zealand team was very happy to talk to everyone. With a much smaller customer base than United, they seemed very interested in talking to frequent fliers such as Jay and myself who are part of a Facebook group composed of tons of fliers doing the same thing as customers of a much larger airline with consequently a lot more destinations, resources, and competition. United's local operations team was also there in force, and while my terrible memory for names doesn't help in this case, I do remember some of them had good taste in scotch.
Ended up being a fun night, and oddly walking back to the hotel accompanied by a gaggle of United and Air New Zealand people felt entirely a fitting continuation to a trip planned around AVgeekery.