The Flight to Nowhere

Josephine and I had quite an adventure getting to Melbourne! We were supposed to fly Wellington to Auckland, and connect to Auckland to Melbourne. I knew there were direct Wellington to Melbourne tickets when I booked the flights (back in January) but they were significantly more expensive, so I chose the connecting flights. Our flight out of Wellington was supposed to leave at 8:20. It was delayed an hour due to fog in Auckland. Finally we were cleared to take off. Then we flew an hour to Auckland, but there was still fog, so we flew in a holding pattern while we waited for the fog to clear. Two hours after takeoff, the pilot announced that we were about to land. We started to descend, then we stopped and ascended again. At the last minute, we had been told that the fog was still too bad to land. The pilot made the decision to head back to Wellington. At this point, one of the passengers became belligerent, and may have shoved one of the flight attendants. Josephine says he was yelling, but I didn't hear because I was listening to Adele at high volume (thanks, Ama, for the cd). Finally, about three hours after takeoff, we landed right back where we started, in Wellington. When we landed, everyone jumped up and started grabbing their luggage, eager to get off the plane. The cabin crew yelled at us, and made everyone sit back down. They even closed the overhead bins that had been opened. We were surprised, since normally everyone is allowed to get up as soon as the plane is at the gate. Then two uniformed police officers boarded the plane. They walked down the aisle with a piece of paper, and finally stopped a few rows behind us. Even though I'd done absolutely nothing wrong, it was a little bit scary. But they were there to arrest the unruly passenger who'd fought with the flight attendants. Once we deplaned, we waited in line for a while, but eventually were able to change to a direct flight to Melbourne. After wasting hours and hours, we landed only two hours late and still made it to our hotel to meet Terry at 6:30. It really wasn't that bad, but I'd never before been on a plane that returned to its point of origin.