This was pretty much one of the most exhausting days so far. We had to get up early to catch a ride to the airport. I had such a great time traveling with Mams throughout Sydney, Perth, Brisbane, and Cairns, but now it was time to go on my own solo adventure and start the second half of the trip. I was so exhausted when I landed in Brisbane that I had left my itinerary in the seat pocket and did not remember until I was literally 10 seconds out of the secured zone and even though the guard had seen me leave, she would not allow me to return no matter the application of logic or pleading. I went directly to the airline desk and even though they called the plane, nothing was found (though I question how much they searched when I gave the exact seat number and location. Those sheets had all my information from flights to reservation numbers. 
Fortunately I had everything saved on my thumb drive and most of the day free before my flight to New Zealand. I took the train into Brisbane (the same one I used to meat the hashers of the bus tour) and after a little searching found a hostel with an Internet area. The staff was nice enough to print out what I needed from their system, so that really saved me an insane amount of hassle. I spent another couple of hours answering e-mail, making some phone calls home using Skype, backing up data, and researching some of the next legs of the trip. I then walked around the Brisbane City Botanical Gardens for a while before returning to the airport. I'd been carrying my luggage the entire time and was pretty tired and not really in the mood for any more hassles. When I got off the train to the airport someone asked if they could see my ticket and looked dumbfounded when I said no and just kept on going as there was no barrier in front of me to block my way. 
I guess in some cases it doesn't always work as when I went through security I was apparently 'randomly selected' for a secondary screening. I almost laughed at the look on the face of the guard when they stepped up and asked "would you like to place your bag here on the table" indicating the secondary area. Of course I didn't want to do so and simply said "no, I do not" and kept going. It looked as if they had never comprehended that someone would actually give an honest answer, but the question was quickly reworded to an imperative, so I complied with whatever was needed. I still laugh when think of that incident (small things amuse me to no end).I landed in Christchurch a little ahead of schedule, but still quite late at night, and had to wait for the city bus to come by to take me into town. It took 30 minutes to walk to the only hostel I could reach by telephone that had any vacancies, but I really wanted to have a real bed and room all to myself for the first time in three weeks of traveling. So, late in the evening, after a long trip and my first real exposure to New Zealand, I went directly to jail.
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