"Although it was July it wasn't cold and we had a thermal pool outside, which was wonderful because I'd never had one - it was such a beautiful place."
After returning home she never stopped talking about how good it would be to live here in this "beautiful country".
It wasn't until four years later Mrs Godoy got her wish when her husband surprised her with tickets to move to New Zealand.
"It's been hard. I didn't speak English or have the qualification to nurse here - without the generosity of the people in New Zealand we wouldn't have made it," she said.
Mr Alarcon got a job within four months, but it took his wife longer. With English to conquer it was four years before Mrs Godoy could return to the nursing profession she loved. She now works as as a clinical nurse at Cantabria Hospital along with her daughter, John Paul College student Consuelo, who works part-time as a caregiver.
Each new New Zealand citizen or family was given a papauma kapuka griselinia seedling by deputy mayor Dave Donaldson.
