New Zealand

First day in Auckland was totally knackered from the jet lag; 4 hours time shift, plus a 6.5 hr night flight with little or no sleep! Screaming kids and Finding Nemo on the TV!

Anyway get in to Auckland and go straight into town, I didn’t want to fall asleep like I did in Hong Kong and mess up my sleep pattern for a week.

Spent the day I a walking around …really tired, bought some hiking boots for the trip and basically just wandered about in a daze…no change there then!

Me at one tree hill !

Mt Eden

The next day went out for a walk with Will a guy from the hostel I met the night before, did part of the coast to coast walk from Mt Eden to One Tree Hill then caught the bus back! Got great views from the top of these ancient Mauri sites and inactive volcano’s, weird to see them in the middle of a suburban area! But a pretty good day out!

at the waterfront...if only

Mauri carving....sky tower in background !

Harbour

Did a free bus tour laid on for the backpackers, got to climb the Harbor bridge for free which was ace, got some amazing views of the city, then it took us over the water to a part of Auckland called Davenport…had fish and chips…all good!

Went to go out for a beer with a guy from the tour but he reckoned he was too tired! What a feeble effort! So just wandered about on my own got some good night shots, then went back to the hostel with a couple of cans!

View from the harbour bridge

Windswept on the bridge

Met up with James from My Coral Bay days earlier on my trip, went up the Sky tower got some more pictures, and chilled out got some great Vietnamese food in the market

The Auckland Harbour Bridge (that I climbed)

Me at the Sky tower

Auckland seems to rely on the Sky Tower for its source of identity; and without it its Skyline would be unrecognisable from a 1000 other cities.

Its really expensive to do anything in the city, alienating its self from the backpackers even though it’s the gateway to many of the tours the backpackers will embark on!

Food, drink and activates are unbelievably highly priced, bottled water more expensive than petrol, and food…pasta that cost 69c in Oz is $4 over here…I’m glad my trip has food included!

Auckland is nice, but that’s all it is, plus it lacks the cutting edge other major places either the style of London, the romance of Paris, or the magic of New York, I was left slightly disappointed with my first taste of New Zealand…close but no cigar!