Tag Archives: Auckland

Day 20 – Waiheke

Sunday started as Saturday had been promised to be: Very sunny. Thus, if we wanted to go and see Waiheke, this was our chance.

The view back to Auckland's main ferry terminal

The view back to Auckland’s main ferry terminal

Nick drove us to the ferry terminal so we could catch the 11am ferry and off we went. The ferry ride in sunshine was supposedly quite nice…the rolling of the ferry made me tired, however, and I closed my eyes for a bit…and suddenly, we were on Waiheke.

Took the bus into town and walked along the beach and across rocks until we hit Little Oneroa Bay, where we had lunch. This is also the narrowest part of the island so we crossed over to the other side and then walked part of the walking track Te Ara Hura which leads around the island.

The whole track is not doable in a day so we walked from Blackpool to Te Wharau Bay, took the shortcut over the hill to Cable Bay and then continued along the west coast until we were back at the ferry terminal.

The look back over Oneroa (the town)

The look back over Oneroa (the town)

It was a great day for walking with all the sunshine and we saw many birds, a couple of horses, including a pony that really wanted to get rid of its saddle and even an ent. The ent was trying to run from the ocean but was ultimately defeated.

The west coast has some spectacular views onto the skyline of Auckland which is probably why there are estates and mansion with helicopter landing sites dotting along the coast.

Close to the ferry terminal, the sun started to set so, again, we got some beautiful sunset shots. After those, I hurried towards the terminal as I didn’t want to miss the 6pm ferry.

The ferry ride back gave us a view onto Auckland, first in fading sunlight and then in the dark with all the city lights greeting us. I think, it was the best time to come back. 🙂

Day 19 – Wohoo, the Zoo

Wohoo, both of us ...

Wohoo, both of us …

This will be a very brief one with a couple of pictures. Our plan to go to Waiheke island was abandoned after the weather (and the forecast) changed on us just this morning. Instead, we decided to go to the Zoo a bit later, after we saw our friend Mash one more time as he was passing through around noon.

Auckland Zoo is nice, but nothing out of the ordinary. We were sometime not 100% sure about the well-being of some of the animals, but the staff and setup inspired enough confidence that they care and do their best.

I really enjoyed the NZ sections of the Zoo as well. The enclosures are set up so that one gets a good look at Kereru, Kaka, Kea & co.

Day 18 – Inside Out and round and round

Blinking arcade games

Blinking arcade games

We decided to hit the cinema to finally watch “Inside Out” which we had missed out on in Wellington. I loved it. Such a good and sad movie.

During our wait for the movie to start, Flo discovered the arcade of the movie theatre and although we didn’t waste any cash, we did wander around for a while.

After the film, we had lunch at a lovely cafe and realized that we had not taken the camera into town so there are almost no pictures. Which is a shame because after lunch, we had ice cream at Giapo. They do haute ice cream in home-made flavours and use decorations on the cone as well. I had two scoops (chocolate and afghan cookie) which was then dipped in white chocolate and had cornflakes sticking to it as well as a whole afghan cookie. It was amazing but also way too much. Flo also struggled with his two scoops so at the end, we both had to admit defeat after 85% of the whole thing.

We also continue to work on preparations for Australia. Since we have quite some time in Melbourne while waiting on the bike to arrive, we now successfully lined up a new rear tire as well as most of the touratech gear. We also exchanged some money already.

In the evening, our friends had a lovely combined dinner and then a round of “Lords of Waterdeep”. It is a fun boardgame and not nearly as complicated as all the parts make it look like. I think Flo will purchase it when we have a home again. 🙂

Day 16 – 16 in a row

When we started our trip, and this blog back up in earnest, the expectation was that we would write maybe two to three posts a week. Without really pushing for it, we now got a post for every single day of New Zealand, each of them with at least some pictures.

The surface works anywhere, this is me writing this post

The surface works anywhere, this is me writing this post

On average, it takes about an hour every day to write this blog. The process is already sinking in as part of our routine. One of us writes the body of the post itself, so far between 150 and 550 words each. Then we copy the pictures of the day onto the external hard drive, have a quick browse and pick images matching the post. Once we have a place with internet access we copy, resize and upload. Then, Flo gives every picture a title and description and 2-3 go into the post and the rest goes into a gallery. All in all about 1 hr.

The end result has been read by a growing number of people, over 100 by now. Cool – and also mildly scary.

By now, I think we both agree that we like the setup. We keep everyone informed, there is a record for ourselves and we get some great feedback (mostly on facebook, so feel free to use the comment function some more!). So we have all intentions to keep the 1 post per day up for travel days.

very hip, the surface is right at home

very hip, the surface is right at home

Now, whether that is actually achievable in places with less than North Island level of connectivity remains to be seen, but we will try.

You may have noticed that I said travel days. Right now, we are calming down a bit, so until we leave for Melbourne on the 25th, there may actually be some gaps on slow days, or posts more about more general things like this one.

Now, we did do some things today. We failed several attempts at buying a sleeping bag, survived a bus trip across town without a modern smart phone and had a lovely lunch at Federal & Wolfe.

Day 15 – Clashing travel modes

The day started with a lovely Nutella toast and tea breakfast before we got into our “getting things done” mode. Ruth and Damien were amazing hosts, driving me around Auckland to pick up our camping gear from Linda and Denis who were kind enough to take it down to Auckland from Cape Reinga.

Flo took the bike, bought a big army bag so we could properly store our gear in the crate and then drove to the airport where Rocinante had a date to be crated. We met up again at the airport (Ruth and Damien were still driving me around) and cleaned all our gear for the biosecurity check in Australia. The tent gave us the most work; especially the footprint had seen some wet and muddy conditions in the last two weeks.

But we finished cleaning, packed the bags for the crate and the bag for staying in Auckland and got driven to Nick’s, Sophie’s and Dan’s place where we can stay for the next little while.

Thank you so much, Ruth and Damien, for everything you did. We hope to repay you some day in Frankfurt for your kindness. 🙂

We are mildly ashamed for going to Burgerfuel over more foodhipster place

We are mildly ashamed for going to Burgerfuel over more foodhipster place

Entering Nick’s place, we suddenly became tourists in a city again. The bike was not available as a mode of transport, most of our biking cloths stayed with the crate as well. Instead, we met Mash, a good friend, on his holiday back home in NZ and went to Kelly Tarlton’s which is an underwater and arctic animals place. Given how long the way to the counter was they must usually have quite the crowd coming in but we had almost no one in front of us. There were line of penguin foot marks outside, showing the way, but they were quite far apart as well. Flo managed a jump from one set of prints to the next and was declared part penguin because of it. 🙂

Interesting talk during the feed

Interesting talk during the feed

We rushed to the stingray enclosure to be there for the feeding and the talk. Stingrays are surprisingly cool and big. Of course, we also looked at the penguins and sharks. A rotating tube was the thing that tickled our fancy the most: It screws so much with your head that you cannot walk straight through it. Everyone wobbled through as if drunk which was hilarious.

Afterwards, Nick took us to Milse which is exactly my kind of place. They have so many awesome sweet things there! We were too early for the dinner menu (which apparently is also just desserts) but I still found so much to try!

To round up the evening, we ordered pizza and watched a movie.