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Published: December 29th 2008
Robert and Vanessa arrived at the Auckland airport at around 5 AM. I picked them up from the airport and we drove (on the left hand side of the road) to the Hilton Hotel on Prince's Wha. They got refreshed and had breakfast overlooking the harbour.
We then walked to the Sky Tower and got a panoramic view of the city. Auckland is built on an active field of volcanoes and we could see many of them from this vantage point. We could also had a close view of Waitemala Harbour.
Next, we drove across the Auckland Harbour Bridge to see the bridge and more of the harbour and then doubled back to visit Mt. Eden.
Mt. Eden is an extinct volcano within the city. In the middle it has a caldera. The whole of it is covered in grass and trees, with cows wondering about. It also has a panoramic view of the city (and a better view of the Auckland skyline than the Sky Tower, which is part of the skyline).
We spent an hour or so hiking around the caldera, enjoying the sunshine and the scenery.
We then drove just below Mt. Eden
to Volcanic Cafe and had lunch; I had a mushroom and chicken crepe. As I write this, we are on Day 7 of the trip, and the food has been healthy and delicious.
From Auckland, we drove to Waitomo for a cave and glowworm tour. Waitomo is in a temperate rainforest and even has a few redwood trees (imported from California and the guide said that they grow three times as fast here due to the climate/conditions).
To see the glowworms, we toured down the caves to an underground river and then took a boat in the darkness. The glowworms were on the ceiling of the cave and had little bright blue lights; there were about 5,000 of them (according to the guide) and they looked like thousands of blue stars in the night sky.
The lights are to lure prey into sticky web-like strings that they drop from the ceiling like tiny ropes. The prey get tangled in the strings and the worms reel them in. Oddly, once the worms transition into flies to mate (they only live a few days and don't even have mouths to eat) they themselves often get tangled in the glowworms'
The NZ Christmas Tree
Formally, the pohutukawa tree.strings, reeled in, and eaten.
We then drove to a fresh fruit stand and gift shop and then to the hostel. The hostel was barely okay. Robert and Vanessa had their own room and went to bed early. I did some laundry, surfed the Internet, and watched TV for a bit before heading to bed around 11 PM. However, the hostel had some kind of party going on until 2 AM with very loud music; the locals know Islands in the Stream (duet by Kenny Rogers and Dolly Parton) word for word, among others, which they sang/shouted along with during the night. Then, at about 3 AM, my roommates got back... one of which was coughing heavily and didn't quiet down for about an hour. I didn't get much sleep.
Nevertheless, it was a wonderful day... a very long wonderful day lasting around 20 hours. It was the first of three straight days full of travel and activities.
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Augusta
non-member comment
NZ
It looks so beautiful there. There have been many places you have visited that I am totally content to just hear your experiences--I have no desire to go to those places. However, New Zealand just looks amazing and beautiful. I would like to go there someday. Those cows seem like they were pretty friendly! I can't believe how close they were standing to Robert and Vanessa. The glowworm thing was creepy, too, but I guess that is the Circle of Life. Eww.