Got a cab over to a nearby shopping centre in Manukau City yesterday, to buy a Garmin GPS. Steve spotted in the shop that the widescreen model was mis-priced, the same price as the regular sized model, so he wangled a bargain, and it means he can see the screen better. So, I'm redundant now as chief map-reader (phew!). Went into Auckland City Centre again today and caught Fuller's ferry (Richie moonlighting again) over to the maritime village of Devonport. It's one of the city's oldest suburbs, founded in 1840, with picture postcard Victorian villas and nice beaches. Had a stroll along Cheltenham Beach from where you can see Rangitoto Island, a 600 year old volcano. Apparently, the earth's crust between the Waitemata and Manukau harbours is so thin that every few thousand years, magma finds ... read more

On Wednesday late morning we left the Comfort Inn Hotel and drove to the car rental depot at LAX to drop off Dodge the Bodged Porsche; no problems with the car at drop-off....Did we need all those waivers??! Got on the complimentary shuttle bus to the terminal and waited around for the Qantas check-in desk to open. Stood for about 2 hours in the check-in queue to get our boarding passes. The guy in front of us thought he could check-in his wife and kids without them being present ... sigh ... so he had to go and get them from the food hall... roll eyes, tap fingers, sigh... Finally got our boarding passes. Watched the baggage handler hurl our bags from the X-ray machine onto the conveyer belt; that must be on the person specification ... read more

We left our comfortable motel room in Cambria late morning, after breakfast and a stroll along the boardwalk to see the seals. We headed on down south to Santa Barbara, covering about 120 miles, mainly along Freeway 101, stopping about half way for snacks - beef jerky, Oreao Cookies, pretzels, Reese's Peanut Butter Cups, Hershey Kisses, and copious amounts of root beer; very healthy! It definitely feels hotter here in Santa Barbara. After arriving at the hotel, the Best Western Beachside Inn on Cabrillo Blvd, we had a walk along the boulevard and it felt like the middle of summer. We made our way downtown along the main street, State Street, to find a camera shop so I could enquire about cleaning the sensor (Steve takes me round gun shops, I drag him round camera shops!); ... read more

We decided to stay book another night in the smelly room rather than moving on. Besides, we're really close to the peninsular and the 17-Mile Drive. I saw a rather disconcerting notice near our room this morning, stating there are cancer-causing chemicals present at the facility! So, it's not really a 20-year old carpet smell at all, it's noxious gases permeating the building and killing us all. I asked the receptionist and she said the State requires businesses to provide warnings prior to exposing visitors to chemicals known to cause cancer; it's probably because of the hot tub chemicals they use. Still, not the best advertisement for a comfortable stay. Steve wanted to go back to the gun shop we popped into yesterday, so we wandered up the road in the morning. It's incredible to think ... read more

I was up at 03:00 hrs as my stomach was complaining that it was way past lunchtime. We both ventured out at sparrow's fart in search of breakfast. At the recommendation of a local, we found Chestnut Street and filled up at a tidy cafe called 'Squat & Gobble'. We'd made it up Lombard Street to the 'Crookedest Street' part by about 09:00 hrs. A ride on a cable car was a must, with Steve the Legend hanging off the side flashing his fire-service ID shouting, 'Hutch Five-0'.... hmm. The conductor charged us $5 each but we didn't get tickets, so we reckon he's making a mint pocketing every 10th or so fare. Still, it's dodgy work cranking those cable car levers and stopping in time at the junctions so we'll let him off. We had ... read more