Tuaranga and Auckland

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Hi everyone

Over the last two days we visited Tauranga and Auckland. Apart from a little glitch in Tauranga where we were pelted by freezing stinging torrential rain the weather was fabulous in both ports Today we are cruising through 4 metre swells. It doesn’t seem like it though. I guess I am used to the rocking and rolling now.

From Tauranga we got a tour around the sights of Rotorua. The tour was basically and guy and a van and he took us to some places off the beaten track. He drove us through the rich parts of Tauranga with the big houses (bit like Noosa without the high rise). He also took us to see the geysers and mud pools etc which weren’t famous or cost a fortune to get into to. The various geothermal features we saw were very interesting. It was fascinating to watch the boiling mud shoot up into the air. Some of the jets went up two metres. The chemical smell (rotten egg gas) was very pungent but not disgusting as I had expected.

We cruised into Auckland about 6:00 am (not that I saw it!). When I stuck my head over the balcony rail out of the window I was greeted with the beautiful sight of Auckland harbour in the bright sunlight. It was spectacular.

We wandered around town for a few hours. Unfortunately it was Waitangi Day and not many of the shops were open. We did happen upon the Shakespeare pub and Peter had a locally brewed beer flavoured with orange and coriander. It was really nice and that’s saying something coming from me because I HATE beer.

Unfortunately I managed to aggravate a graze on my leg that I got early in the cruise and ended up with lots of blood soaked into my lime green leggings. The staff patched me up and I received the sympathy that I thought I duly deserved and got stuck into my sauvignon blanc.

We were given a rousing departure from Auckland Harbour by a flotilla of boats of all sizes. We were accompanied by tinnies, sailboats, motorboats, jet skis, surf skis and the blue tug boat. Everyone wanted to sail away with the ship and there were lots happy people waving us away. We are very lucky that we are on the side of the ship where the boat docks so we get to see all the activity of people scurrying on and off board and when the ship arrives and leaves from ports. It’s fascinating. The ship seems to be tied to the wharf with bits of string.

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This afternoon we went to the ice spectacular show. The venue is quite small and intimate and had seats right at the front and a close up view of the skaters. A couple of the male skaters performed somersaults and landed gracefully on their skates. It was another incredible show that was free to attend. We have really been spoiled.

Xx pj and Sandy

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