Auckland and north to the Bay of Islands

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Auckland
Friday 7th January
Flew in at about 13:30 and picked up the car at Auckland Airport. Slight moment of panic when they asked to see our driving licences. I looked at Julia (officially designated keeper of all official documents) and she looked at me - but thankfully we did have them buried in one of the bags. Drove to Heritage Hotel in Auckland to find we had been upgraded twice to a junior suite which is huge with a separate lounge area.
Also found a washing machine and tumble drier in a cupboard so our first purchase in NZ was washing powder (and a case of cold beer – we are not completely mad). Our luggage is much less smelly now!

Wandered down to the trendy Viaduct Basin area with lots of bars and restaurants, overlooking the harbour for our supper. Ate the first non-curried meal in a while and people watched - so many girls in 7 inch killer heels tottering by.

Saturday 8th January
Guide books don’t give a huge list of attractions in Auckland so decided to spend the day gently wandering. Visited Mount Eden which is a park with great views over the city and strolled the seafront at St Heliers (which is rather different from the one near Sutton). Then drove to North Point to admire the views of the harbour, the disappearing gun emplacement ( it hinges down out of sight to reload )and to sit under a tree to read and catch up with the blog. Tomorrow we head north to the Bay of Islands.

Sunday 9th January
We did a little shopping in Auckland. Julia bought some zip-off trousers and when she got to the check out they were half price - bargain. Then headed out of town and north on Motorway 1. This was 3 lanes to start with and had a stretch of Toll road but soon reduced to one lane each way with occasional overtaking lanes. However there was very little traffic so that was not much of a problem – the most difficult thing is keeping under the speed limit of 100km/hr. Spotted our first speed trap. Took a short side trip to Waipu Cove on the east coast to eat our lunch overlooking the sea. The wind was blowing strongly so had to put a jumper on for the first time since arriving in Malaysia on 29th January.

Quick detour to see Whangarei falls and then a supermarket for milk and cereal – no more cooked breakfasts for a while.

Just outside the Bay of Islands we stopped in a small town called Kawakawa which was full of arty shops and had the most amazing public toilet. It was designed and built by a famous German architect Friedrich Hundertwasser who moved to Kawakawa in the 1970’s. The block has colourful ceramic columns and tiles, with wine bottles used to create a glass wall and a garden roof.

Then tried to carefully follow the instructions we had been given to get to our accommodation in Paihia (pronounced Pie-Here). However were distracted by some very unusual road signs that Peter needed to take pictures of - so ended up going completely the wrong way. However it appears that all roads around here lead to Paihia so we arrived at Cooks Lookout Motel without too much bickering.

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Comments

[John Moss]

What is it?
What is it..?! John.

[peterandjuliaottershaw]

What is it?
Hi John - its a metalwork pig in an artists studio. It was cute but cost about $600 and was too big to fit in my suitcase. Hope its not too cold there :-) J

[David and Julie]

Disappearing Gun
Did anyone else see it ? We did ha !