Off to visit our first city in New Zealand, Auckland. It was chosen on the basis it was the one closet to Hobbiton. My sister loved Lord of the Rings books and the movies.
5th March 2020
The economy seats had cushy foot rest that can turn into a bed. Well, if you can afford three seats in a row. For lunch I had beef rang dang and Sis had chicken penne. I managed to watch some movies: Doctor Sleep and The Farewell (half of it). From the last movie, nio nio me me means uninterested shrug yet shy. Eh? A traditional saying, I want to learn how to use it.
The airplane landed pretty late. Jucy Snooze hostel was located up a hill, near Emily place, it took us a while to drag our suitcases up the hill and up several flight of stairs. We checked-in immediately and I went to complete a T5 raid, and then went in search of dinner. Several of the restaurants we wanted to dine at had closed down. So, we settled for Madriaz (Spanish) and had tapas.
6th March 2020
I had a good sleep. We went for a light brekkie with sweet cakes at Amano. Headed down to the pier for our Auckland Free Walking tour. Our hosts Olivia and Kurtis were friendly and informative. Majority of the tourists did not make a booking and many of them flew from UK or Europe. The city is so hilly. Interesting Lorne Street is like their version of a tiny China town.
We tried Hanoi Cafe and it had over priced simple dishes. Then we went shopping on Queen Street and proceeded to walk up the hill towards the Skytower. Where I did two T5 raids before we went to do our Skywalk. Scary fun! Our host was friendly and kind. Overall, we managed to successfully completed 5 challenges on a circular grid with no rails. Whoa.
7th March 2020
We slept early the night before. We walked to the Skytower hotel to be picked up. From there we drove to Piha national park camping ground. There we changed into our bathers and wet suits. Later we geared up, learned to flip shape of 8 ring, types of rope holding positions, and practiced what to do if we eventually fall. We hiked up the mountain to the top of the waterfall and it was pretty crowded. People were jumping into the pool of water, sitting on the edge of the water/cliff, and a small group of us were trying try do abseiling.
The 54 metres of the waterfall section was by far the most slippery and had very few rocks for your feet to latch onto. No nooks. Just slime. I slipped and lost my footing, dropped 1.5 metres the rope riddled against my sides, I did my best to steady myself, but it was a difficult course. Not for the faint hearted, I’d say. We did 75% of the course and did not proceed any further. The last section involved swimming under water in a dark space.
By the evening my sister and I had a sore back, sore calf muscles, and left arm riddled with misquote bites. The water was nice, but short lived.
Ken Yakitori for dinner. Feels like we never left Japan. Yummo.
8th March 2020
Again we slept early the night before. We walked to the Skytower hotel to be picked up. The staff took us to a portable office unit for the bridge climb and bungy jump. Apparently, I weigh 55 kgs. No where near 60 kgs. Well, it ain’t no zipliner, so I am fine. The walking underneath the bridge and above the water was partly scary. The grills was the only thing that separated you and the water.
Bungy jumping. You can feel the g-force on your face and feel the wind pushing against your body. Then you swing and hang upside down. It feels great. Thank god we have trained staff to bring me back up. Felt amazing.
The bridge climb was filled with historical and factual information. The bridge is composed of two extra flexible moving sides. internet cable and supplies water to the city. A multi purpose bridge alright.
9th March 2020
A resting day.
The Thai food place was super salty. All appetisers were served with carrot and sweet chilli sauce. Bland. The Mojo cafe at the gallery was disorganised. They served Sis a fork to eat her cake when her cake requires a spoon. Auckland city has so many trainee staff everywhere.
Queen Street by the Civic Centre is just as busy as downtown. The lobby for PoGo was small just 6 players. Geez.
YoYoSo retail store is similar to Miniso. The Only difference is the city store has these Pop mart collectible toys. Surprise blind box stuff. I shook a few boxes myself before settling down to one. Boom! It was the one I wanted after all. Wow. Who would have thought. Me? Also, I purchased two lightening cable surprise blind box as well. I couldn’t help myself. They were so cute.
They have David Jones here. Woolies is called Count down here.
Westfield shopping centre in Newton is trying to emulate Japanese department store with roof top dining. Most of the dishes were salty. The patrons here tend to drown it with beer. That’s how bad it is. People come here for socialising, not so much the food.
10th March 2020
Glow worm cave day tour day. 2 hrs drive. Just the 3 of us. Dozed off most of the way.
The worms resembled green LED light. Interesting creatures. They have a self sufficient eco system. They drop these lines from the ceiling to catch their preys. When they are tired they actually switch off.
Smartphone and GoPro or any camera of the sort were forbidden as it ruins the ambience experience said the guide. Not for the worm, but for the humans. Hey, the cave ceiling had the same amount of glow as the stickers in my room, I can replicate cave experience with a raft of my own. That’s what it looked like. But I wanted to capture how these animals huddle up against each other and how some turn off/on their lights. I’m sure David Attenborough would have documented it. I’d watch it via the Internet as per usual.
If you like Adelaide then you will like Auckland. Where you cannot top up your travel card at bus stops, only at train stations. And all tourist operators are anti GoPro. They only do still shots. No live video or Live Photo’s. They can’t stand action shots done by an individual. The experience are not immersive. Backwards really. Some have OH&S issues. Why would you take a person feeling dizzy up for a bridge walk? Shouldn’t you hike up the bridge then do the bungy jump?
On ride back to the city, we saw vast amount farm land. Much of trees were gone. Barren hills. No plants. Maybe a few cows here and there. You can easily mistaken it for Tasmania.
The gift shop by the pier opens later than the nearby restaurants. The marina area had skateboard ramps. How odd and cool. Lots of bars down here.
11th March 2020
Raining in Auckland today. As drove deeper into farmland it got sunnier, especially in Matamata. The place may have lots of cows, but they serve microwave processed meat in their burgers. Probably, all of its produce is reserved for exporting purposes.
Rotorua infamous for:
- Mud - skipped
- Geyser - skipped
Once we got to the skyline. We asked how much do we have to play around here. 45 mins apparently. To get to the luge ride, we took a gondola up the hill. From there, we left our bags with our driver and proceeded to claim our first ride (part of the tour). Luge is like go kart but it has more sophisticated controls and setup. We chose to go down the scenic route and intermediate route. It was fun alright. Just by letting go of one hand you can lose control of the steering. This place has dedicated cameras to take still shots of while steering a luge and on the chair lift back. You often had to slow down at the corners and there are heaps of them. Not enough time to do the advance course which opened up later on.
Note: The 4G cellular reception is poor in Rotorua.
The Hobbiton 2 hours tour was filled with reminiscent scenes from the movie The Hobbit. Anecdotes to the books and movie magic. Even quiz questions. Endless photograph opportunities. I even got to drink cider in The Green Dragon Inn. Sis had ginger beer.
Back in Auckland. Where the rain has stopped. We went around gift stores to look for noise making kiwi bird toy and Sis found it. Then we had dinner at Crab shack. Yummo. Finger licking good.
12th March 2020
Lunch at District 5 (a Vietnamese cafe above a carpark). Then got shunned, not stunned by Giapo. App only purchase they said, no pay wave available, and that they were closed at 2pm despite white folks were eating in front of their shop. We could not afford to waste anymore time. So, we caught the INN green bus to Auckland Museum, and boy, did we just made it the last cultural performance of the day. Phew. It was most educational and insightful. We feel content. A side of New Zealand that we wanted to see and cannot find it in the city. Exception of carved pieces of jewellery.
Kia ora can be expressed in three different ways. Hi (flagging people down). Thank you (hands by the heart). Be safe (waves). Wow.
Dinner at the Marina. Oyster and chop. Windy. The seafood was good and the truffle sauce was delicious.
13th March 2020
Time to fly home. Left luggages with Jucy Snooze after check out. We had bagels for brekkie before ducking down to the Maritime Museum to go for a sail along the harbour on a heritage scrow, Ted Ashby. The sun was shining on us and the water was crystal blue. No sea creatures came by though. We did see two people do the bungy jump from the bridge and two competition ships sailing past. We had a bite at Burger Boy for lunch. Talk about spicy sauce. A quick visit to Davenport chocolate before picking the luggages and catch the sky bus to the airport.
There was no one at Auckland airport custom to check our temperatures and upon arrival in Melbourne it was the same deal. Customs was more focus about dried food and wooden pieces.
