Final Day

OK, so it's only taken me a week to write the final chapter to our "down under" trip. I believe that I need to go back 2 days to bring everyone up to date.

Friday we didn't have anything planned, so hopped the ferry to Devonport Island for a leisurely stroll along the shore and through the little village.

Not much on the island to see, but some of the older homes were quite spectacular. We stopped for a pleasant lunch, walked through the little village, bought 2 t-shirts for $10 each (the only thing we had to declare on our customs form) and walked back to the ferry just in time to catch it back to Auckland.

We walked by a bar next to the hotel and they had NCAA BB on the TV, so thought we would have a pint and watch some games. And guess what came on next - the UA BB game, so had to enjoy some vino and watch the game.

Saturday our flight was scheduled to leave at 7:30pm, so we had to find something to do during the day. Went to the Auckland Museum, walked around the grounds for our morning walk, then went through the museum. As you can see it is quite a large building, it had 3 floors of exhibits. Talk about overload on history (not that I remember anything that I read).

After the museum, we thought we would get out of the busy central district before the traffic got too bad, so we headed towards the airport, which it just so happens that a winery in located close to the airport - Villa Maria Winery. We stopped in for a pleasant wine tasting and decided to have a leisurely lunch. After lunch, it took us about a 1/2 hour to find a gas station to fill the rental car before returning it, but couldn't think of anything else to do, so headed for the airport about 3pm to wait there.

We got the rental car turned in and headed for the international terminal to go through customs and security. Now we have travelled from Tucson to Sydney to Christchurch without a problem with our carryon bags. But here in Auckland they have a weight limit on the bags you can carry on (never heard of that one before) and both our bags are over limit. So we have to pack as much as we could into one bag and check that bag. So it took us a bit of time to get this all done. But made it through customs and security fine after that. Here is the plane (Boeing 777) that took us back to LAX (note - M&R Sheetmetal produces some of the parts that are used to build these planes).

The flight back to LAX was only 12 hours, but it seemed like forever. It's just difficult getting comfortable on a plane. But it is neat how they have your own personal screen in the seat in front of you and you can watch movies, TV shows, listen to music. It does help the time to go by.

Overview of our trip - was a great time, saw just a small portion of both countries, but it did give us a good idea what the country is like. Got to see the highlights. Three weeks went by quite fast and it didn't bother us to be gone that long. Driving in New Zealand was easier than in Australia as it was less congested, but driving had to be the most difficult part of the whole trip. It took both of us to keep the car on the "wrong" side of the road and watch for the traffic coming from the "wrong" direction and the "wrong" side of the road. If I never see a "roundabout" again I will be happy. They just love them in both countries instead of traffic lights and stop signs. They are everywhere.  The weather was excellent, started out maybe a little cool and only had one day of minor rain. It was hard to find restaurants that served salads and vegetables. It was great to get home just to eat fruits and vegetables again. We found people in both countries to be hospitable and quite friendly.

I hope all of you have enjoy our trip along with us. As you can imagine, we have many more photos than what I've posted, but the internet was limited and/or nonexistent. All the photos were taken with our iPhones which made it quite convenient not having to carry my bigger camera. We did not have phone or cellular data service on our phones, but used hotel and restaurant wifi's to connect. In traveling out of the country, I'm finding that you take advantage of any wifi connection you can find for free to upload the pictures to the iCloud, but I really didn't discover this until half way through the trip. The motels might provide wifi, but limit you to 500mb (gone in a minute) or their service is so slow you cannot connect.

Auckland

"We arrived in Auckland on Wednesday around 11am without a bit of problem.  Traffic was ok, relatively light and we drove right to our hotel on the harbor. Checked in and proceeded out to explore this city. We are once again right in the central business district, so everything is within walking distance. At the ferry terminal we bought our tickets for Waiheke Island for Thursday but we also went on a harbor cruise. Sat on top for the best views, but it was also windy and cool. Here are some views from the trip.

Afterwards we walked up to the sky tower to see if we could get reservations for dinner, which we did for that night. Here are the stats on the tower.

We had a wonderful dinner, great service, great food, great view. 

Here is a person jumping from the building on their sky jump (no way would I do that).

Today (Thursday) we took the ferry to Waiheke island. Just used their local bus system (after we sorta figured it out) and went wine tasting (which the island is known for). Took the bus to the end and had to walk from there about a mile or so, but up about 100 steps, down a road, to a dirt road.

Great views along the way.

Next winery we followed a path through the vineyards.

The next winery was a bit further through vineyards, over a mountain and through some forest, but found our way.

After 6 wineries we were done so caught the bus back to catch the ferry back to Auckland. Great day, got some good exercise, over 6 miles and many steps and steep hills. But a beautiful island.

Only a day and half left before we head back home. I can't believe it's been almost 3 weeks.

North Island Here We Come

Sunday we turned in our rental car at the Picton ferry terminal and boarded the ferry after an hour delay for our 3 hour cruise to the North Island. We headed to the top deck to get the best view.

The weather was great but a bit windy and the crossing the Cook Strait was a pretty calm sail.

Beautiful scenery of all the mountainous shoreline.

Once we hit the open waters,we headed inside to enjoy a bit of refreshments and warmth.

Approaching the North Island, Wellington (New Zealand's capital) comes into sight.

After debarking and picking up a new rental car, we immediately headed north out of town for a 2 hour drive to Masterton to find a motel room. Finally found one with a/c (they are difficult to find) and proceeded to walk to the Lone Star for a Texas style dinner.

I had the lamb shoulder and it was great.

Monday morning we headed for Napier which is in Hawks Bay known for red wines that Jim likes. It took us about 45 minutes to find a motel, but once settled we took off for the wineries. Tasted at 5 places and only found a couple of wines we liked, but they were better than the South Island.

Didn't get pictures of the area because it was nasty weather, cold and raining. Woke up to rain this morning, so headed towards Auckland (which natives pronounce it like we would say Oakland) raining most of the way and found a room in Hamilton, about 1 1/2 hours south of Auckland. Went for a 5 mile walk around this lake that is close to our motel. It was a real pleasant walk except for the humidity about 70%. Now sitting  back watching Kansas Texas BB game while doing laundry. 

Marlborough Sounds

Took a scenic drive this morning up through part of the Marlborough Sounds. Starting at Picton where the inter island ferry terminal is located, it's a small town north of where we are staying.

This is the ferry we will be taking tomorrow morning heading to the North Island.

Here are some views of the sound.

We passed through Havelock, best known as the greenshell mussel capital of the world, so a must stop was The Mussel Pot for a pot of mussels and a brew.

After lunch we headed back to Blenheim, stopping at a couple of wineries for a bit of a taste.

Spent the rest of the afternoon doing a load of laundry after checking into the motel, then going for a walk. We have limited amount of clothes since we only have our carry on luggage, that means laundry, but it's worked out quite nicely most of the motels have laundry facilities. Also everything is so casual that we've only been wearing shorts.

Like I mentioned, tomorrow we head for the North Island. The 3 hour ferry ride should be quite scenic. We go through the Cook Strait to land in Wellington.

Kiwi Land

Need to do a bit of catching up here. Wednesday we left the hotel at 5am to miss all the traffic getting to the Melbourne airport. We only missed the turn to the rental cars once but got checked through security then customs with not too much of a problem, then waited for a our 9am flight. Arrived in Christchurch, New Zealand at 1pm ( they are 2 hours ahead of Melbourne and 20 hours ahead of Tucson). Picked up our rental car and made it to our motel. We needed exercise so took off for a nice long walk through a park to city center (which isn't much).

For dinner we went to Trevinos about 2 blocks from the motel for a pleasant outdoor dining experience. We met a couple from Liverpool and traded wine stories.

Thursday morning we drove North to the Waipara Valley wine area and went to about 6 wineries to taste their wines. Enjoyable but did not get blown away with any of the wines. We proceeded up the coast for a pleasant drive to Kaikoura to find a motel for the night. There was nothing in the area that we were willing to stay at, so had to continue on for another 2 hours to Blenheim, where we did find a room. But after we got to the room, we found out that it didn't have air conditioning, so it was quite warm sleeping. Here are some pictures of heading up the coast and the wineries we stopped at.

New Zealand is much less populated and much easier to get around. Every place we go the people are very friendly and quite helpful. The countryside is beautiful, the coast pretty in places with more of a rocky shoreline.

This morning we drove around for another motel with air conditioning for tonight and Sat. We ended up with a different motel each night, but will be cool, it's been quite warm, in the mid to upper 80s, with higher humidity than we are used to. After taking care of business, we headed for the wine trail.

We tasted at 6 wineries and nothing really to our liking. This area is known for Sauvignon Blanc which we are not a fan of, but also Riesling which we like. But it seems that all the winemakers like dry wines. Here are some beautiful views we saw, which made up for the wines.

The area reminds me of Napa or Sonoma wine regions with the plentiful vineyards.

This afternoon we took a drive over to the coast and found a nice view of the coast.

When we got back to the motel we decided to get some exercise, so took off on a nice path along this small river. At close to 90 degrees needless to say, we only walked for an hour.

Well I better finish so we can go find dinner.