Lift=Elevator

From Auckland City

Mental note: When traveling to New Zealand, you need a departure date and a visa to enter the county. It seems they don't want to entertain anyone they can't eventually get rid off. At the LA ticket counter we were obliged to set a date to fly to Melbourne. We'll be leaving for the Outback on Wednesday the 9th. A total of two weeks in the land man has only inhabited for 800 years.

The flight was fine and only took a little longer then expected due to strong headwinds. Air New Zealand is one of the nicer carriers I've taken across the Pacific. I slept pretty much the entire time. Susanna wasn't as fortunate. There was a bit of commotion mid way that woke her up. A woman sitting a couple rows behind us has to have an oxygen tank brought to her. Apparently, she had packed her inhaler and had no access to it.

We're here and it's early (8 am). After catching the Airbus Express from the airport, and walking 5 blocks with 150 lb. (total) worth of luggage, we limp into the Albert Park Hostel covered in sweat. It's an adequate 3 star high rise filled with random people of all ages. Our hostel is located right next to Albert Park which is on the Auckland University campus. After our day long jaunt about town we come to find out the campus literally makes up for half the city.

Waking up, now in the afternoon, from complete body shutdown, we set out to see the city. The Link Bus will be our chariot. At $1.60 a ride, it's the best buy in town. Although, everything else is one and a half times what we pay in the states. Jobs must pay more here. Auckland is a beautiful city. It reminds me of the D.C., Northern Virginia area. It's also a very young and culturally diverse city. Most likely due to the college.

Auckland Domain was next on our agenda. A large park area filled with cricket fields (the sport), walking trails and museums. Not so different from The Mall in D.C. Within, we patronize "Tamaki Paenga Hira", the Aukalnd Museum. We hit up all 3 exhibits. (The Maori: New Zealand's native people, NZ War and NZ History) The Maori people are very similar to the Hawaiians. All exhibits were pretty amazing. so our duty to find out more about the culture we were visiting was fulfilled.

After wandering pretty much the entire museum grounds we ended up on Parnell St. There we hit a couple pubs and had some pizza . Non Solo Pizza was recommended to us and is a must stop. Note: The Kiwis love their bacon and manage to slip it into a lot of dishes. During our Parnell stroll we scheduled a camper-van for the next week.

Our day two adventure was to the Island of Waiheke. Just a 40 min ferry ride from the Auckland Harbor. It leaves on the hour so be sure to time it accordingly. We ended up making two coffee stops before departure. Waiheke is an absolutely beautiful place! and the ferry ride out there is pretty amazing as well. Plenty of lush green islands with nothing on them. If they were close to the states, I'm sure they'd be stacked with houses. Think Catalina Island with vineyards and sheep instead of buffalo. There's a local bus that will take you around all day for $8. Upon recommendation we went to StoneyRidge Vineyard. Great views, great food and great people. Here is were we met our first friends. A family that extended from NZ to England to Australia. They were a ton of laughs and weren't afraid to give some pointers on where to travel. Susanna took portraits of all of them!

That was an all day affair. So when we got back to the city we stuffed our faces with Kabobs (not really kabobs, more like gyros) and forgot about all the errands we wanted to run.

Right now we're waiting for the camper-van folks to pick us up. We are in sort of a communal eating area and when anyone opens one of the 3 refrigerators down here an overwhelming putrid smell comes over and smacks you in the face. I guess I'll harden up later on. It is only day 3. Our hostel check out time is 10 and the van peeps should be here by 10:30. Just enough time to run down to Starbucks and pay $8 for one of my foof coffees.

I'm really excited to head for the coast. I saw the surf as we landed but we haven't been in the water yet. We blanked on taking our suits to Waiheke and Auckland faces northeast and is surrounded by small islands so their swell opportunity is nil. It's only an hour drive to the closest surfing beach, but I think we're going to shoot straight down to Raglan (2.5 hrs max). I can't wait.