Our trip has begun! We left Seattle on Tuesday Feb 2, 2010 at 3:35 PM and arrived in Auckland at 9:15 AM on Thursday Feb 4. We lost Wednesday. Flying to New Zealand from the west coast of the U.S. is a lot easier on the body than flying from the east coast or the Midwest. The flight from LAX (Los Angeles) was 13.5 hours. I was fortunate in having an empty seat next to me which was really Mark’s seat but he had gotten an exit row seat. We both took sleeping pills which helped a lot.
Auckland is a beautiful city. We took a bus tour of the city on Thursday afternoon which was a good way to get a sense of how things were laid out. We went to the Auckland museum and saw some wonderful Maori artifacts and were taken to some great vantage spots where we could see 360 degrees around the city. We stayed at the Quadrant hotel.
On Friday, Feb 5, we rented a car. Now that sounds easy…you just rent a car. Well, Kiwis (New Zealanders) as well as Aussies (Australians) drive on the left side of the road. It takes some getting used to especially for a young 70 year old like Mark. But he was terrific. He and I just kept saying to one another “stay to the left, stay to the left, look to the right, look to the right”. Once we were on the road we just followed the other drivers but the tricky part was when Mark had to make a turn or merge into a travel circle. We had relatively few close calls(!) and Mark did great.
So on Friday we drove 3.5 hours north of Auckland to Russell in the Bay of Islands. New Zealand is a truly beautiful country but the Bay of Islands is spectacular. We stayed at a bed and breakfast called Papiroa Homestay hosted by Gary and Paula. They couldn’t have been nicer and the views from their place were as gorgeous as any place we have ever been to! On Saturday we took a boat tour out into the Bay. We were very lucky because it happened to be a national holiday and out on the Bay were “wakas”, Maori long boats. Close to the boat was the largest waka in NZ with 100 rowers. The Maoris were the original settlers of NZ descended from Polynesia. When the Englishman, James Cook, first came to NZ in the 1760’s he mapped the islands and brought trinkets to the Maoris. Then the first English settlers came in the 1830’s and there was conflict between the Maoris and the settlers. There have been five treaties since then and a lot of intermarriage.
We explored the lovely town of Russell and on Sunday, Feb 7 we drove back to Auckland. There we met up with our friends, Al and Karreen from Lacey, WA and had dinner with them. By the way, the weather this whole time has been glorious-sunny with temps in the high 70’s, low 80’s. This is summertime in the southern hemisphere and February is their August.
On Monday, Feb 8, we made a lifetime dream of Al’s come true and we drove 3 hours south out of Auckland to the Waitomo Glow Worm caves. We visited two of them. They are unique to this part of the world. In one of them we took a boat as well as walked and were amazed by the thousands of glowworms sparkling above and beside us. We were mesmerized by the spectacular ornate cave decorations and sculptures developed over thousands of years. In the second cave, distinctly different from the first, we entered through a spiral entrance and walked down 185 feet to the bottom, our way lit only by dim lights set into the walls of the cave. This cave was huge and we experienced the sheer majesty and intimacy of its corridors. Its crystal tapestries are truly other worldly.
We returned to Auckland feeling distinctly grateful for having been a part of this aspect of nature’s magnificence. More to come……