EC-Rider Travels

We had a very amusing breakfast cooked by Sophie and her helper (we never quite got her name) who never drew breath though we understood little of what she said. Sophie however was absolutely charming and cooked the most amazing looking breakfasts, which though mum and I declined, were much enjoyed by our fellow guests who were charming and varied!

We took a taxi down town to pick up our hire car. A brand new Hyundai Tucson with only 45km on the clock. Yikes! It took us quite some time to work out how to turn it on, but eventually we drove very gingerly out of the garage and our first journey was to Auckland Zoo! We had seen it on the TV that morning and felt we should go! It was rather amazing and had a number of successful breeding programmes the results of which we were able to see – we felt we should take a a few photos for Eliza!

We returned to the Great Ponsonby Art Hotel for a quick change and then headed down-town to the Sky-Tower where we were to meet Michael Hawes (who used to live at Hilldrop and I had not seen for about thirty years) and his partner Sarah. We had such a lovely drink with them on the 52nd floor of the Sky Tower – a magnificent telecommunications tower – overlooking the harbour. We felt we were incredibly high, and it is indeed the highest freestanding structure in the Southern Hemisphere, but at 328m it is apparently not even half as tall as the Burj in Dubai! Still it is an iconic landmark in Auckland’s skyline and pretty stunning. It had an observation floor where you could see Auckland in all its glory. It really is a beautiful city based around two harbours and full of impressive looking buildings and many beautiful boats! It was the original capital, named by the British when they colonised New Zealand in 1840. However in 1865, following the Māori–European conflict, it was replaced by Wellington. With its ports, logging and gold-mining activities, Auckland continued to grow and remains the largest city in New Zealand by some margin. Almost 1.5m, of the 5m New Zealand population, live in Auckland.

Following our drink, we had the most delicious dinner with Michael and Sarah in one of their nice ‘local’ restaurant We had such a nice evening hearing about life and bringing up children in Auckland and their work as landscape architects. They seem to have the work/life balance well sorted here!