Firstly I would like to pay my respects to my brother’s partner Ann who passed away. Tommy hosted a memorial for her at Comiskey Park  in Chicago (now know as “Guaranteed Rate Field”???) She was an avid White Sox fan!

Today we planned to venture out, using our bus passes, to the city center of Auckland. Being Sunday, there was not too much traffic, and the weather was blustery and cool. Before we left I took a quick walk around the cemetery across the street from the hotel we are staying at. What an interesting collection of headstones! We witnessed a funeral yesterday with traditional island dress worn by the mourners.

One of the native? headstones. It looks rather ‘Picasso-ish”. Walking back to our hotel I had to take a picture of the huge kiwi on the roof of the neighboring hotel. The hotel is closed due to the catastrophic flooding that occurred in August, 2022. We had reservations to stay at that hotel when we made plans for this trip in 2022, we were supposed to stay there in October, 2022. Nature had other plans! The kiwi survived apparently!

Our bus trip took us around the city and eventually to the city center where we headed to the Sky Tower.

No, that’s not us on the outside walkway above the observation deck (although we plan on that eventually!) This was a poster in the entryway to the tower. Today was too windy, cool and gray, and there was a large group with reservations ahead of us. Instead we headed for the Sky Bar for a beer and appetizers, and a view of the cables that guide those brave enough to do the jump off the tower.

The two wires on either side of the picture are the guide wires for the adventurous! We waited, but there were no jumpers today! The pointy island in the distance is Waiheke island, known as the ‘wine island’ of New Zealand. Walking around the observation deck (inside) I got many panoramic views of the city and surrounding countryside. I was almost able to get the window decal of the harbour bridge lined up with the real thing!

Finally we took the ‘lift’ down to ground level and explored more of the city, walking to the harbour where the ferries to Waiheke and other islands depart. We saw the old ferry building and enjoyed an ice cream while we walked around.

Outside, a small window displayed the wares inside! an homage to Jimmy Buffet!?

Inside, this beautiful window reflected in the equally beautiful tile work surrounding it! And the surrounding architectural embellishments brought to mind colonial (British) influences, juxtaposed with the modern electronic transport modes!

Today was a windy, rainy, cold, gray day as a gale swept over the island. But there were breaks in the weather and we took advantage because the motel room is pretty small! We decided to use our bus passes we purchased yesterday to head the 1.7 km to the Mangere Bridge Tavern to watch some rugby! We got decked out in our foul weather gear!

Since arriving in NZ we have become aware that the country is in the thick of the Rugby World Cup, with NZ claiming the Cup 3 times, in 1987, 2011 and 2015, and rugby being considered the national sport, it’s a big deal here! The “All Blacks” as the team is known, because of the all black uniforms with a silver fern frond adornment, are also known for the “haka” dance they perform before matches. So we got some “kai” (food) and joined the locals watching women’s rugby. We avoided the weather, met some friendly blokes and had a great time!

Our first full day in New Zealand was beautiful, sunny and very windy! In the late afternoon of the day of our arrival we walked a few blocks in lashing rain to a small retail area nearby. We were pretty soaked when we arrived at a great little Indian restaurant and enjoyed a wonderful meal of curried lamb, the first of lots of lamb dishes we’re looking forward to! The second day we had much better weather and we walked the opposite direction to the little center of the community of Mangere Bridge.

We passed the Mangere Mountain walkway to the summit, part of which is behind this beautiful palm tree view. We also saw our first wildlife, a bird strutting along the busy road.

It looks like some sort of heron or egret.

Interspersed between more modern town houses and mid-century houses are some very ‘colonial’ style houses. Some are renovated like this one, some are run down and we saw one in the middle of renovations.

Everywhere there is evidence that it is springtime here! We stopped at a little bakery and bought meat pies, mine a steak & mushroom pie, Robert’s a bacon & egg pie. We enjoyed lunch on a park bench in a cute little park surrounded by some blooming bushes.

It got windier on our walk back, then started raining so we ended up having dinner delivered to our motel room from the Indian restaurant down the street!

After 2 years of planning and having world and personal events cause us to cancel those plans, we finally were able to fulfill our bucket list of traveling to New Zealand! Our plane tickets took us from Redmond/Bend airport to Seattle, then to San Francisco where we finally boarded our Fiji Airways flight to Nadi, Fiji on our way to Auckland!

As we watched the lights of San Francisco fade into the darkness of the Pacific on our long flight, we sat back and relaxed, enjoying a glass (or two) of champagne!

We were able to lay down on our seats that reclined flat, with comfy bedding and light turbulence that rocked us to sleep. We woke sometime in the night to watch our route on the screen as we crossed the equator and the international date line almost simultaneously! The area where we crossed between the red line that marks the dateline was the entirety of our Wednesday, Sept. 27!

A few hours later we woke again to see (on the screen again, since we did not have window seats) the sunrise as we approached Nadi, Fiji in the early morning of Thurs. Sept. 28!

Our best view of Fiji!

After a few hours in Fiji, spent in the lounge since we were not able to leave the airport since we were only transiting the country, we boarded our last plane for the 4 hour flight to Auckland. We arrived in a rain storm and moved with the crowds through the airport and under the elaborately carved archway into our “home country” for the next 6 months!

Stay tuned for more of our adventures in New Zealand!

An interesting flower on our walk along Sweet Creek Falls trail. A fellow walker taking pictures of flowers along the trail informed me it is a lily. He mentioned the scientific name, but my mind retained only ‘lily’!