After nearly a fifteen, leg-cramping
hours later, I arrived in New Zealand! Immigration at the
Auckland Airport was the usual cattle gridlock, however moved on
quickly. The customs was quite stringent in the fact that officers
asked the same question,if you had brought any food items from other
country, in three or four different ways. But, still finishes
with everyone's luggage being x-rayed before exiting the airport.
At first glace everything seems
expensive here, but only because I kept forgetting to apply 20%
discount to the price (to convert to USD), so it's actually not too
bad, pretty much the same as US. I took the airport bus to the downtown,
where I was staying. Downtown Auckland is pretty neat. It
has large buildings, a diverse group of people, all the hustle and
bustle that any typical city has. I walked through the
downtown area towards Mount Eden which is a dormant volcano and
offers some of the best panoramic views of the city and
beyond.The entire downtown area is very hilly, similar to San
Francisco. So walking can be exhausting. There is also buses
that will drop you at the Mt Eden village, from where you can take
the trail up to to the summit. It probably took 20 minutes to get to
the top. The first thing you notice once you reach the summit is the
huge volcanic crater. Its very Interesting seeing the remains of a
dead volcano, huge crater overgrown with grass. From the summit
you get the most stunning 360 degree views of Auckland. You could see
all the volcanic hills that is scattered around the city of Auckland
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| Mt.Eden crater with the background of Auckland skyline |
I took a bus back to the the downtown.
The downtown, or the CBD as locally known is dominated by the Sky
Tower. This is the tallest structure in the Southern
Hemisphere.You can buy tickets for the Sky Tower and take
the elevator to the observation deck . I contemplated going up
as the views from 220m up will be breathtaking,
but decided against it. The sky tower also offers sky walk
around the outside of the observation deck on top of the tower
and buggy jumping jumping.
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| Sky Tower in Downtown |
Albert park is small park
surrounded by tall buildings of downtown on one side, and Auckland
University on the opposite side. It is a steep but
very worthwhile climb to a well-kept and idyllic city-centre park.
There are different paths leading different directions, but most lead
to the University Campus Walking through the
University, I enter the Auckland Domain which is essentially a
big park in Auckland with several walking paths, one of them leads to
the Auckland Museum which is in the Auckland Domain. A bit
of an uphill, but then the view is worth it. Before you enter
the museum the view from the steps of the harbor and ships
is eye catching. The museum is free to enter and gives
an excellent outline of New Zealand's discovery and settlement. It
has a comprehensive Maori and Pacific section including
original sea and war canoes and a replica Maori meeting house, with
all its intricate carvings. Next to the Auckland Domain is
Parnell, one of the oldest suburbs in Auckland. I walked back
through Parnell. It has a quaint village feel area, with a
stretch of shops, restaurants, and cafes.
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| Auckland Museum |
In the evening, I walked down the Quay Street and west to the Viaduct harbour. The Viaduct harbor was developed for the America's Cup . Great sights of expensive sail boats including the home of the America's Cup yachts and the Maritime Museum.
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| Home base of Team New Zealand |
The harbour is a
bustling place where you can stroll .There are plenty of restaurants and yuppie type bars to choose from and a
seascape of berthed yachts/sail boats to look at, thousands of them. And then one can wander over the little bridge towards the Wyndham
quarter to the fish market and another 10 or so restaurants/cafes
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