We arrived at Auckland at 5am after a 3.5hour flight. We barely got any sleep, but it was full on into our Auckland sightseeing. After picking up our hire car, we made our way to the city and got our tickets to Rangitoto Island (600 yo volcano island just off the coast the city). With an hour to spare, we found some soft couches and soon fell asleep before the ferry departed. It was an hour's walk up to the summit of the top of the island, and a slight detour took us to some lava caves (made when hot lave kept flowing when the outer parts cooled down). It was quite a hot day, and we hadn't quite planned it well - most of us had long pants on for the flight, and hadn't thought of bringing sunblock! However, we did pack our lunch, water and hats. After that, we checked in to our motel and slept for most of the afternoon, and had a quiet evening.
Highlights:
MK: Relaxing on the comfy couches at the ferry terminal.
MJ: We lost 4 am as it was 3 am in Australia and instantaneously 5 am in New Zealand due to time zone change.
MH: Loved the Toppa lasagne.
Logbook:
05:00 (0 km) Looking out the aeroplane window about to land in Auckland at 5:00 am. Look at the sunrise (just)!
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| Looking out of the plane as we arrive in Auckland |
06:00 (0 km) Picked up the Budget hire car - a red Holden Cruze HYE674 with starting odometer reading 27345 km.
06:45 (25 km) Auckland city is quite quiet at this time of the morning. Fortunately, there was a 24 hours supermarket open - Countdown (Woolworths) Supermarket.
08:00 (27 km) Breakfast of bacon and cheese rolls. Got to Auckland jetty to get tickets for the ferry ride. Waiting for ferry at comfy couches at terminal.
09:15 (27 km) Caught the ferry to Rangitoto Island.
10:00 (27 km) Landed on Rangitoto Island. Went for a walk up to the summit. After an hour of quite a long walk up to the 600 year old crater, we found a magnificent view of the surrounds - Auckland and Motutapu Island.
11:30 (27 km) Made ham rolls for lunch and had apple and bananas.
11:40 (27 km) Had a look around the lava tube caves. They had cool air coming out of them.
12:15 (27 km) Back to Rangitoto jetty.
12:45 (27 km) Caught ferry back to Auckland.
13:45 (27 km) Leave Auckland.
14:15 (45 km) Airport Gold Star Motel. Room 309.
18:10 (51 km) Buy groceries at Countdown Supermarket.
18:45 (54 km) Cook dinner of Toppa Lasagne.
20:00 (54 km) Played 500, Mum bid 9 spades but Dad won.