Day Out

Well, if all goes to plan, today was my last full day in Auckland for a while. I got up this morning, got a green tea smoothie, and headed out with some mates from the hostel for a quick free tour of the city. We started out by going over to Sky Tower, which most people know as the sort of space-needle-y thing in the middle of Auckland. Here you can see it from a bridge I was on later in the day.

One of the big things to do at Sky Tour, apparently, is to base-jump off of it, so a couple of kids did that, and then we headed on to a point about five miles away from the city where you could look back and take pictures. It was in a really pretty green park, and the wind was blowing and you could smell the sea, and I felt for the first time as if I was really in NEW ZEALAND, rather than just a big city. For me, most big cities are the same no matter what country they’re in. Anyway, from there we went down to the docks and saw where the ferries leave and where to catch the whale watching boats. Apparently the bay is so chock full of marine life that there’s a 99% chance of seeing dolphins and a 75% chance of seeing whales, and if you DON’T see either of these they give you your money back! While we were in the harbor I caught site of THIS awesome guy. Well really, how could you miss him?

No idea what he was there for.

Then to lunch at a cute pub (I had the classic fish and chips) and then to our final stop, the Bay Bridge. According to our guide, this is New Zealand’s cheapest place to bungy jump, so four different kids got kitted up and the rest of us put on our harnesses and hard hats and went for a walk under the bridge out over the water. Here’s me waiting for the jumpers to come down.

For a minute I almost changed my mind and decided to try to jump, but when I saw the first guy balk at the end of the plank I knew there was no way I’d be able to get up the courage. At least not today. Anyway, here’s one of the guys jumping off…

…and from below…

So that was my day out in Auckland!

Tomorrow morning I’m taking the ferry over to Waiheke Island where I’m going to spend the weekend exploring and chilling out on the beach. I found that the cheapest way to stay overnight is to camp (as I’d expected), so I’ll be staying at a beach campsite tomorrow night and possibly Sunday night. Then I ferry back over here early Monday morning and hopefully set out for Raglan, the best surfing spot in the country, to learn how to surf! We’ll see if this all pans out.

What I did discover today was that it would be worth it for me to invest in a Stray Bus pass, which is a bus company like the one I took around the highlands in Scotland. They take you to different cool locations and they have a bus driver who doubles as a tour guide. The bus is hop-on-hop-off, and it’s unlimited rides for a year for 620 NZD, which is totally worth it since it goes to all the major cities from Auckland to Wanaka, and if I want to go farther North or South than that I just pay a tiny bit extra. There ARE two other bus companies like this in NZ; Magic Bus and Kiwi Experience. I’ve heard, though, that Kiwi Experience is basically a city-to-city non-stop bar crawl, and that Magic rushes through things so it’s only good if you have a very short amount of time. Stray, on the other hand, takes it slower and concentrates on hiking and the National parks, which I’m down with. So, given all this, I shall be spending a large chunk of money on one of these handy passes tomorrow.

Mostly I’m excited to get out of Auckland to this brilliant island called Waiheke, which Kiwis say is the chillest place in the country. And this, coming from a Kiwi, means a lot. I probably won’t have internet out there, so I suppose I’ll update you all again on Monday or so!

Later!