January 29, 2018 Auckland, New Zealand – Day 1

Cultural capital of New Zealand’s North Island, Auckland is known as the “City of Sails” for its residents’ love of boating. The city encompasses 100 miles north to south and 60 miles east to west. It sits between two glistening harbors and the city’s Maori name explains its beauty well as it translates to “the maiden sought by a hundred lovers.” This seafaring city has hosted two America’s Cup challenges, and getting ready to host the next one in 2020. Its marinas are brimming with world-class yachts.

We are here for two days and we are docked right down town. It is the biggest port in New Zealand and has 60% of the imports and exports of the country. They say one in four people here own a boat. We lucked out and today (Monday) is part of a long weekend celebrating Auckland Day.

We were here in 2015, but we did the included tour of the city and it was great. It was a bus tour and our guide was our driver. His name was Roger and he was so knowledgeable.

Coming through the gangway to get off the ship we were greeted with this sign.

As we left the port we drove along the shore line. The large tower is called the sky tower and is beautiful on the skyline, and you will probably get tired of seeing pictures of it as we took them from everywhere.

One of the oldest suburbs of Auckland is Parnell, settled in 1841. We drove by an old colonial house with a rose garden next to it with 500 varieties of roses.

Also, in Parnell, is an old Anglican Cathedral called Holy Trinity. The front church is fairly new but behind it is the original cathedral that they moved from across the street.

Next, we rode by the neoclassical Auckland War Memorial Museum that chronicles the nation’s history within its edifice-like walls. We did not stop, but we had toured it when we were in Auckland in 2015.

We also made a stop at the Michael Savage Memorial. In 1860, 1879 and 1880 Ngati Whatua leaders Tuhaere and Te Kawau assembled many North Island Chiefs to the Kohimaramara Conference to establish a Maori parliament. They sought redress on land issues and equality under the law. In the 1930’s Maori sought remedy through Michael Savage, the then Prime Minister of the Labour Government. With Maori support Labour entered the parliament for the first time beginning a long-standing relationship.

The Harbor Bridge in Auckland was finished in 1958 with two lanes each way. In 1968, they realized it was not wide enough to accommodate all the traffic, so they wanted to widen it to four lanes each way. They contracted with a Japanese company that prefabricated the additional two lanes each way and then brought they to New Zealand and clipped them on to the existing lanes. Hence, they call them the clip Nippon Clip Ons. These are picture we took during this tour, but we have better ones later on.

The beautiful harbor area was all developed when Auckland hosted the first and second Americas Cup races.

After this we went over to the side of the port where they were having an open house for the port in honor of Auckland Day. It was like a street festival with tents of food and drink as well as exhibits. One of the things they had on display was a New Zealand Naval ship and they were giving free tours. The ship was the HMNZS Wellington. It is one of two Offshore Patrol Vessels that the Royal New Zealand Navy has in their fleet. They deliver substantial capability to the Royal New Zealand Navy. The ships can go further offshore, stay at sea longer, and conduct more challenging operations than the inshore Patrol Vessels, and enable the RNZN to conduct patrol and surveillance operations around New Zealand, the Southern Ocean and into the Pacific.

They also had the naval band marching and performing.

There was also docked at this dock the William C Daldy, a steam tug. She was built in 1935 and has two coal burning boilers, making her one of the strongest such tugs still afloat today. She was going to be sold for scrap in 1978 but was bought by the preservation society for $1. It is run by volunteers today to give tours. We could not turn it down. It was a 90-minute tour of the harbor. As it was a big holiday there were so many beautiful boats out in the bay. We also went under the Harbor Bridge and saw them bungee jumping from it. What a wonderful way to spend the afternoon.

That evening on the ship they brought on some local dancers. They were good, but not as good as the ones that came on in Tahiti. It was a great day and I did not tell you about the walk to the sky tower and the church. We walked about 5.5 miles during the day.