Auckland, Piha

What's this, another blog update??!! We happen to find internet available to us at this sweet little place we got for our last few nights in this incredible country. Therefore, I thought I would take the time to download a few photos we've snapped since the last update.

Here's a nice sunset over Auckland shot I got when we pulled into port after our ferry ride back from Great Barrier Island.

Speaking of which, on this ferry ride we were FINALLY treated to a whole dolphin show!! Lots of them showed up to play infront of the ferry as we sailed along. They were spinning, jumping, grinning and playing with us for quite a ways. We really feel as though this was a wonderful feeling of completion to our trip- we had been hoping to see them the whole trip!

We spent all day today exploding our rental car of all of our accumulated stuff that we've been driving around with for a month! We rented a sweet little place in a beach village outside of Auckland to do so, on the Tasman Sea, called Piha. We got all organized & re-packed in record time, so had some time to do our last good-bye sunset on the beach.





What an amazing trip!! We know we are heading back to COLD winter, there is snow already up at the house we are told, so looking forward already to the hot tub!

We will continue to use this blog site & address for other trips & updates of our house projects, so please don't throw away the address in your website bookmarks! Come & visit again & again.

Great Barrier Island

We had a nice backpackers room the night of Eric's birthday, which we spent in Auckland, New Zealand's own little New York City. It's a bustling, busy town, but a lobster dinner was amazingly still elusive. So we settled for nice steaks at a little restaurant, and when the waitress heard it was his birthday, she surprised us both by finishing our meal off with a warm chocolate cake! We went to bed early though as the next day we had to get up at 5:30 AM to catch a ferry over to Great Barrier Island. Here is a photo of the sunrise as we got up, from the room window- you can see their version of the "space needle" in the background.

We then caught the "slow boat to china" as our backpacker host called it- to the Great Barrier Island, a large island NE of Auckland. There are barely any people living here, it's mostly hiking trails, campsites and beach! We hiked into some backcountry hot springs, which were surprisingly nice & hot, and there were lots of good pools to choose from.

We have also spent some good days just relaxing the beach, even though the clouds have continued to follow us most of the time. Here are our happy feet on the beach on a sunny day... And here is a great sunset shot we got last night.

Now we are headed back to Auckland to land and then over to a little town called Piha. We will spend some time packing all of the shells we've collected in our dirty laundry and sending it home! :)
Winding down is hard- we 1/2 want to be home again to see our pets & family, and 1/2 want the adventure to continue!

We might not get the chance to do another blog posting before we return, so thanks to ALL who have logged in to read about our trip. A big thanks to everyone who gave to our wedding registry to help us get here. It was the best gift any of you could have ever given us, the memories will last our entire lifetimes.
It has been a once in a lifetime journey.
WE LOVE YOU ALL!!
Eric & Laura