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 th
e 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 t
he 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
2 comments:
Hot springs, eh. That sounds really good since there were blizzard warnings in the mountains west of Denver the night before last. And we had freezing rain here yesterday. Yup, you are coming home to winter.
Look forward to seeing you and all the photos and hearing the whole story when you are here for Christmas.
You guys are certainly gonna miss NZ, but US will be happy to have you back. Here's the last map waypoint for everyone who's following your travels, this time to Auckland.
Travel safely! - Tim G.
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