Flag Hotel President Plaza Auckland

... and when the first people in our boat were a very lovely but very Japanese couple we thought it might be an eventful trip. I think they actually jumped out before the raft even got to the top of the waterfall, either way we flipped straight over and Steve was stuck under for quite a while but finally emerged only to be dragged back under by the Japanese girl who was trying to use ...

... a bit pretentious. It may just be those speaking it, but I recall really enjoying it the last time around. <br> Speaking of sounds, I must include the sensory update. Currently, I live under a polycarbonate roof, so the heavy rain last night and scampering birds this morning offer quite a delightful sound. Beth claims the honey shed smells vaguely of honey, but I maintain that it smells more of the shed. The residence sits softly on the rim of a very ...

... on backpack is heavy like hell, so I&#8217;ll need to plan better for the future.<br><br> I filled out the immigration card for NZ because I plan to go into the country for the 8.5 hour layover. I&#8217;m going to take the Airbus Express downtown, visit the Maritime Museum, and enjoy whatever else fancies my interest until ...

... the clear skies. I couldn't believe it. The sky is so amazingly clear, making the Milky Way amazing! The stars over Nevada and my home in Washoe Valley are impressive, but this seemed to be even more clear. I could just reach out and touch them almost. Also, what appeared as clouds that wouldn't move, were actually nebulas in our galaxy! So Cool! Dave challenged me to a game of chess that night, and I accepted. By sticking to a method my brother ...

... village where they performed war dances and the famous Haka. We had a great meal that was cooked under ground using volcanic heat. The Mauri guy also sang Tom Jones for Emily and Swing Low for Ashley- a great night. We also went trekking through caves, gorges and over waterfalls. The scenary is amazing and you can see why Lord of the Rings was filmed here, we also visited the town of Hobbiton and had photos taken with Gollum! I leave the ...

... we were glad of. So we hamered it. I think I ate about 18 slices.............. We can both feel the difference in the temperature here. Although its about 23 degrees, its cooler than Australia by about 10 degrees. I guess we're just used the the heat off OZ! Hopefully we have enough warm clothes for going south as its getting into the end of summer, the side of the hemisphere. Today we booked onto the Kiwi-Experience to ...

... works we were unable to stop at Mission Bay (just like being at home road works everywhere) so stayed on until we got to the cathedral. Holy Trinity Cathedral is very modern with some lovely stained glass windows. Next door is the beautiful old cathedral of St Mary's, built in 1860 and became Aucklands cathedral in 1887. This cathedral had originally been across the road but they decided to move it next to the new one. So the whole ...

So I got back on the Magic Bus and headed south back towards the drearyness of Auckland, and it really was dreary too - it was throwing it down with rain the whole way... but I don't have a lot to say about the journey back as it was really boring and the driver we had this time wasn't exactly the most talkative person you will have met... he never even told us any thing about anything. Tara and I decided that we were going to stay in ACB again as we enjoyed it last time ...