Starting out

Friday 5 Dec Joe’s post
We left Auckland this morning so we could get a little ahead of the weekend traffic going out of Auckland. We picked up the car on Thursday, and we neglegent about not having insected it for dings and dents, of which there are a few.

Auckland is very nice, clean, easy to get around in by bus. The whole of the country, like Hawaii, is formed by volcanos. Auckland is the remnants of something like 50 extinct volcanos, altho a number of them in the bay off of the city are just dormant, so they have evacuation plans for emergencies. Problem is that there arent that many roads out of town.

Today we headed north, but went on country roads along the east coast as much as possible. There are some towns marked on the map, but for many of them it’s just a single building. The "big " towns don’t have more than 2 blocks of commercial district. We ran into some kids who run a dive shop out of Leigh. They take divers out to Goat Island, which is supposed to be great. We thought about spending the night in the area, and going on a dive tomorrow with them, but the only accomodations in town were sub-standard, and we have very low standards. So we hit the road and said that we’d stop at the first decent place we could find. Well there was not a structure to be found until we got to Wellsford, which is inland about 30 miles or so. It has a golf course, so we’ll probably play golf instead of swimming.

We’ll swim a little farther north, where the water is warmer, altho we did test the water and it’s not at all cold, but I wouln’t call it warm. I’d have swum in it and I don’t like cold water. The scenery is lush and green, and sure enough there are sheep cows and deer all over the place on rolling hills. Kind of like Tuscany, but much much greener and lusher. Plants and trees are different, but sometimes similar. They have a "Christmas " tree , which is a deep green disiduous tree, but just at this time of year it pops out brilliant red flowers which look like roses from a distance, lots of them. I’ll have to take picture and post it, since it’s hard to believe.


Sat Dec 7 or possibly the 6th.
We have stayed in "Motels" so far, and they are clean spacious and very cheap, about $100 NZ, which is about $55 US. Golf today was also very cheap, less than $15 US each! The course was not world class, but the greens were in good shape and the ball rolled a ton. The whole operation was run by the guy in the snack bar, and when he’s not there you leave the money in a box somewhere, but he was there today.

When you check into the motel, they give you a half pint of milk for your tea, so the rooms have to have a small refrigerator so you can keep the milk cold. They assume that people are going to eat in the rooms, so all rooms have cooking facilities and a few dishes…. Just what you would minimally need, but no stove, only a microwave. I wonder what you’re supposed to cook in that?
Every sink in the country has separate hot and cold faucets…. I think that a single handled faucet is a great invention, but we had these separate things when we were kids, so it’s like going back in time. Pleasant for me.

We’re not making very good time. We are in Whangerai, north of Auckland about 150 miles or so, and on the east coast. It’s the nearest protected harbor for people coming in from the South Pacific Islands, and its where middle sized sailing boats ( 40 to 100 feet) come in to get out of the nasty seas, when they kick up. We ran into a guy from Baltimore who left the Cheasapeake Bay sometime in 2005, and thinks he may be back there in 3 or 4 more years. It turns out that there are a lot of people like that, who just go to sea in boats, and that’s their life.

So it’s been a good day. We played golf, stoped at a beach and I went swimming…. We’re not very well organized, we have a big car, and the stuff is all over, and I can’t put my fingers on my bathing suit, a towel, sandles, golf divot digger, my golf watch, and just about anything else I want, when I need it. It’s either in the trunk somewhere or in a different suitcase, and if it’s black like my swimming trunks, then I can’t see it even when I’m looking straight at it.