The big New Zealand holiday blog..Back to the City of Sails

The following morning, we packed up our stuff and headed to the bus station. We had Intercity tickets to Auckland that morning. I texted my friend 'P' to let her know we were on our way back. She was meeting us for a late lunch as it was our last day in New Zealand

We caught the coach from Hamilton bus station and sat behind the driver. He was a lovely bloke, Maori descent, very talkative and direct. Pulling out of Hamilton station, we spotted an extremely overweight young lass eating what appeared to be a foot long baguette with a gooey, greasy looking filling.
"She's had way too many of them", quipped our driver. He said what we were thinking and we immediately hit it off..

The journey to Auckland flew by, with constant chatter from our new friend in the driving seat. We disembarked at Sky City and pottered around the corner to our hotel. After dumping the bags, we ambled to the ferry port and jumped on the Devonport ferry for the short crossing of the harbour. I do like Devonport, it's a small place with cracking views of the city, good cafes and a good pub.

We took a seat outside the pub with our drinks, it was cloudy but warm and the sun appeared every now and then. 'P' soon arrived to meet us, and that's when things got serious on the drinking front. I remember going for our lunch and having a couple of glasses of NZ wine which were delicious. We then went for another drink somewhere and spent the afternoon catching up with 'P'.

Before we knew it, it was early evening. So we went for more food at a restaurant and several more glasses of plonk. By 9.30pm when we went to catch the ferry back to the city, I was feeling no pain, loved everybody and everything and almost fell asleep on our 10 minute ferry crossing...

After staggering back to the hotel, I threw some belongings into my case, collapsed onto the bed and fell into a fitful sleep. We were being picked up for the airport at about 5.30am the following day and I was frightened of oversleeping.

Here are some pics of Auckland (while I was still sober enough to take some). The view taken from the ferry of the city, the harbour bridge (not as imposing as the one in Sydney, but a great bridge nevertheless), The Esplanade at Devonport and the view of Mission Bay and the sailboats taken from Devonport.

Attached Thumbnails