We finished our packing and cleaned the house, emptied the fridge and drank all the booze (not quite) and we are off again on our travels, this time back to New Zealand to see out the cold English winter months.
The Air New Zealand flight was quite full but we had booked seats in the nose end of the aircraft and the seats (read beds) were great and we both slept very well on our first leg to Hong Kong.
After almost twelve hours we arrived in Hong Kong on Tuesday evening about 45 minutes early which meant that we reached our Hotel in plenty of time to go for dinner. We decided to go to the ‘Milano’ which has been one of our favourite restaurants from previous visits. The food and wine were up to the usual good standard and afterwards we went to a busy little bar called ‘From Dusk till Dawn’ where we listened to the live band for about an hour before heading back to the Renaissance New World Hotel for bed.
Wednesday 29th An easy day
A late small breakfast and Noel went off to meet some old business colleagues whilst Jen sat by the swimming pool for a few hours.
Noel got back about 3.30 pm and also enjoyed the poolside for a while. We were both looking forward to our dinner at the Hong Kong Club with some more of Noel’s business colleges.
We had a great evening at the Club with Peter G, Wolfgang & Gigi S and Phil B. names are withheld for good reasons. It was a most enjoyable evening and the food and company were great.
There was still some life in us after the dinner and so we went to the Mandarin Oriental Hotel for a couple of quick ones for the road. We returned to the Hotel around 12.30 am feeling a bit tired but it was a lovely evening.
The discussions over dinner ranged from the current financial challenges to how a mutual friend ‘Archie D’ and his horse were doing? Anyway we solved the financial crisis within one hour after committing all the rich Nations ie China, India and Taiwan to bail out the rest of the world. This was a very good plan we agreed after a considerable amount of booze had been consumed..
Thursday 30th October Got a hangover
We had a late breakfast after a late night and then packed our bags and checked out at midday and went for a walk, including a visit to an electronics arcade. This is two floors of about a hundred small companies all selling cameras to notebooks to bits of computers etc. I needed to purchase a new battery for my mobile phone.
Lunch was taken in an Irish Pub called Delaney’s from where we watched the world walk by. There are a lot of Australian and New Zealanders in Hong Kong at this time getting ready for the Rugby match to be held in the Hong Kong Stadium.
The sun was emerging from the Smog and highlighted the amount of China Smog that swirls around Hong Kong almost every day. When the Olympics were on and the polluting factories were closed we understand that the weather in Hong Kong was really clear and bright, "just like the old days". The train from downtown to the airport was as efficient as ever and we reached the Airport Terminal in ample time to relax for a while. It will be another 11 hour flight to Auckland where we are due to arrive around 1100 in the morning.
The stock markets around the world continue to fluctuate badly and we noticed at one time today that one of the Hong Kong stock exchanges was closed for a while, strange we thought.
Friday 31 October- We arrive in Auckland
The flight was pretty much on time at about 11.00 hrs and we were off the aircraft and through immigration and customs within about 35 minutes which we thought was pretty good.
The car from the Langham Hotel was waiting. They have just purchased three Lexus 600 hydrid models and it was fantastic to be in, I even asked if I could drive. The weather was mild, but not warm, and there had been some rain earlier in the day. It would appear that the weather in New Zealand over the winter months May-September had been pretty bad with considerable amounts of rain and high winds and perhaps the worst winter for some years.
The Hotel seemed fairly quiet which is just what we wanted and it was slightly out of the Central Business District. We needed a rest and so hit the sack for a couple of hours and then went for a walk down town and had dinner at a great Italian Restaurant called Vivace where we had eaten before on past trips to Auckland.
We walked back up Queen Street to the Hotel, most of it was uphill and so a good exercise after dinner. And so to bed.
Saturday 1 November- The weather is better today
We left the Hotel fairly late and had breakfast in a small bakery. Auckland town was very quiet compared to our last visit. We went to a sport store to look at tents and to find out prices for all the equipment we will need to purchase for when we start our tour of the South Island in the early part of next year.
The shop only had one make of tents set up and we asked about the Coleman range and they said that they do sell this brand and would put up the one we wanted so that we could see what it looked like. We were told to come back in half and hour and it would be ready. We found a café and had a well earned cup of coffee and then went back forty minutes later to peruse the tent. It looks just right and so perhaps we may well go ahead after we have made some more enquires about other equipment etc.
We walked partly through an area called Ponsonby and then took the bus down to Victoria Park where the Auckland marathon was due to start on the following day and we saw all the preparations for the day.
As the sun was shining we walked along by the Marina and back in to the town centre for an excellent ice cream and then booked tickets for the cinema to see a Coen brothers film called, "Burn after reading".
We took dinner at Wagamama’s and of all things sat next to a family who had lived in Winchester and the mother was going on Sunday to a house less than a mile from where we would be staying.
The film was excellent and a really good example of black humour. It’s really worth watching.
Sunday 2nd November and the sun came out
The last Formula One race of the season from Brazil was on and we were able to see a certain Mr Hamilton win by one point after scraping home yards in front of a Toyota. Well done and its nice to have a BRITISH Formula one champion again when you consider that most of the F1 teams are either based in the UK or use mostly UK engineers.
We only saw part of Ponsonby yesterday and as we had partly got over our tiredness I decided to take the camera along and make it a photographic trip. To me I have to be feeling good and not tired to enjoy taking photographs and that is why we had not taken any during the last couple of days. So we walked around Ponsonby which is a nice part of Auckland town and being a Sunday morning couples and families were enjoying their breakfast. We had our big breakfast in a small café in a very old arcade. After enjoying this area we took the bus to Parnell which has a great tourist attraction and there were many foreigners??? there. We prefer Ponsonby as it’s got a much better feel to it.
During our walk we saw a number of signs for the forthcoming Government Elections,see photo.
On the walk back to town we checked some car hire pricing for our travels next year.
A very large cruise liner from Celebrity Cruises has arrived in town and discharged a couple of thousand people and therefore downtown was very busy indeed.
We took the Shuttle back to the Hotel for a ‘freshen up’ before meeting our friends Brian and Shelia for dinner. It is their house that we will occupy for three months just outside Taipa whilst they are away on their travels to South America and the Antarctic.
We tested a few beers at an Irish Pub, yep another one, and then went for dinner. We decided to have an early night.
