Amazing Auckland, Road Scholar Day One

The Road Scholar portion of our journey began on Tuesday, October 29, with a walking tour of downtown Auckland. This city has lots of interesting architecture, much of it newly constructed, so that it is earthquake-proof.

The sky tower is visible from just about everywhere in Auckland, but during our stroll we managed to catch someone jumping from the tower.  See that little black speck in the lower right hand corner?  That’s him, and yes, it IS an approved activity.  The Kiwi are very big on bungee jumping.   And no, I had absolutely no desire to “give it a go”, as they say down here.

We ended our walk at the Art Museum, which has a wonderful gallery of Maori portraits.  We weren’t allowed to take photos there, but this postcard gives you an idea of what a tattooed face looks like.

As one might expect, the facial swelling from face carving is fairly severe.  the guide showed us a large funnel, which functioned as a feeding tube while the facial wounds healed.

I as quite captivated by the flower sculpture hanging from the ceiling in the entryway.  The petals move!

Auckland has a number of incredibly beautiful parks.  The museum is next to one–Albert Park has this interesting entryway, and we did a quick walk by after our excellent lunch at the museum cafe.

Our hotel has two things going for it: a great location near the harbor, and a spectacular view from the restaurant on the 13th floor.

I told told you you could see the sky tower from everywhere!

We had just enough time for a brief walk around the waterfront before joining our group for dinner.  This picture is for our former host, Norman, to show him that we actually DID see some tall ships!

New Zealand is an amazing country with many things the USA could learn from, but their wifi isn’t one of them. It is very limited, and blogging is a challenge. So, uploads are being done on the fly, and proof reading is a luxury to be reserved for better connections and more time. Typos will become a regular feature!