A walk through Auckland

      Sunday, February 4, 2018

     Our third day in NZ- we are still pinching ourselves.

     We had an out-of-this-world experience (literally) at the Auckland Night Market last night, held in an underground carpark (aka parking lot), where there were many stalls of unfamiliar and hence fascinating Thai, Chinese, Japanese, and Polynesian food.  Morgan started with Thai prawn kebabs, and ended with chicken gua bao.  I watched the crowds of people, many of them of Asian descent.  There was live music, and vendors selling wares.  Morgan got a pair of sturdy beach sandals.  Through it all, the steadily falling rain outside the garage added a cool and refreshing touch to the smokes of the numerous steadily burning bbq grills.

      This morning we woke excited to finalize Morgan's camper van purchase.  We met the German kids (Vincent and Paula) with their camper van at the pre-purchase motor vehicle inspection center, then brought them back to our place with us while the van was getting inspected.  We talked with them for two hours, and solved all world problems right away.  My next trip may have to be to Germany.  I know many good things about it now.

      The van passed the major inspection hurdles, with only a few minor issues (needs oil change, wheel alignment and replacement shock absorbers - called "bump stops" here - and a few other things) that Vincent and Paula agreed to take care of at their expense.  Morgan planned the repairs for tomorrow morning, at which time the cost will be taken off the purchase price, and she and Vincent will finalize the title transfer, insurance and payment.  Vincent offered to give her all of his discount cards for petrol and groceries that he accumulated since he was here.
   

   

   In the afternoon, Morgan and I returned the rental car to Avis in downtown Auckland, and then walked around the city, through streets we had read about.  We ate at an awesome Thai buffet (we cooked the meat ourselves at the hibachi grill built into our table), shopped at the Sky Tower lobby shop, walked up High Street, browsed at Unity Books, had a beer at Vulture's Lane, and stopped to watch a comedian/street entertainer who juggled knives while standing on a ladder and taught us to count in Roman -"eye", "eye, eye", "eye, eye, eye" (I, II, III).  We walked through beautiful Albert Park, past the grounds of Auckland University, and kept going, right back to our flat.  We had thought we would call an Uber at some point after we dropped off the car, and instead, ended up walking about 3 miles in all.   The weather was beautiful, about 70 degrees with a refreshing breeze, and it never rained, despite the weather reports that had called for thunderstorms in the afternoon.  We talked about the beautiful day, the tall Kauri tree we saw on a hill in the middle of a residential area, and how we are still pinching ourselves.

 

 hillside Kauri tree