Saturday 14th January 2023
This morning we thought we’d visit the Sky Tower. On the way, we passed by Top Rolls Vietnamese Street Food so decided to share a Bahn mi for breakfast. The roast pork Bahn mi was amazing, probably the best we’ve tasted since leaving Vietnam.
We continued to the Sky Tower, and were surprised by how quiet it was. Apparently it gets much busier in the afternoon.
We went up to the main observation deck on the 60th floor. This deck has a glass floor, which is pretty cool as you look directly down onto the street below.
We then went up to the sky deck on the 68th floor. I preferred this deck, there were much fewer people and so you had great unobstructed views over the whole of Aukland.
We next went to Auckland Art Gallery Toi o Tāmaki, which is free to enter. There’s a wide variety of art on display, from both New Zealand and international artists. I really enjoyed this gallery, it’s well worth visiting if you’re in Aukland.
On the balcony of the upper floor of the gallery was a Mexican arts and food market, which was interesting to wander around. We also got to taste some free food and drink samples which was a nice bonus.
The art museum is right next to Albert Park, so we walked through it. It’s a lovely park with some beautiful displays of flowers and some huge ancient trees. At the far end of the park is the impressive looking University Of Auckland Clock Tower.
We next went to Emily Place Reserve, which is right by our hotel. It’s a very small reserve, but is worth visiting to see the trees that loop over the walkways.
We need to drop off the hire car and then we’re picking up another hire car from the airport. It’s a very inefficient way if doing it, but we found hiring a car for more than 6 days made the price shoot up. So having two separate hire car agreements (with different companies) saved us a few hundred dollars.
We’ve got just enough time to get an early dinner before the hire car is due back, so we go to Firewood Pizza Haven and share a pizza and a cheesy garlic bread. It’s basically a takeaway shop, but they’ve got a couple of tables where you can sit and eat in. The food was excellent, it definitely deserves its 4.9 star google rating.
Right by the hire car place is The Strawberry Farm, which we’d noticed when we first arrived in Aukland. The so fresh fruit strawberry ice cream, which would obviously make a perfect dessert! The queue was huge, but we took this as a good sign and weren’t disappointed. It was lovely ice cream!
We dropped off the car, the got a shuttle to the airport. We went to the Hertz desk to pick up our new hire car, a Toyota Yaris Cross. It was much bigger than any Yaris I’ve ever seen but was a lovely car and when we got inside thought it had a new car smell. Turned on the ignition to find only 25km on the clock, so it literally was a brand new car! Not bad for $45 (about £25) a day.
We’re driving down to Taupo this evening, and stopped off at Huka falls on the way. It was evening by the time we got there (but still very light as it doesn’t get dark until around 9pm) and the car park was already closed so we were literally the only ones there. It’s a stunning waterfall, not particularly high but the sheer volume and velocity of the water was impressive.
Our accommodation for the night was an Airbnb just outside Taupo. It was in the middle of nowhere but was such an idyllic setting and had a huge comfortable room with a separate sitting area. I’m very glad we chose it over somewhere in central Taupo, where we would’ve paid more for a much smaller, more basic room. It was nice to sit on the sofa with a glass of wine before bed, something we’ve not been able to do very often!
Emma and Pete’s Asian Adventure 