Back to Auckland

We arrived back in Auckland a few days ago and thought we had better have a proper look around this time, instread of just mooching up and down Queens St (in the centre). So yesterday we booked on the free city tour with Stray (the tour operator that we have been travelling around New Zealand with). Dribbles turned up to meet us with his bright orange bus and it was hugs all round.

Auckland is actually a very nice city, gorgeous harbour and scenic views of dormant volcanos. We stopped at an ice-cream shop to try the hokey-pokey which is a vanillary tasting ice-cream with some crunchy bits in it. This is when the day went a bit wrong for an american girl on our bus - she was too busy eating her ice-cream and not looking whilst crossing the road. So she got hit by a car!

I obviously went to have a look, but she told me that she didn't need any "candy stripper/dr wannabe" helping her. I left her then with her mate as it turns out they were both ICU nurses, but I did tell her that she was going to need an operation for her broken foot, which she didn't seem to chuffed about. She really was a horrible person, all we can think of is KARMA!

That little incident spoilt the rest of the day,so Dribbles took us to the pub for the remaining few hours. This turned into a large one for our last night in New Zealand. We are off to Melbourne in a few hours.

We love New Zealand and will definitely be coming back - especially as we may have blagged ourselves a couple of free Stray passes for next time. Last night we ended up having a few beers with the owner of Stray (who set up and used to own the OZ and Kiwi experience) Neil, who was very lovely and showed me some pictures of places that Stray were going to be using next year. I was obviously outraged that they were going to be staying in nicer places and I had now finished my pass (although it doesn't expire til next march), so he offered us free passes whenever we come back to New Zealand.