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| Musick Point Bluff |
Day 7: Tuesday, October 20
Exploring the many varied and rich suburbs of Adelaide by car with Aunt Sujata. They have schools on beach cliff sides! Could you even imagine?
Things to Note:
Things to Note:
- Auckland is built on a series of ancient volcanoes and islands. It is sprawling, one of the largest cities in the world. The volcanic "mounts" are everywhere, within and without the city, and easy spotted. Each boosts spectacular views at the top, and all are worth visiting. The surrounding parks boast trails, both paved and unpaved for walkers, joggers, and mountain bikers (mountain biking is huge in NZ, possibly bigger than road, though this is purely anecdotal). The parks also contain a varied mixture of flora and fauna (though NZ is not lacking that anywhere), wildlife (hello, sheep!), and family activities (archery, anyone?). NZ apparently split from Pangaea at a very early stage, and did not develop the pests that other continents (ahem, Australia!) did. I never even spotted a fly (though I hear there's a particularly large variety on the South Island). They feel perfectly comfortable bush walking in bare feet (must explain the hobbits) there because there are literally no snakes.
- Kiwis are also huge outdoors people (they did invent bungee jumping, after all), and if you enjoy exploring on foot and being outside, NZ will definitely be satisfying for you.
- I can't go without saying how much I appreciated the level to which they were integrating and growing to respect the Maori culture. This is a total outsider's perspective and I did not have much time to explore this, but the relationship much healthier and much more beautiful than that of the relationship between Australians and Aboriginals, or even in the U.S. with the Native Americans. The Maori influence on places and culture seemed everywhere, and I noticed how much Kiwis tried to use the Maori names for things.
- NZ also has a much cooler and wetter climate than Oz. I was expecting much the same, but I had to wear a "puffer" jacket the entire time I was there. The climate resembled that of Seattle more than anything else I could think of.
- Australia and NZ are much more different than I expected, and much more similar in ways I did not expect. Out of all the cities in Australia, however, I think Adelaide actually resembled the vibe of NZ, although literally nowhere else in the world came compare to the beauty of NZ.
Activities:
- Slept in till the ripe ol' time of 7 AM, ate breakfast, and then headed out by vehicle with Sujata.
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| View from my room. I admit, I totally got spoiled. |
- We explored 3 mounts and the memorials atop each:
- One Tree Hill, now known as "none tree hill" after someone decided to chop the non-indigenous tree there down... the city still hasn't decided what tree to plant in its stead
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| Suji and me |
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| It was windy, okay? |
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| Memorial at One Tree. You can see the little enclosed area where the one tree should be. The even littler thing is me. |
- Mount Eden, which boasts a cool world map on a circular tableau, detailing cities and distances between Auckland and each destination
- Savage Park, with its beautiful gardens and reflective pool by the grave of John Savage
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| Savage Park gardens |
- We stopped in the town of Mt. Eden to enjoy freshly basked thai-peanut masala mussels and local beer. Side note: the craft beer industry in NZ appears to be booming and their beers are damn good. I brought back several. We also explored the shops in this quaint town, stopping in to grab a few baked goods (oh yum yum yum these are Paris good) and some local fruit. None of the purchased goods lasted long ;)
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| Mmmmmmuscles! |
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| Champagne cake inside a local bakery. Had to snap a pic for Belinda and Aunt Murph. |
- Climbed up Musick Point Reserve. There's a building with an old radio station inside that local kid's clubs still use on weekends. There's also a climb down to see some fantastic ocean-side views. See the picture at the top of this page? That was there.
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| I said I was most definitely not interested in the plant life so we could skip the botanic gardens. So of course I spent my entire time going around NZ asking "What's this?!" as a spied another marvelous specimen. SMH. |
- Sat in a local coffee shop in a little cafe by a bay while we waited to pick up Sujata's youngest son, Syon, from school. The Italian Coffee Culture is strong here, too, and I was yet again relegated to sipping on long blacks...
End-of-day:
- Had an amazing walk with Sujata and Aunt Suchi (Suji's younger sister - typical Indian family has Sujata, Vivek and their two boys living with Suchi and Suji and Suchi's mom, whom I referred to as Granny). We strolled along the Beachlands path for an hour, walking past amazing scenery, including beach views, mountain views, parks full of school children, a camping ground full of campers, a goat ranch, all before we turned onto the beach itself and walked the beach entirely back to home. (NOTE: Wildlife preservation is HUGE in NZ, and they are apparently doing it well. You know how you go to the beach in the US and struggle to find a seashell? I thought the beach was littered with pebbles until we walked on it. Then I realized all those thousands and thousands of pebbles were actually seashells! More than I've ever seen in my life. There was live sealife there, too. I stumbled across a live clam. They told me Kiwis are allowed to pick up 50 mussels, clams, whatever off the beaches and eat them at leisure. I didn't take the little guy, but I was enthralled).
- Ate dinner at home with the fam, courtesy of Granny. Home-cooked Indian food! At last! I was thrilled.
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