Saturday, May 28, 2011

On to our last New Zealand stop... Auckland!

We had to return the rental car the same day that we saw Hobbiton.  So after our tour there, we had to get in the car and drive like crazy to get to Auckland in time to drop the car off.


Kim did not do much driving throughout our trip but she had to put some time behind the wheel before we turned the car in.  (It is amazing how different it can be driving on the opposite side of the road!)

Welcome to Auckland!


Experience the Sky Tower from which you can have a 360 degree view of the city, eat at a restaurant, buy souvenirs, or jump off of it and get that nice feeling of losing your stomach.  (Out of all of the options, Jake and I opted to stay at the bottom and enjoy the views from there.)


The view of the Sky Tower from our hostel.

The inside of St. Mary's Church in downtown Auckland.


Jake posing by a local kiwi statue while we were doing some last minute souvenir shopping.


The two of us next to the harbor.  Some of the boats were amazing!


There just happened to be a 'buskers" street festival in town.  We had no idea what that meant until we walked around and found street entertainers from all over the world on various corners throughout downtown.  Apparently, in New Zealand/Aussie English "to busk" is to entertain others on the street (hoping they will give you a donation).  Who knew?


Our view of downtown during our dinner the last night we were in Auckland.  


We were eating our last "foreign" meal.  We ordered kebabs and were eating them on the lawn of a building close to our hostel.  We couldn't believe that the next day we were finally going home to the United States!

1 comment:

  1. Hey, Deborah Schug has given me your contact info before but I've lost it. Pete and I are headed to PNG w/ WA in August and would love to talk with you sometime this month if you're still in Billings. See me an email at peter_schug [at] wycliffeassociates [dot] org

    Look forward to hearing from you.
    Rebecca

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