Day 1 – Sydney – Auckland – Pauanui Beach

After an uneventful trip to Sydney last night, and a good night’s sleep at the Airport Rydges, Carly & I made the trek across the road to the International terminal this morning to begin our adventure. A small hiccup occurred at security where Carly was scanned, patted down, tested for gunpowder and other deviant activity…all coming back negative with an errant zipper on her pants being named as the culprit that brought her to the notice of the officials. With all that sorted we grabbed some brekky, had a short wait, and then boarded our flight for Auckland.

A surprisingly pleasant second brekky of a fruit plate on the plane, and a movie later, and we arrived in Auckland safe and sound. After picking up our hire care, and most importantly setting up the much needed Sat Nav, we set off. With me behind the wheel and Carly occupying the navigator’s seat, we amazingly had no problems, wending our way along motorways and country roads alike. One of the things I immediately noticed is that the houses aren’t brick as you would see in Australia. A quick Google search confirmed this is because of potential earthquakes. Happy to say that the earth hasn't moved for us yet.

Within two hours we had arrived at Pauanui Beach where we were booked into a lovely mountainside resort. Our chalet is nestled among the ferns and trees of Pauanui Mountain, a bit of a trek up from the car park certainly, but good exercise after sitting all day none the less. Carly did say “dad would not be enjoying this!”

After checking in we went in search of dinner, first checking out the beach and enjoying the local  scenery. A mix up at a local café meant we waited over an hour for what turned out to be an average tasting pizza. Carly vowed we would trust Trip Advisor unreservedly from now on – this place was lowly rated and our comment of “how bad can it be?” continues to ring in our ears. It was then back to our room where we found the Jets v Melbourne Victory on TV. It could have been a perfect end to the day…but a 2-0 loss put paid to that. A brief wrestle with an errant moth provided some entertainment, (you would have loved it James!),  before we settled in, trying to come to terms with the 2 hour time difference, so a 10pm bedtime Australian time is midnight here…but we can sleep in, so it’s all good.

Posting photos on the blog is way beyond me...not sure how I ever did it before...check Facebook for photos.