Day 23 - Auckland

Since the last entry, we traveled by train to Christchurch, spent the evening packing our bikes in bubble wrap and getting ready to head to north island for our final days. Exhausted after hours of unbolting racks and fenders in the dark (our train was late and we had to work on the bikes on the lawn outside our hostel in the dark), we hung out with an energetic family from 'Good old England' playing cards and burning through a whole lot of beer. We were so sad to leave the south island and be packing our bikes.

So on to Auckland by plane, staying at the Bamber house, a large colonial in the Mt. Eden neighborhood (which to Dan and I was pleasantly reminiscent of the Elmwood neighborhood of Berkeley). Dinner on Mt. Eden road felt a lot like College Avenue only smaller scale. Posonby St. had the feeling of Melrose Ave. in LA, and downtown Auckland is a bit hilly with a wharf and harbor giving it a bit of an SF feel. Overall, this city made us feel right at home with all of the things we love about the Bay area but all very close together. We found out later from some folks we met over dinner that a lot of the architecture was borrowed from San Francisco and the bay area, and many of the original architects were California transplants. So it made sense, but was unexpected for us how much we would love it.

For the first time, we rented a car and are driving on the left! Dan is driving and is doing great save the one incident where he was trying to remember which side the turn signals were on our car at home (vs. the rental), and he started visualizing driving at home. He did this while driving. Guess which side of the road he ended up on...???