Day 09 - Thu 18Apr2024 - Bay of Islands, NZ

 After two failed previous tries on other cruises, we quietly sailed into the Bay of Islands which are located north of Auckland.  After anchoring and deploying the tenders, the water shuttle operations began which dropped passengers at the little pier at Waitangi.  As for us, we were on a Princess shore excursion called Waipoua Footprints.  After meeting in the Princess Theatre at 8:50am we were escorted down to the water shuttle platform.  We were totally surprised that there were only 6 people on the excursion including Susan Beard, the onboard Destination Specialist.  We had a pretty long hour and 20 minute drive out to the Waipoua Kauri Forest with a brief stop to pick up our two Maori guides.  However the drive was quite scenic and allowed us a view of the rustic side of New Zealand.




Max, our Maori guide

At the forest we had to clean our shoes and could only walk on raised pathways as there is a disease that has been introduced that kills plant life on the ground.  Tāne Mahuta is the name of the  kauri (pronounced Cody like Wild Bill Cody) tree that is the largest remaining specimen. Max, our Maori guide gave us lots of historical information about the tree which is 2,500 years old and its connection to the Maori people.  This species first grows tall and skinny to pierce the forest canopy and then grows in diameter.  Tāne Mahuta is about 14 feet in diameter and 169 feet tall.  This species was aggressively logged especially for replacement masts for ships.  We spent about 40 minutes at the tree before heading back to the ship.  Along the way we stopped for a refreshment break, a viewpoint, and a stop at the 1830 Mission House at Te Waimate.  The grounds, Mission House and church were beautiful along with a very tranquil cemetery but the mission house and church were closed and only open Friday-Monday. 

Mission House 


Norfolk Pine


Back at the pier, Angela and I along with another tour participant hopped on a shuttle bus that took us over to the nearby little town of Paihia.  It was filled with souvenir shops, restaurants and other businesses to support the local economy.  We shopped and also enjoyed some fish & chips for a late lunch.  We caught the next to last water shuttle and had a great conversation with Zooey and Nick from Australia on the boat ride.  We didn't get back on board until 5:30pm, and dropped our packs and cameras off in the stateroom and watched the final preparations for our departure.  Darkness here comes around 6pm so the watching was pretty slow.  For dinner we just had some salad as we were still stuffed from the fish and chips.





Our 7:30pm entertainment was a variety show of Scot Robin, vocalist and Patrick Roberts, violinist.  Both were excellent and the show took all of an hour compared to the normal 45 minutes.  We wanted to go to the 8:30 first act of the Irish comedian, William Caufield.  That show was packed so we did the game show "loosely" modeled after Survivor.  It was pretty dorky although some of the challenges were interesting.  We then attended William's 10:30pm show in the Vista Lounge which was quite good and very well attended.


Tomorrow is Auckland and our last New Zealand stop on this voyage.  We have an interesting shore excursion planned and we'll do some exploring on our own.

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 28 - Mon 06May2024 - At Sea to Vancouver, BC - Day 4

Image
 Today I made the transition to long pants to accompany the sweatshirt I'm generally wearing during the day around the ship.  It's 5-6 degrees colder this morning with an outside temperature of 56ºf at wake-up time.  We attended our normal Bible study session this morning and it was the first of two days of sharing as many of the people are getting off in Vancouver in a few days.  3 men shared.  One was a former federal agent severely burned in a helicopter training accident; the second shared about becoming a Christian on his way back from a second tour in Vietnam, and the 3rd fellow shared about his volunteer work in disaster relief around the world.  Ron will continue with a Revelation study for the following 3 days starting on Wednesday. Our first enrichment lecture this morning was all about bears and Mark Harris had a really concise presentation about the 3 types of bears: black, grizzly, & polar. Lewis Lucke followed up with a great presentation ...
Read more

Day -2 Mon 08April2024 City Tour

Image
 After we collected our luggage and surrendered our entry documents, we made our way to the luggage truck which was positioned beside the tour coach parking spot.  We left our luggage and boarded the second coach to depart.   We were taken on a city tour which lasted until 3pm when we were dropped off at our hotel.  I'll not describe all of the places except to say we had several photo stops for the Sydney Bridge and Opera house, a lot of downtown, a visit to Mrs. Macquarie's chair, and a 1.5 hour stop at Bondi Beach for a lunch break.  We enjoyed a nice plate of mixed meat from a döner shop and it was so filling we skipped dinner. Mrs. Macquarie's Chair An Ibis After checking in and reaching our room, there was no remote to control the TV.  It took two calls and 45 minutes to get a replacement.  Our room is on the 17th floor and has a great view of the Opera House. We even got to watch the P&O Pacific Explorer depart on a 4 day cruise. I kept awak...
Read more

Day -3 Sat-Sun 06April2024

Image
 At long last our 2024 Sydney, Australia trip is underway.  And to quote the title of a CS Lewis novel, we've been surprised by joy! In fact gobsmacked!  A few days ago we learned that long time motorcycle friends, the Beards, are already in Sydney preparing to join the Majestic Princess on Wednesday like we are. Twelve years ago we sailed on a cruise with them and 3 other couples that we knew from our motorcycle group but we didn't know those 4 couples would be on the cruise until shortly before the start of the cruise.  We had a terrific 3 week cruise with them and we are looking forward to another with the Beards. Our son, Ken, took us to the airport a bit earlier than normal for our first leg flight departing at 7:40pm to San Francisco (SFO).  While we were checking in I heard a familiar voice behind me exclaim, "That's the Bowman's".  I turned around and long time friends, the Hays, were in line to check in for the same flight and trip.  We go bac...
Read more