Auckland 9.23.2009

I arrived into Auckland around 6pm after a long day of waiting at the airport before the flight. It took far less time than I had accounted for and had to spend a couple hours wandering around the terminal. Upon arriving in Auckland, it was already dark and raining. I caught the airbus into town, found my hotel and dropped things off.

Now, I had chosen the hotel for its location in the CBD, price, and the fact that it had a kitchen. Eating out every meal for an entire week sounded expensive and not very appealing. The hotel, however, made you rent kitchen equipment. So in my cheap mode of not wanting to bother, I opted to use just the glasses, spoon, tea kettle, microwave and mini fridge that the room was already equipped with. It actually worked out pretty well.

I took a walk around the city to find a grocery store. There were numerous convenience stores, but it took quite a while to find a grocery store--and that grocery store ended up being in the Asian part of town, so I stocked up on produce and was pleased to have such a vast selection of soy milk and fine teas to choose from.

After taking the food back to the hotel and stocking my refrigerator, the rain started to let up. Given the two hour time change, I was far from tired. I decided to walk along the water, by the docks, and see the lights of Devonport across the harbor. My inner 4-year-old found excitement in watching forklifts loading and unloading crates on the dock as I passed. There weren't many people out, and the mixture of quiet, city lights, crashing waves and drizzling rain made the walk very refreshing.