Tahiti, New Zealand, and Australia: Exploring New Zealand and Australia

The three siblings

New Zealand

We’ve been to NZ and Australia three times now (Marcia has never been to either country) and love the people and ambiance in each place. They are both real naturalist’s countries, and if you are a hiker, biker, explorer of flora and fauna, these are your places to be.

As we flew into Auckland, we crossed the International Date line, causing us to skip one day forward. Funny how that works! But not to worry; we’ll pick it up again on the return trip.

The beach in Mangawhai Heads

In Auckland, our sister Diane and her husband Mike (Di & Mi) were there to meet us and take us back to their new house in Mangawhai Heads on the North Island of New Zealand, about a two-hour drive north of Auckland. It was good to see our gracious relatives once again; we haven’t seen them since 2013.

Enjoying family in Mangawhai Heads

It’s springtime down under, so we expected the weather to be similar to our own spring back in Pennsylvania. Lots of flowering shrubs and trees, and yes it did rain every day intermittently while we stayed here in NZ. A nice gentle soaking rain that only came in short spurts – not lengthy, heavy downpours. Most of the time, it rained during the night (just like in Camelot).

Over the next few days, we spent a lot of time with Di & Mi catching up, the five of us learning all the new stuff that was happening in each other’s lives.

Lunch at Brick Bay drinking their
fabulous rosé!

Di & Mi took us to lunch at Snell’s Beach in the town of Warkworth, about an hour’s drive from their home in Mangawhai. “Brick Bay Vineyards” had a vineyard and wines of course, as well as a lengthy glass house where lunch was served, surrounded by well-manicured, jungle-y greenery, walking trails, ponds, magnificent flora, and art sculptures placed at various locations throughout the landscape.

Hiking through the Sculpture Walk at Brick Bay Vineyards

Art sculptures in the middle of the woods? Rugged, often-metal or plastic modern art were placed as fun points of interest in strategic locations along what they called a sculpture trail.

Art sculpture in the pond

Before lunch, Mike took us for an hour’s walk thru the woodland along the well-kempt trails to admire the art and the nature. They even included music with Gregorian chants piped in to create the feeling of being in nature’s cathedral.

Lovely water lilies

Water lilies and their colorful spring flowers flourished on each pond’s surface.

At the picnic with friend Bev

One day, Di & Mi put together a barbeque on their outside deck for a group of special folks: Karen and Steve (daughter and son-in-law), Tori (granddaughter), and Bev and Ash (good friends), and of course the three of us.

Bennett's Chocolate Shop!

A highlight of Mangawhai is shopping in the artsy shops and always a visit to Bennett’s Fine Chocolate Shop. Yesssss, we do love their international chocolate selection and try to visit it whenever we’re nearby.

Mike has some fun with the girls
on the beach

Another highlight was walking on the beach at Mangawhai Heads, a gorgeous stretch of soft sand with fascinating sand dunes and rock formations. The water was still cold but that didn’t stop the hearty Kiwi surfers. What a joy it would be to live this close to such a magnificent place.

Anne checks out Di's elevated garden

We were surprised that Diane makes much of her own recipes with fruits and veggies from her garden. She has a unique garden just outside her kitchen window with various edible table items that she picks almost every day for very healthy eating! The waist-high wall design of her garden allows her to harvest food items, weed, fertilize, and/or plant without bending over or getting down on her knees. Great design, and how wonderful to be able to grow all this stuff all year round in the mild NZ climate!

Enjoying an afternoon with the family

Her recipes are artisan quality – like her coleslaw, her plums in her special sauce, and her fritters made with whitebait (an expensive delicacy) made from minnow-like fish. Diane enjoyed telling us that if we looked closely, we could see the little eyeballs still in the whitebait patty (and she wasn’t kidding)!

Gas prices in NZ

One other thing. Frank always tries to get a bead on the average price of some common products in other countries such as this. Obviously, NZ is an island and prices of most things are higher than back in our country. The gasoline prices here are on the order of $6/gallon when you do the math conversions.

Welcome to Oz!

Australia

The next and last phase of our lengthy excursion took the five of us over to Sydney, Australia. Marcia had never been here before either, so she was thrilled to set her little peds on Aussie soil for the 1^st time. Altho the rest of us had been here a number of times, it is always fun to return to Oz (such a cool nickname).

The family in front of the famous Opera House

Of course, the Opera House in Sydney is a major attraction to all. Altho the unique construction and history of its inception is a story for the history books, we will not get into that here. Suffice it to say that, in our humble opinion, this is probably one of the top ten worldwide modern structures.

Our main interest in the Sydney Opera house this time around was seeing a show on stage there. Anne worked her magic and found that the musical “Evita” just happened to be playing the week of our stay in Sydney. So, the five of us got side-by-side tickets in the fifth row from the front. And, the performance was spectacular!!

Seated in the Opera House ready for the show

The songs of Andrew Lloyd Weber were expertly delivered, the view was unimpeded, the seating could not have been better, and the cast were perfect for this politically-charged musical! What an indelible memory to have seen this show, in this venue, with the family!

Purple Jacaranda tree in bloom

The Jacaranda trees accent the Australian countryside at this time of year. The fast-growing purple-flowered native of the tropics is a common sight here on the continent of Australia. We had seen them in other places on other travels, such as Argentina and some Caribbean countries, but they always impress.

Bondi Beach

We took a city bus tour mainly for Marcia but also to refresh our fading knowledge of this Aussy town. The tour included Sydney's most famous beach spot, Bondi Beach.

The famous Sydney Opera House at night from the ferry

A souvenir hunt thru famous Paddy’s Market in downtown Sydney was a fun adventure too. We also checked out the classy restaurants around the Darling Harbor area and took a ferry to Manley Wharf to see the famous Sydney harbor after dark. All fun and memorable things to do with the family.

A toast to our Kiwi relatives!

We hated to end our fun tour thru out the South Pacific, but we all knew we had to go home at some point. With a few toasts of champagne to a wonderful encounter with our Kiwi relatives, we had a lengthy parting of the ways from our hotel room balcony on the 55^th floor.