Bird poo

Since I plan to be here in Auckland for awhile, I'm taking it pretty easy so far. As proof: I arrived in Auckland on Tuesday around midday and met up right away with James, my CS host. He was on his way to visit his 93 year old grandmother and asked me if I wanted to come with. Sure, why not? Within a few hours of my arrival, I'd met James, his cousin, and his grandmother, all Kiwis through and through (well, except for grandma, but she's lived here for more than 50 years, so that's close enough). James had other couchsurfers staying with him, but they were out when we returned to his house so we spent the night listening to music and talking about our various travels. It was a chill, low-key, but still fun way to spend the evening.


Low-key was just what I needed since I woke up Wednesday morning and went for an adrenaline rush first thing. If you've been around here for awhile then maybe you've figured out by now that the bird poo title is in reference to my father's thoughts on bungee jumping and, if you've gotten that far, you've probably also figured out that I did another bungee jump.

I hadn't planned on it, actually, but the Marshes told me that there was a winter special and you could jump off the Auckland Harbour Bridge two times for the price of one. So it was their fault (and with their encouragement) that I decided to go ahead and make it three bungee jumps in three weeks time. :-)


These two jumps were from one-third the height as the last one, but I jumped in different ways each time, so all three jumps were totally different. I got the added bonus of walking up the bridge to the jump off pod, getting views of the Auckland skyline along the way. It was first thing in the morning, it was crisp and clear, and I was the only one jumping; what a way to start the day!


Afterwards, when my legs were no longer jelly, I walked to the area of city center known as Sky City where the Sky Tower is located. Sky Tower is the tallest structure in the southern hemisphere (328m) which means that I've now seen the tallest structures in both hemispheres (although one is actually the tallest in the world and beats out the Sky Tower by quite a bit). I had fun snapping pics and had the same happy I'm-in-a-city feeling that I had last week in Wellington.

Like I said, I'm taking it pretty easy, so not much else exciting was on the agenda for the rest of the day. I ran a couple of errands and hung out with James and a couple of other couchsurfers. Oh! And I tried hokey pokey ice cream, a New Zealand tradition!