Auckland really reminds me of Seattle. The similarities are quite staggering actually. I am only here for two days but I can already tell that I wish I had another day or two.
I arrived last night but I didn’t get in until 11 PM local time. And I guess I thought it would be a good idea to sleep at the airport because I didn’t book a hostel for the night. It actually turned out to be a not-so-terrible decision. I have to save money where I can I guess.
No jet lag either. It worked out extremely well because by the time I landed it was time to sleep in Hawaii also. It’s just in New Zealand an additional day had passed. Crossing the International Date Line will do that.
When I woke up I chatted with a couple from Oregon and they suggested that I look into car transfers. When a rental car or camper van company needs to move their assets from one location to another they will let people drive them for very cheap. But usually, you have to travel a route that is not popular with tourists. I will look into it but it seems unlikely that it will work for me.
I had some time to kill before officially checking into the hostel. So I dropped my bag off and hopped onto one of the street scooters they have here. Similar to the Lime or Bird scooters you see out on the west coast. It’s fairly cheap but they are terrible going up hills. And Auckland happens to be fairly hilly.
I drove it down to the harbor and walked around for a bit. It’s a really nice area and everyone was out and about. Today is Waitangi Day which is the anniversary of the signing of the Treaty of Waitangi. The treaty was an agreement of cooperation between the European colonizers and the Maori, the indigenous people of New Zealand.
I am reading a book about the history of New Zealand and knew all about this. I just didn’t realize that it was the day that I arrived. They are having a few events in the evening here so I will probably head to one of them sometime after dinner.