DAY 4
Week 1
AUCKLAND (Auckland, NZ)
Tuesday October 24th, 2006
TODAYS MILEAGE – 15 miles or 24 kilometres
TRIP MILEAGE – 7808 miles or 12566 kilometres
Looks like I'm over my jet lag – I got up at my normal time of 5AM 
As silly as it sounds, I like nothing better than heading out at sunrise to feel a city/town/camp site slowly awakening to greet a new day. Auckland awaken to the sun coming across the harbor and you feel like you have the city to yourself as there is no traffic at all. The smell of the city is as though someone had just cut the lawn after it had rained. If you've been to any major US city, you can appreciate the sweet smell of this Pacific city.
I spent a couple of hours just walking around the downtown and harbor of the city before feeling a bit peckish. If you're ever in Auckland, head across the road from Sky City Casino and you'll find a little hole-in-the-wall joint called Brucie's Diner.
As you can fathom, Brucie is the owner, chief cook & bottle washer and always good for a yarn. Wanna tell me where else you can get a hot cooked breakfast consisting of bacon, eggs, a snag (sausage), ½ a tom tit (tomato), 2 pieces of toast and a diet coke for $8.00??? What better way to start the day???
After Brucie's, I walked across the road to Sky City Casino and took the elevator up the 60 floors to the Sky Tower Main Observation Level. Standing at 328 metres and billed as the tallest tower in the Southern Hemisphere, it has three main observation levels. The Main Observation Level (MOL) is at 186 metres and costs $20.00 to gain access. For an extra $3.00 more, you can take another elevator 9 floors up from the MOL to the Skydeck Viewing Platform (SVP) which is 220 metres from the street.
For $145.00 you can climb the last 50 metres up to the Vertigo Climb Viewing Platform (VCVP). The price includes access to both the MOL and SVP as well. Should you want to stretch the legs (and lung capacity for that matter) you can take the 1029 step up to the MOL, rather than the comfort of traveling at 18 kilometre an hour on the 40 second lift ride.
Dougy Doug (who is 1/3 of the 4 Skin Divers Minus 1) flew in from Denver (Colorado) via Sydney (Australia) and finally makes his way to the room. We are going to take week and travel together to Wellington (New Zealand) for the Golden Oldies Rugby Festival. Can you say road trip??
We decided to wander around the downtown and grab a bite to eat before heading over to One Tree Hill that overlooks Auckland city. You are only 15 minutes from the centre of the downtown, but it looks and feels like you've landed in the middle of England's countryside. The stone walls, roaming sheep & cattle as well as lush green rolling paddocks all seem to make you feel like you're in the Northern Hemisphere.
Seeing as it was after working hours, we ducked into an Irish pub to undertake the vital study of the splitting of the beer atom. We managed to garner the attention of this Pommy git, who was intent on telling us just how good he is in the field of medical software and it's support. Both Dougy Doug and myself filled all the holes in his statements with clear logic to the point that his drinking mates took him aside and obviously told him to pull his head in.
Dinner was had a joint called Mai Thai and we were both impressed with the meals we had. We both concurred that it was some of the best Thai we've had, but you wouldn't want to go there for the service – as there was none!!!
• AUCKLAND (Auckland, NZ)
• AUCKLAND ~ Sky City (Auckland, NZ)
• AUCKLAND ~ One Tree Hill (Auckland, NZ)