AUCKLAND - NEW ZEALAND

I found it strange that the cheapest flight I could get from Sydney to Auckland was with Emirates but I was not complaining. Getting into New Zealand was a hell of a lot easier than Australia, no lengthy questioning about my travel history or travel plans. Stayed in a suburb called Parnell in a small homely kind of hostel.

First impressions of Auckland were nothing special, just an average big city. There were 4 other Brits in my room so we ended up going to an Irish bar nearby for a couple of hours and had a good night out.


The following day the display packed up on my camera but it still worked apart from having to guess when you were taking pictures. I would manage for the rest of the trip (another 13 months) and still taken good pictures. At night 6 of us headed down to a bar near the harbour that was full of locals and again we had a good night.

Moved into a big base backpackers hostel in the city center because I had some official things to sort out such as bank accounts and tax numbers and they could help without that sort of thing. Got my bank account sorted which was good but my accommodation was a bit of a nightmare. It may sound strange but the more people there are in a hostel the more difficult it was to meet people. Apart from the 2 people in my room I didn't really get to know anyone and had the feeling I was completely anonymous among the hundreds of people that were there.
I seen a street protest by a load of Tamils about what was happening in Sri Lanka. One thing I was expecting to see was lots of obvious Maori people but Auckland seemed to be full of people from far east Asia.
Didn't hang around Auckland long because I knew I would be going back there again.