We take a Hop-On-Hop-Off to in Auckland.

We have definitely not got our internal clocks set yet.  At 4am, we woke and tried to go back to sleep but by 5:30am we were all up.  At 6:30am, we went to breakfast at the hotel and it was great.  We were very satisfied.

We called the Hop-on-Hop-Off company and found out we had to go to the #1 stop first and NOT the one closest to us to join the bus even though we had already bought our tickets online.  So we called a taxi to get us downtown. He was very nice and it only cost $20 NZ including tip. That would be just under $13 US Dollars.  Cheap for a taxi for three people across town.  We missed out on getting a donut.  I am amazed at how many US food companies are represented everywhere we have traveled around the world.

The Auckland Explorer Bus was a bit of a disappointment.  Not the buses or the people but the low number of busses running the route caused long waits.  It was not unusual for us to wait 45 minutes or even an hour before the next bus.  Lots of wasted time.
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We toured around town and got off to tour Bastion Point Savage Memorial.  It had very pretty views with large open grass areas.  Michael Joseph Savage Memorial.  Mr. Savage was a Prime Minister who is known to have worked to protect the native people of New Zealand known as the Māori. 

--- Warning Beginning Rant. ---

This area has a terrible history.  A Māori, native people of New Zealand, village was on the land for a long time and that seemed to not work for the city officials.  They then decided that it would be better to relocate the village members and BURN DOWN THE VILLAGE.  Really! And this was in 1952’s.  NOT 1800s. Why?  Because Queen Elizabeth II was visiting and they thought that the village was “a dreadful eyesore”.  Oh and the Queen was coming to show off how good the New Zealand’s race relations were at the time.  REALLY!

Just to make it clear how ridiculous the people were who ordered the village burned down, they did this less than 10 years after the monument was completed to, Michael Savage, a man who fought for the Māori peoples rights.  I guess they liked the memorial just not the people he tried to protect. 

Well after the land became an unofficial 60 acre park the city council in 1976 thought “Hey that land we forced an entire village of Māori to move to would be a great place for rich people to build homes."  It seems the council was surprised when hundreds of Māori came from all over to protest.  For 506 days, they stayed on the land. In 1977, the council approved a new plan to leave the land as Sacred and that there would never be anything built on the land.

The protesters did not immediately leave and on May 25, 1978, 600 police with some soldiers in army vehicles forced the protesters on buses and bulldozed the protest site.  Powerful governments taking advantage of native people is a world wide thing not just something that happened in our country. 

--- End Rant. ---

We waited much longer than expected but finally a bus came to take us down from the point to the SEA LIFE Kelly Tarlton's Aquarium to see Penguins.   Yep, not the zoo but the Aquarium.  Seems a strange choice but the display was amazing.

Kelly Tarlton worked hard to get the Aquarium built. He was a well known diver and archaeologist.  The large walk through display in the Aquarium is made from unused sewage tanks. He worked to design an innovative marine Aquarium and that his “tunnel” would four times larger than any other in the world. He died at 47 just under 2 months after the Aquarium's opening.

The Aquarium begins with some equipment from an Antarctica expedition.  There is a walk-through replica of Captain Robert Falcon Scott's Antarctic hut.  There are authentic memorabilia of the expedition from over 100 years ago.

From there we enter a spinning tunnel of “ice” that really throws off your balance and ends with the Penguins.

We were able to watch King and Gentoo Penguins swim, walk about, and be fed just inches on the other side of a glass wall.

We were just in time to see the penguins being fed.

There was a glass tunnel where you have sharks, rays, and fish all around and above you.

From the tunnel we moved to smaller tanks with lots of fish and other animals.

We walked out of the Aquarium to the bus stop for another long wait.

Our last stop of the day was the Auckland War Memorial Museum.  The museum is in the middle of a huge park on an old volcano.  It is an impressive museum.  There are 3 floors of displays. 

We start on the ground floor which is dedicated to local history and the Māori people.

Also on the ground floor was a restaurant and we were ready for something to eat.

The pizza and fish was great. Look close at the contents of the Coke.  Outside the USA Coke is JUST Coke. There is no need to have a Chemistry degree to understand the ingredients. Everything has a simple list of contents. Could we have this at home? Please!  Oh and it tastes a lot better too.

With full stomachs, we start our tour of the museum.

​The ground floor has a large area dedicated to the Māori people which includes a huge canoe and many displays of carvings and what would have been used in village life.

We walked around the corner and there was Moana's boat.  Okay, it was the style Māori ​  boat used for the cartoon.  Hey, maybe this one.

Even a log drum. Sure, I was tempted but no I did not bang the drum.

We continued on to see more of the skills the Māori people have at weaving and carving.

The second floor is mostly natural history.  Animals from dinosaurs to modern animals of New Zealand and other parts of the world.  This included the Giant flightless bird that was hunted to extinction by the Māori people long before Europeans “discovered” New Zealand.  Those birds were enormous.  Much larger than an Ostrich.

The entire third floor is dedicated to Wars that New Zealand had been involved which included the World Wars.  Betty was just too tired for us to tour that floor. We returned to the hotel by cab as it would have been a long walk back.

Back at the hotel to rest and recover for tomorrow.  We had dinner in the hotel restaurant.  It was very good.