Auckland

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Saturday, February 25, 2017

It has been a long week and a long trip to get to our first scheduled tour of the trip. We went down and enjoyed a lavish buffet breakfast in the lobby of the Stamford Plaza. It is included. We were met promptly at the front door near 9am by a driver with Hallmark Limos.. Their deal is that they buy used government cars so this one used to be used by the prime minister. We did not know but it drew a lot of attention and our driver/guide explained. It was an adequate 4 hour overview. We were both very happy that we had been here before. We did see things that we had missed before so that is the upside.

We got dropped off at the Ferry Building a half Km or so from the hotel on a wild goose chase for a Tip Top ice cream scoop shop. Otherwise known as a dairy. We had been to one near the cruise port last time but evidently there aren't any anymore. According to the woman at the Visitor's Desk in the Ferry Building, the closest one now would be over in Devonport on the other side of the bay where we had started our tour this morning and where we had discussed where to be dropped off and why because we wanted to get Tip Top ice cream! Our driver also advised us not to plan to return to the Food Alley for dinner because it was a place for Asian workers and would be closed tonight since it is Saturday. I really wanted a BBQ pork steamed bun that I had missed getting last night. It was open and still had BBQ pork buns but was out of red bean paste buns when we walked by so we went in and got them instead of ice cream. As we were headed into the hotel to eat them hot, I noticed a "dairy" about where we had parked down the block across the street. When we finished the buns we went back out. They didn't serve scoops but it was like a convenience store with twice the freezer space of the other Tip Top coolers we had checked. We were looking for Hokey Pokey. I had it before here and Clay didn't. We found a version on a stick and we were both satisfied.

We have our last  of 2 nights here tonight and have an early start tomorrow. We are supposed to be picked up by bus tomorrow between 7am and 7:15am. Breakfast buffet starts at 6am. We'll have to be fed, packed up and checked out by 7am. We did get a confirmation letter slipped under our door this afternoon by tomorrow's tour provider so that is a good sign. We are supposed to be taken to Hobbiton and Waitomo Glow worm caves on our way to our next 2 night hotel in Rotorua. Fingers crossed since Hobbiton is one of the main reasons we came back to New Zealand.

I will close for now and get this posted.

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