NZ Day 3 in Auckland

Sunday! Lazy start to the day, skyping with Tristan and Sean and showing them the view from Innes and Rita’s windows and decks. In the afternoon Innes had a golf game and we took the ferry and tour to Rangitoto Island, off Auckland. This island is volcanic, last erupting 500 years ago. Its a classic cone with fairly shallow slopes. The tour, in a carriage behind a tractor, circles the peak, allowing a walk up to the top and around the crater, which is completely vegetated now. The track goes through several lava patches. At first they look like dried ploughed earth, but then you realise it is actually solid rock! There are a few cottages (Batches) on the island, but they will all revert to nature when the current owners give them up – they can’t be passed on or sold. The Department of Conservation has been aggressively poisoning and hunting anything that moves on the island for the last 20 years. Possums, rats, rabbits, mice…any non-indigenous mammals (and there are no indigenous New Zealand ground mammals!). Then they are reintroducing some of the native bird species that these mammal invaders have decimated over the years.
Sunday evening was the final of the Cricket World Cup, Australia vs. New Zealand in Sydney. unfortunately NZ won the toss, elected to bat first and promptly lost 3 wickets very cheaply and were all bowled out for ~150. Australia overtook that easily. The neighbours, Alistair and Jackie, joined us for dinner watching the game.
Unfortunately, at this time, I cant find the photos from this day or the next…