New Zealand 1988

Saturday 16 April — Auckland

Not much happened till we decided to go for a winery crawl, and that wasn’t much. All the stories of being pressed with copious quantities of samples to facilitate the choice, were written on other days. All the staff we encountered at four establishments were parsimonious in the extreme, a small taste of exactly what you asked for and that was it. Another quiet evening being fed and watered.

Sunday 17 April — Auckland

Al and Claudia had each booked a flight, one at a time, in a Tiger Moth flying from Ardmore in South Auckland, as their anniversary (11 April) present to each other. It had been scheduled for last weekend but was cancelled due to adverse weather conditions. Today was fine and sunny (what happened to the cyclone?) so out to the airfield. It costs $65 for about fifteen minutes flying time within the Ardmore training area. Apparently, the highlights are circling over the airfield and over the Country Club. Claudia was much impressed by the large houses and swimming pools over towards Clevedon.

Then on to Pukekohe for lunch with Vince and Fran, Denise and John. Pauline and Wayne were unable to attend owing to Pauline being offered paying work picking raspberries. Very pleasant afternoon, returned to Henderson for a quiet evening.

Monday 18 April — Auckland

Claudia gave me a lift into town and I went to AVTEC to pick up a couple of processed films and put in another three. Round to the bank in Symonds St to settle my affairs with them The balance in my VISA account was out by thirty cents in my favour, I must have added wrong somewhere. They were quite happy to let me keep the Autoaccess account for a few more days, it can be closed on the spot just before I leave.

Downtown and enquired the cost of hiring a car for next weekend, my last few days in New Zealand. The cheapest way would be to hire the car from Thursday to Friday, then hire again for the weekend till Monday, then hire again for another day till Tuesday, keeping the same car all the time but changing the paperwork.

Then I went to the YHA office to buy a new travel pack, a Macpac Gemini, for a large sum of money, and took the bus back out to Henderson for another quiet evening.

Tuesday 19 April — Auckland to Wellington

I have decided to take my kilt to Wellington. I threw a few bits and pieces into a small bag, Al gave me a lift into Newton and I walked down Queen St to the Airporter terminal at the Downtown Shopping Centre. Went out to the airport early and sat in the bar, where I had a couple of conversations with a man from Barra and a lad from Dunedin.

After we boarded, the pilot announced a half hour delay while we waited for someone to fetch spare parts, not for us but for another plane in Wellington. The flight was reasonable, only a glass of orange juice and a few boiled sweets, I had a window seat and got a good view of the cloud over the sea. However, when we cut the corner over Stratford and Hawera, there was a good view of the summit of Taranaki (Mt Egmont). I also got a view of the Marlborough Sounds and a ferry crossing the Cook Strait as we turned towards Wellington where we landed safely after a bumpy approach.

I took the bus into town, went for a beer, then took the trolley bus up to Karori, the fare has gone up. There was no-one in so I sat in the garden till Anne arrived with William and Hannah. A quiet evening, interrupted only by a trip to the bottle shop for supplies for the morrow (Sue’s birthday).

Hannah was not too bright. Both kids have had chicken pox since my last visit and Hannah now seems to have a heavy cold or some such.

Wednesday 20 April — Wellington

Anne took William to school and Hannah to kindy (she wanted to go although she still looks a bit peaky), then dropped me at the top of the cable car at Kelburn. I walked downhill through various bits of park and side street and pedestrian walkways and made my way to the Indian High Commission to enquire about a visa. It can be done in a day so I went to the British High Commission for a letter of introduction, then got the necessary three passport photos and returned to the Indians, filled in the appropriate forms and left my passport to collect at four.

Into a pub to recover from the shock of spending all that money ($15 for a letter of introduction from the UK embassy, $16.50 for the photos and $52 for the visa). Visited the Maritime Museum by the docks, lots of models and memorabilia of Clyde built ships. The New Zealand model maker is a chap called Flannery who lives in Hawera and seems to do an excellent job.

Back to collect my passport, no problems, then trolley bus up to Karori. Sue and Phil, Elizabeth, Trish, Lee and Steve to tea. Another pleasant evening.

Thursday 21 April — Wellington to Auckland

Someone else’s turn to take William to school. Anne took the Merc to the garage for a warrant, they’ve sold it and the new owner collects this evening. (In New Zealand, any car being sold must have a warrant of fitness (their equivalent of an MOT) issued not more than a month before the sale.)

Hannah was going for an inoculation against Hepatitis B, part of a national campaign to reduce the high incidence of the disease in New Zealand, so I left them at the Kelburn Medical Centre, where half the pre-schoolers in Wellington seemed to be gathered. I wandered down through the Botanic Gardens and the Bolton St Cemetery to the Beehive, then decided to get the bus straight out to the airport and drink there.

At the airport, I couldn’t find the bar so had a cup of tea, and then I found it, still with time for a couple before I checked in at 1145, boarding at 1200 they said, but the flight was delayed for “operational reasons”. Back to the bar. They called for all passengers with international connections today to go to the check-in desk, presumably they get priority, then they cancelled the flight. All passengers to return to check-in. The next flight at 1310 was full but might get a standby. I didn’t, but would be going at 1355.

I decided that I would just hire a car at Auckland and asked the airline to get a message to Claudia not to wait for me. We finally got off the ground at 1405 and headed up the inland route this time. Solid cloud below, just the top of Ruapehu above the clouds. Further north, the cloud was more broken and I could see the odd coastal landmark, Aotea, Raglan Harbours.

I picked up the car at the airport and headed for Henderson. My attempt to cut a corner avoiding most of the city went somewhat awry when I found myself driving along a road that I had already gone along in the other direction. Finally found Henderson, got to Al’s and there was no-one in. Claudia arrived half an hour later, she had waited at the airport till half past two and despite asking at the information desk, did not get my message.

I phoned Scotpac and discussed the question of shipping most of my stuff to Glasgow. Doesn’t seem too much of a problem as I’m not in a hurry to get it there. I’ll pack up and take the stuff over tomorrow. The reason I selected Scotpac is that in scanning the ads for shippers in the Wellington Yellow pages, I had noticed that they have an office in Glasgow. It turned out that that is their head office, though I doubt if many decisions are made there. Certainly no ships sail into the Clyde.

Howard came over in the evening for a few beers and a crack. He’s sailing off for Hawaii or somewhere on Saturday. It was good to see him again before our paths diverge.

Friday 22 April — Auckland

I finished a crude form of packing before I went to bed at about three in the morning. When I got up again, after phoning round a few folk to arrange to dine tomorrow evening, I set off for Scotpac in Mairangi Bay with two cases and a carton containing my chilly bin, full of books and papers.

There was also a black plastic bag in the boot with a quantity of clothes which I was willing to discard but would keep if it was necessary to repack the other packages into larger standard containers. But it wasn’t, so I didn’t.

The chap I saw, the sales manager, said “nae bother”, or words to that effect. He also quoted a price a good deal less than the fellow I spoke to on the phone yesterday. So I left things there, having declined insurance as the cash value is nothing compared with the historic significance of the record of two years in New Zealand.

Back into town to the Avis office to renew the car hire, to take advantage of the cheap weekend rate, then AVTEC to pick up my latest slides and say goodbye to Juliet, then EDP for a cheap cup of tea. Baden wanted some info on the Quatro, Raymond wanted some info on VIDOS terminals, and a variety of people wanted me to go back to work. Very touching but not tempting.

Over to ICL. Gary and Vic were not around but I said farewell to the others. Then back to the Astor, Sheryl and Liz (Sargeant) were leaving. Drank a beer or three then back out to Henderson. Al and Claudia are out at Pukekohe so I had the place to myself and I didn’t forget to put the food out for Tess and Missy.

Saturday 23 April— Auckland

Well, I didn’t seem to do anything today, until evening when I went out to dine with Al and Claudia, Steve and Debbie, Denis and Robyn at Tony’s Vineyard Restaurant in Henderson. The food was better than the surroundings, but it was all a very pleasant evening. Another present from Denis and Robyn, a mounted bit of carved greenstone in a wooden box with paua shell inlay in the lid. Very nice.

Back to Al and Claudia’s for a few more drinks.

Sunday 24 April— Auckland

Time for a bit of washing, my last in New Zealand (until the next time). Then over to Kevin (Barlow)’s for a farewell refreshment, at noon on a Sunday! He had obviously had a hard night at whatever it was that prevented him attending my dinner last night.

Then I rolled north to Sandspit, to say goodbye to Kevin and Judy. Stayed for tea. Kevin is now cooking three days a week at a health farm, using Judy’s recipes which, speaking from my small experience, are very good. They gave me a brochure for the farm which I intended to send home with the comment “Kevin’s the cook” across the front, but I left it on the table. Nicky went to London on Thursday for a five week European tour and which will probably include Manchester. Everyone is keeping well.

Monday 25 April— Auckland

I didn’t do much packing this morning. Maybe I washed this morning, rather than yesterday. I’m writing this on the plane on Tuesday and can’t remember that far back.

Went into town and visited Kelly Tarlton’s, at last, very good, well worth the visit. Took the car back, not too expensive, then got the bus out to Henderson. Roast lamb for my last meal in New Zealand, very appropriate.

Tuesday 26 April— Auckland to Sydney

I finally crammed everything I could into the travel pack at two this morning. The rest I will have to do without. My watch alarm went off at seven but it took me fifteen minutes to climb out of bed.

Al gave me a lift to the airport. Very slow on the North Western Motorway, as is usual, but not too bad after that. A ten dollar departure tax is a bit of a cheek, still it could have been worse, it used to be two dollars then went up to twenty dollars until it came down a few months ago. The US and Australia have a similar arrangement for varying amounts.

It took about twenty minutes in the queue for the check-in. Claudia arrived with today’s child and we all went for a cup of tea. At ten o’clock, I said my farewells and nipped into the Duty Free for the essential bottle of whisky (Glenfiddich - not much choice) then boarded the plane.

We took off a few minutes late but with a tail wind, the flight time was less than usually quoted so I don’t suppose it matters much. No film on this flight, just lunch, a lamb chop and a bit of steak, no choice. Came down to land at Sydney at 1230, but that’s another story.

Postscript

As I type this, two years later, I still get the sinking feeling that accompanied me across the Tasman. I have never regretted my decision to stay in Scotland but New Zealand is a marvellous place and I thoroughly enjoyed my stay there.

God willing, I’ll be back.