Tourist First: New Zealand: Unavoidable Auckland

Thursday, March 30, 2023

New Zealand: Unavoidable Auckland

King penquins at Kelly Tarlton's SeaLife aquarium on the Auckland waterfront.

Auckland is the one "must" on most visits to New Zealand if only because it's where most international flights land. Auckland has good restaurants, a unique aquarium, a lively waterfront and a stand-alone store for almost every luxury brand in the world. It's clearly a shopping destination for many crazy rich tourists, but it is not even close to being our favorite of the dozen cities we stayed in during a several-week trip in February and March of 2023.

I'm sure we would have enjoyed Auckland more had the weather been better; it was overcast if not raining for all of our first days in the city. We spent one of our two full days there visiting nearby Waiheke Island, a Napa-like wine-producing island that is reached via ferry. Friends, who have a daughter who will be having a destination wedding there later this year, strongly recommended spending some time on Waiheke. I don't think our visit, mostly riding a hop-on-hop-off bus the length of the island, having lunch at a beachfront restaurant and visiting a winery, did justice to the island. We didn't see anything that was away from the one main road, so I'm left thinking that Waiheke's charms are down the many side roads.

As for Auckland itself, I can recommend one restaurant where we had two wonderful dinners, Oyster and Chop. I had John Dory on our first visit, along with a couple of glasses of Foxes Island sauvignon blanc sur lie, and fish and wine were both memorable. On our second visit, our last dinner before flying home, I followed some wonderful Bluff oysters with perfectly pan-seared red snapper. The Foxes Island was listed as available by the bottle but not the glass this time, but actually they were out of the bottles. So a small disappointment. We did not have reservations for either of our dinners and the Oyster and Chop website showed none available, but we were seated right away both times after simply walking in. This is a huge place and it's hard to imagine that it ever has a reservation for every table.

For our first three nights (Feb. 2-4, 2023) in New Zealand after flying in from the U.S., we stayed at the Hotel Debrett, which is downtown and a short walk from the waterfront. We then left for 10 days in Tasmania. On our return, on Thursday, Feb. 16, we stayed one night at the Hotel Fitzroy in the hip Ponsonby neighborhood. The next morning we walked from there to the SkyCity area to pick up our Hertz rental car for getting out of town. After a month touring around the entire country, we flew back to Auckland from Christchurch on Wednesday, March 15, for a last night before flying home. Again, we stayed at the Debrett.

On that Thursday, killing time between checking out of the hotel and our 11:35 pm flight, we walked about three miles along the waterfront to Kelly Tarlton's SeaLife aquarium. Fortunately, this was our one sunny day here. The aquarium is an underground complex that includes a huge icy chamber with 70 or so king and gentoo penguins, along with a glass tunnel through a large tank with sharks, rays and other fish swimming beside and above visitors. A white revolving tunnel disorients visitors in a way meant to mimic the effect of an Antarctic whiteout. After our visit, we weren't up for the three-mile walk back to downtown. In Auckland, fare cards for buses are not sold on the buses themselves and there was no way to buy cards at the bus stop near the aquarium. When a bus stopped, we explained to the driver that we didn't have cards. He asked us how we got to the museum. When we said we had walked from Britomart (his bus shuttles between Britomart and the aquarium), he shrugged as if we were crazy and waved us on for free.

Britomart, by the way, is a several-block shopping area on the waterfront, complete with trendy New Zealand shops like Deadly Ponies as well as cozy eateries like Ortolana. It wouldn't be a must for most visitors, but some well-heeled shoppers might find it a nice alternative to the Prada, Rolex and other high-end international stores on Queen Street a few blocks away.

Here are some photos:

Our first day in Auckland was rainy,
so we took shelter in the Auckland Art
Gallery, which has free admission and
pieces such as "Horned Wheel"
by Don Driver.

Another work that caught my eye at the
Auckland Art Gallery was "Imagination
Dead Imagine (lilt for tenor and Jean
Arp guitar)" by Oscar Enberg.

This is something at the Auckland Art Gallery that I think art museums and galleries
everywhere should replicate. Without making an appointment or paying anything,
gallery-goers are given pencil and paper and invited to try their hands
at sketching a live model. MOMA in New York? Listening?

A skyline view that I captured during our long walk to SeaLife. The needle-like
tower is SkyCity, which we didn't visit though we ate at a restaurant near its
base and picked up our rental car nearby, too,

Sidewalk cafes such as this are in alleys and streets
near the Hotel Debrett, where we stayed.

This ain't the United States. Here environmental activists are honored. This is a
sidewalk on the waterfront.

Again, a contrast with the United States. Clean and
easily accessible public toilets are found all over
New Zealand. This was on the waterfront.

The band on the right side of the floor is a moving sidewalk that lets visitors
glide through this tunnel, the first of its kind in the world, at the Kelly
Tarlton SeaLife aquarium.

The tunnel is a lengthy dreamlike trip.

Hermit crabs at SeaLife.

We involuntarily became witnesses to many "hen parties" in New Zealand. This
pre-wedding bridal party (bride and her bridemaids) were waiting with us to
board the ferry to Waikeke Island. We waited in line for about an hour
and a half. These women had bottles of sparkling wine and plastic
glasses to help kill the time. Which they did, noisely.

Aboard the Waikeke ferry.

A lunch at Ki Maha on the Strand
at Onetangi Beach on Waikeke
involved a bit of wine.

We stopped in at Tantalus Winery on
Waikeke to try their pinot noir and
sauvignon blanc. Wines from Waikeke
are sold throughout New Zealand,
though I don't know that they
reach the U.S.

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Argentine Patagonia

They are called what they look like: Mexican hats. They occur naturally in the highlands above the town of El Calafate. The water in the distance is glacier-fed Lago Argentino. An hour's drive east of El Calafate, near the headwaters of the lake, visitors can hike on the Perito Moreno glacier and take a boat ride among icebergs that have fallen off the several glaciers in the Parque Nacional des Glaciares. El Calafate is basically a summer (Nov. to Feb.) tourist town, and there are a number of hotels at all price points. We stayed at Esplendor El Calafate, a very stylish hotel with a full restaurant and bar. The South American picker-upper drink mate is available at breakfast. The hotel is an uphill walk from the commercial area, but that's not much of a drawback. Click on the photo to visit the Esplendor online.

Dominica

Probably the greenest island in the Caribbean, in terms of color and ecological awareness, is Dominica, just north of Martinique. It was named by Columbus, who sailed past it on a Sunday. The island nation is one of the poorest in the Western Hemisphere, but it is rich in friendly people and natural attractions, including a boiling lake, hot and cold waterfalls, a parrot jungle and hill after hill of dense green jungle. There is also a cable-car ride through the jungle canopy (http://www.natureisland.com/AerialTram.html). I wrote about Dominica years ago, and much of that article is still relevant: http://www.nytimes.com/1997/10/26/travel/winter-in-the-sun-an-island-where-less-is-more.html?scp=2&sq= Unfortunately, one of the hotels I mentioned, Petit Coulibri, has since closed. Fortunately, there's still a wonderful eco-resort called Papillote Wilderness Retreat http://www.papillote.dm/), four acres of lush gardens, hot-spring-heated soaking pools and modest cottage rooms.

Palm Springs

Palm Springs, Calif., is a great destination for nature lovers -- Mount San Jacinto State Park is a wonderful gondola ride (shown above -- click on it to visit its website) away, and Joshua Tree National Park is a short drive away. It's also a great destination for naturists; there are several major clothing optional resorts in the area -- and for fans of Mid-Century Modern architecture. For a dose of mid-century style, stay at the Orbit In (http://www.orbitin.com/), which does ask that you keep your clothes on.

Pompeii

If you're driving from Naples to the Amalfi Coast, and it's hard to imagine anyone who wouldn't want to visit the Amalfi Coast, you should plan to spend a night in the modern city of Pompei, adjacent to the ancient city of Pompeii. Above are the murals depicting an unknown ritual in what's called the Villa of the Mysteries in Pompeii. If you can, devote most of a full day to exploring the site. Afterward, you'll want a good hotel. Click on the image for info about Hotel Amleto, a small and friendly hotel in the heart of the new town and an easy walk from the ruins.

St. Vincent

This is one of the "rooms" at Petit Byahaut, an isolated (access by boat only) eco-resort on St. Vincent, the largest island in the country of St. Vincent and the Grenadines. Bequia, mentioned above in this column, is one of the Grenadines. The photo above is of the living deck and doesn't show a relatively enclosed area that had a real bed. Did you notice I said "had"? That's because the place has closed. To read about the property in its heyday, click on the image for a New York Times article I wrote. The article has a link to a slide show with more images of the resort.