We spent the next day wandering around downtown Sydney, checking out the shops and dodging the trams.
Sydney has some beautiful old shopping arcades, including the impressive Queen Victoria Building, opened in 1898.
And The Strand Arcade, opened in 1891.
In the evening we joined our good friends John and Fiona for dinner in a cool little restaurant called Love, Tilly Devine, tucked into a back alley in the trendy inner city neighborhood of Darlinghurst.
Afterwards, we walked back to our hotel through the city, checking out the rainbow lights that were everywhere as Sydney was in the middle of World Pride 2023.
Back in 1983, we lived in Sydney for a couple of months. Our home was a one bedroom bedsit in the inner-city neighborhood of Redfern. Back then Redfern had not gentrified and was a little rough around the edges. In fact, there was a riot in the neighborhood while we were there. We happened to be passing through Redfern on our way to the city and asked the cabbie to drive by our old home. We lived in half of the second floor of the middle home (the place just above the red street sign). It looked much the same. Our home was a one room bedsit with mice in the walls and a bathroom we shared with the other tenants, who we remember as mainly alcoholic old men. Being young, we weren’t particularly concerned at the less than salubrious surroundings.
Next we went for a walk down by Circular Quay and watched the ferries sailing to and from various points on Sydney Harbor. The harbor bridge and opera house provided iconic backdrops.
There is a widely told (and sometimes disputed) story that the opera house almost didn’t come into being. The design was one of 223 entries that had been received and according to the story did not make the early cut. It was not until one of the judges who had missed the early days of judging pulled the design out of the rejects pile that it went ahead. That judge was Eero Saarinen, the famous Finnish American architect who among other famous buildings, designed the TWA Passenger Terminal at JFK Airport in New York and Dulles International Airport outside Washington DC.
After a walk through the neighboring Royal Botanic Garden, we returned to the hotel for a rest before joining our old friend Chris and his wife Caroline for drinks and dinner down on the Quay, looking across to the opera house.
Out on an evening walk, we found ourselves up on Ponsonby Road, where the annual pride parade was about to begin. As the parade’s participants got themselves ready, we wandered around, enjoying the happy vibes. Particularly joyful, was the Brazilian carnival band, banging out Afro-Brazilian rhythms on an assortment of drums and other percussive instruments.
Walking along Karangahape Road (commonly known as K Road by the locals) we decided to pop into St. Kevins Arcade for lunch. The arcade is home to some funky little shops and one of our favorite Auckland restaurants, Gemmayze Street, serving incredible Turkish food. Unfortunately, it is not opened for lunch so, instead, we made do with eggs on toast from the cafe next door.
A wide staircase steps down from the arcade and directly into Myers Park, a narrow urban park that is name for Arthur Myers who had been mayor of Auckland from 1905 to 1909. In 1913, he gave the city nine thousand pounds to purchase the required land for the park.
The park is home of a full scale replica of Michelangelo’s ‘Moses’. The statue is made of marble from the same quarry as the original.
A path winds down toward Queen Street, lined with majestic palms.
Opened in 1915, the park was focused on children and included plans for a kindergarten and playground. An updated playground still stands in the park.
As we were walking through the park, we decided that living in one of the apartments or town homes that line part of the park would be ideal, being quiet and serene but also just steps from the hustle and bustle of Queen Street and downtown. Apparently, great minds think alike, because a couple of days later we dropped in on our friend Cris at her store, Pearl, on Great North Road. It turns out that she and her husband Peter have recently moved into one of the townhomes that line the park. As an aside, if you are in the market for Auckland’s most elegant clothes, go visit Cris at Pearl. She also showed us her recent bridal collection and the dresses were nothing short of stunning.
If you start at the center of downtown Auckland by the port and drive east along Tamaki Drive, you pass through a number of pretty bays before ending up at St. Heliers. With the sun finally out, we decided to drive out to St. Heliers, have an early dinner and then go for a walk along the waterfront. Mal lived in St. Heliers during his High School years, so he is always a little nostalgic going back there. In the following photo you can see the white apartment building where he lived with his parents.
And here are some photos of the St. Heliers shops and beach. It doesn’t look much different from when Mal lived there, although the restaurants are much improved.
From St. Heliers, we walked along Tamaki Drive, passing by Kohimarama Beach and ending up at bustling Mission Bay, before turning and making our way back. Anyone with doubts as to whether Auckland is truly a multicultural city, should take a trip to Mission Bay. People from many nations were out and enjoying themselves, welcoming a respite from the endless rain. On such a beautiful evening, it is hard to think of a more idyllic city anywhere in the world.
They said that the flood we experienced a couple of days ago was a once in a century event. Well apparently not, because this morning we were once again inundated with surging waters. If anything, this one was even worse. Nothing to do but close the doors and throw every towel and sheet we own on the floor and hope for the best. Fortunately, it passed pretty quickly and we were able to limit the water to the back of the house. It is sunny out at the moment and no heavy rain in the forecast, so hopefully we now have a respite and time to dry out. Here is a video from early this morning.
With the weather reports calling for bad weather, we decided to cut short our Holiday on Coromandel and head back to Auckland. It was a very fortuitous decision because a few hours after we got home, a river began to flow through our back yard. Auckland was being hit by the worst flooding in its history. Fortunately, with the help of two kind neighbors, our friend Judi, dozens of towels, and some makeshift barriers, we were able to prevent most of the water from getting into most of our house. If we had not been here the whole house would have become flooded. Many in Auckland were not so fortunate with three people losing their lives and many many more losing their homes. With more heavy rain in the forecast, we are not out of the woods yet, but are hoping for the best. Here is video taken during the storm. By setting up outdoor furniture cushions as dams and sweeping furiously we were able to divert most of the thousands of gallons pouring into the back yard around the house and down the driveway.
Cathedral Cove is perhaps Coromandel’s most famous and most beautiful beach. Although it is only a short distance from Hahei as the seagull flies, it is inaccessible by car, requiring a 45 minute hike along a path that is paved and well maintained but has lots of ups and downs. Fortunately, there is an ice cream truck parked handily along its route to help sustain weary hikers.
In the afternoon, we hopped in the car and drove an hour further north to visit our dear friends Marcus and Vasu and their whanau (family) who were renting a bach at Kuaotunu. Along the way we stopped for lunch under the kiwi fruit vines at the Hive.
We also stopped at a quirky little roadside pottery shop that was nestled in the trees and doubled as the potter’s home and workshop.
In Maori, Kuaotunu means ‘to inspire fear in young animals’ or ‘roasted young’ which, apparently, references the good hunting and fishing in the area. Either way, it is a rather gruesome name for a pretty beach.
The Coromandel Peninsula is about a two hour drive from Auckland. It is about fifty miles long and 25 miles wide at its broadest point. Along its shores are some of New Zealand’s most beautiful beaches. It gets its English name from HMS Coromandel, a British Royal Navy ship that stopped at Coromandel in 1820. The ship, itself, was named for India’s Coromandel coast. The Maori name for the peninsula is Te Tara-O-Te-Ika-A-Maui which translates to ‘The Spine of Maui’s fish’ with the spine, no doubt, referencing the high ranges that extend along its length. In Maori and other Polynesian cultures, Maui is a great folk hero and trickster who is famous for his cleverness. Under one of his most famous exploits, he used a magic fish-hook to catch a giant fish that became the north island of New Zealand.
Our first stop on the peninsula was at Thames which we expect gets its name from the English river that runs through London. Its Maori name is Parawai. The town was initially built during New Zealand’s gold rush in the late 1860s to early 1870s. In 1870, it had a population of about 15,000 which would have made it one of New Zealand’s largest towns at the time. By the time that Mal’s father was born there in 1925, its glory days were already well behind it. Today, it is still the largest town in Coromandel but with a population of less than 5,000. Along its main streets are some of the old hotels that served the miners back during its heyday. There are also more than a few second hand stores, called opshops (opportunity shops) in New Zealand.
From Thames we drove up over the ranges to our final destination, Hahei. One of the peninsula’s more popular beaches, it is named for Hei, who arrived in New Zealand with Kupe, the legendary Maori explorer and navigator who is said to have been the first human to discover New Zealand.
We immediately set out for a walk along Hahei beach and up the headlands at its southern end.
Back on the beach, we walked by a mix of old and new beach homes, commonly called baches (pronounced batches) by New Zealanders. The following photo shows a classic small bach with its larger newer and fancier neighbor.
A number of these baches had tractors parked outside, which we can only assume are used to tow boats down over the beach for launch.
We also stopped by the local general store for some provisions.
There were also avocados available roadside, selling on an honesty basis for $5 for a bag of six.
We decided to check out Mangere’s Saturday morning market. Auckland is the largest Polynesian city in the world with close to 400,000 of its residents coming from islands such as Samoa, Fiji, and Tonga. Many live in the suburb of Mangere and the market had a decidedly Polynesian feel.
There were a large number of huge pots and long wooden spoons on sale, reflecting the fact that Polynesian culture if very family oriented. With households usually consisting of three or more generations, there are lots of mouths to feed.
Christian missionaries first came to Polynesia in the late 1700s and were very successful in converting many Polynesians to their religion. As a result, over 80 percent of Polynesians now identify as Christian. But a good evangelist’s work is never done and there were a number of groups proselytizing at the market.
Speaking of evangelists, on our way back from the market we decided to knock off another of Auckland’s volcanic peaks, Mt. Roskill. One theory is that the peak is named after John Roskill, an evangelist and local preacher who lived in Auckland, before committing suicide in 1870. An alternative theory is that it gets its name from Roskhill, a hamlet on Scotland’s Isle of Skye. It also has two Maori names, Puketapapa (flat topped hill) and Pukewiwi (hill covered in rushes). Both names are rather apt as there are indeed many rushes and its summit is rather flat. However, that may have more to do with the fact that its main crater was excavated in 1961 and filled with a water-supply reservoir.
Mal and Lauren 