Crashed out on hotel bed after lovely day in Auckland. Peter suggested we visited the Botanical Gardens here for coffee so we did - Peter, please note! We wandered through the gardens taking lots of photos and soaking up inspiration. All the plants which we hothouse in England are just out in flowerbeds over here, in great profusion and colour. Banks of purple and white, red and orange, great sculptures and water features and an old boat. We thought we could steal this idea and have an old boat and some rigging plus a gazebo that looked like a little theatre as a reflection of our interests. Of course, this would also mean we would have to have a bar of chocolate sculpted in shrubs and a crossword made of gravel. After the gardens, we dropped off our hire car and got a taxi to our hotel. The taxi driver took it upon himself to draw up a tourist itinerary for us.His programme included 2 museums, a ferry ride to a nearby island and a couple of shopping centres. Now, we can move pretty swiftly when necessary ( really?)but packing all this into the four remaining daylight hours did seem a tall order even for the most applied American tourist.(He also told us that Auckland is the tenth largest city in the world and that the Sky Tower is the highest building in the southern hemisphere- trivia buffs of the world please let us know if this complete baloney)So we strolled down to the harbour, marvelled at the indecently large boats ( which made small tower blocks look paltry), ate Mexican food and soaked up the atmosphere. As I write, John keeps snorting with laughter while reading the The New Zealand Herald ( NZ man fathers 82 children, vicar bangs on car windows at traffic lights to demand donations etc)- I'm guessing it lacks the gravitas of the Daily Telegraph but more importantly, it also lacks the crossword. So, now we're going to read / watch TV and have a carpet picnic of apricots, nuts and dark chocolate ( a combination which Nigel and Orasa prepared for our mountain trip and which was delicious) in preparation for our 6am start tomorrow when we fly to Brisbane. We're very much looking forward to seeing Jonny and Reanne and catching up with all their news, not to mention seeing their new house and it won't be a huge wrench to leave them with the ski gear and bedding currently in our suitcases! Xxxxxxxxxxxxxxxxx Ps photos will be included when we get to Oz Pps what a wonderfully small world we live in - we just sang Happy Birthday down the phone to John's mum in Spain. Maybe, this is like the Truman Show and this is only a NZ film set set in Pinewood Studios in England and our 27 hour plane trip was just a bumpy ride in a big tin can. Or maybe I need to start on the chocolate........