Auckland is more or less surrounded by water with harbours on both coasts and endless coves and bays and islands and beaches. It’s easy to see why it claims bragging rights to the largest number of sailboats per capita based in its waters, as well as being a working port and cruise ship stop. From the water, it’s easy to believe, as you can see thousands upon thousands of masts in the many city marinas and at anchor in protected waters. An evening stroll around the downtown marina where the larger visiting sailboats berth tell a story of long sailing voyages to reach this beautiful place so far from home – on one short walk I noted large sailboats from London, Denmark, Cayman and Big Sky, Montana (?). Later in the trip up north, while having lunch beside the marina in Wharangei I spotted a small Canadian sailboat, no more than 35 feet, with a very skinny sailor washing the deck and a dozen plastic water containers lashed to the bottom of the mast. It almost made me lose that lunch – a cross ocean voyage of epic proportions and my own personal nightmare of epic proportions.

Auckland harbour has seen many many impressive sights over time, from regattas to races to visitors in all sizes and shapes of vessels but on our last day there, a transient arrival caused a stir, newsworthy even in this city that has seen a lot of yachts in its day, earning itself a front page spread in the local paper as the largest superyacht to arrive. I was fortunate to have a front-row seat to the buzz.

Early that morning as I made my way over to the coffee machine, I glanced through the glass wall to the harbour to see this sight, just below our apartment – James Bond meets Auckland.

This 439 ft, $330 million yacht is one of the largest in the world and has a crew of 52, two helicopter landing pads, storage for a large submarine and a huge interior salt water pool, among other creature comforts of home. You can rent it for $5 million a week (which is no doubt negotiable) as Bill Gates did last summer. It is owned by the Russian vodka tycoon, Yuri Scheffler, who was rumoured to be aboard, and who is on the outs with Putin, who tried to snatch the vodka, and now makes his Stolychnaya in Latvia, and lives, well, anywhere but Russia.

It was a fun and fascinating morning watching the docking action with binoculars and taking a gazillion photos with my wonderful 40x zoom Canon camera. Every yacht has to have a blonde, so I went looking for her. Oh, there she is.

This was not, by any means, the only black-hulled vessel with pride of place in Auckland harbour. Across the wharf from our apartment is the Maritime Museum where one day I found myself wandering about, pretty aimlessly, without a clue to what I was looking at. In the middle of this 3-storey high atrium of what I found out was a new purpose-built wing of the museum was an intriguing permanent exhibition on international ocean racing. Looming above it all was a huge black hull of a racing vessel suspended from the ceiling. This exhibition seemed to have a specific focus on some guy called Sir Peter Blake. Who?
I ducked into a small darkened theatre off the exhibition space where a looping video of the life of Sir Peter (known commonly as ‘Blakey’ which suits this smiling, blonde Kiwi adventurer so much better) was screening. Fascinating story of this man who spent his life on the seas, becoming a leader in Kiwi international ocean racing, including breaking all kinds of records for fastest circumnavigation of the globe (1994 ‘Enza’), winning all 6 legs of the Whitbread around the world race (1989 ‘Steinlager 2) and ultimately the America’s Cup (1995 Black Magic), which is still described as one of New Zealand’s greatest sporting moments. It was not just his prowess behind the wheel that was fascinating, but also his role in the early development of the sport. Blakey was the team leader, the promoter, the main PR guy, and maybe most important to get the boats built and the race entries possible, the major fundraiser. There was no back office in those days.

The film gave a sense of the private Blakey as well, the family man. His wife Pippa tells the story of when, in their early days together, she traveled with him on one of the racing boats, to the extreme displeasure of Tom Clark, the team’s major funder, who disapproved of women on the boats and threatened to withdraw support. Blakey refused to step down and Pippa ended up spending her honeymoon on board with a bunch of guys, enduring the same hardships as they made their way through a major typhoon, and cementing her place as just the perfect woman for this man. “Family first” he said, not for the first time, which is a bit curious as for their entire life together he was away for many months at a time, and she spent a lot of time on planes, flying here and there to meet him in various ports of call. A mariner’s wife.

After retiring from competitive sailing, Blakey turned his attention to exploration of the planet and documenting climate and environmental effects on the Amazon and Antarctic. He was an expedition leader for the Cousteau Society for awhile and then went out on his own with Blake Exploration after buying his ship from the Society. In late 2001 after completing a major expedition in the Amazon, the ship was anchored in the mouth of the river one evening when they were boarded by a bunch of armed bad guys. In the ensuing fight and mayhem, Blakey was shot dead. 53 years old. The robbers made off with a bunch of watches and a 15 hp motor.

After enduring and embracing everything the planet’s oceans could throw at him – uncountable typhoons and hard weather, running aground off Namibia, breaking his mast in the south Atlantic in his first Whitbread attempt, and much much more, his life was taken too early and too tragically – by a human with a gun.

When we came up with the idea to go to New Zealand, back in November after that glass of wine at the neighbor’s house, I had no idea of what the country was all about, where to go, or what to do. But what I did know was how to plan a trip that would suit the way I like to travel now and to find a path of least stress.

So here’s my own very personal recipe for success:

1. Forget all about the idea that just because you are traveling such a long distance (and it’s so expensive to get there) you have to stay a long time. I don’t want to stay a long time. Dennis might get grumpy. So the first decision was to go for a minimum of 2 weeks, which would also be more or less the maximum.

2. If you are moving around from one place to another make sure that there is a minimum 3 or 4 night stay in each place and be careful to account for travel time.

3. No hotels. I want space – a living room. bedroom. kitchen, balcony or terrace, and views. A bathroom is nice too. “Vacation rentals” or “holiday lets” or whatever the local terminology is, is the way to go for me.

4. Make sure there is recovery time. Stay put for awhile upon arrival to rest, recuperate and get oriented.

5. Travel light.

All this meant that I knew right off the bat that we would only scratch the surface of all that is on offer in New Zealand, and that we were limited to 4 locations.

Auckland – New Zealand’s largest city and where the international flights land.

Northland – I’d seen lots of paintings, photos and videos of this area of the North Island through an artist I’ve been following and liked what I saw. We stayed on a very rural hilltop overlooking the ocean about 1/2 hour from Whangarei, the largest city in the north.

Wellington – Another city, smaller than Auckland and where you get the ferry to South Island. A dynamite museum on the waterfront and Botanical Garden oasis.

Nelson – A small city on the north part of South Island. When Howard found out it was the “craft beer capital of New Zealand” and I heard about its thriving arts scene the choice was a no brainer. I want to live there. Except Dennis likely wouldn’t appreciate the move.

We arrived in Auckland after our 13 hour flight at 5:30 on a Sunday morning. We picked up a phone at the Vodofone kiosk at the airport and piled into the $100 taxi for our first destination – a waterfront condo at Prince’s Wharf, right downtown. (The airport is far away; if we hadn’t been so wrecked we might have considered the airport bus that stops 5 minutes away $16 per). I had not been particularly enthusiastic about being in a large city, no matter how nice it might be, but see (4) above. The compromise was the harbour.

The manager met us at the front door to let us in, and we found that we had been upgraded to a large 2 bedroom instead of what I had paid for. Walls of glass and a huge terrace stretching the entire length of the apartment, views from living room and both bedrooms, faced one side of the harbour, out to the bridge. The skyscrapers of the immediate downtown were somewhere to our backs and not within view. The scenery was of the sky, the water, and the endless fascination of the boat and ship activity on the water.

And that wasn’t the only activity. I had thought that such an early hour on a Sunday morning downtown would be a snoozer, but instead, the scene was total excitement. A Triathlon had just begun and the start line of the first portion of the event, the swimming, was just below our balcony. All morning the sounds of the loudspeaker announcers carried over the harbour, the streets around it were blocked off,  and through my binoculars I could watch the thousands as they swam, biked and ran their routes and hear the cheering of the supporters as these nut cases crossed the various finish lines. Later (after the NFL final game between Seattle and Green Bay was over – oh what joy when it was discovered it was being carried on local cable) when we went out to explore, we found a busy scene on the streets, wharves, restaurants and cafes of the waterfront, under brilliant summer sunshine.

We spent our 3 days in Auckland either on the water or within about 3 blocks of it, totally ignoring the rest of the city. Right beside Prince’s Wharf is the ferry terminal with its gorgeous restored old building with ferries coming and going constantly to and from various day tripping (or longer) destinations. My favourite was the 12 minute ride across the harbour to the town of Devonport, a little historic cutie of a place, with great walks,  restaurants, bars, galleries, shops and views. It would also be a great dinner destination – a short ferry ride across and a ride back in darkness and city lights. We also took a harbour cruise which took us out past Devonport for a brief stop at the “new” volcanic island of Rangitoto, with its black rock shoreline, which erupted from the sea 600 years ago. I loved the look of the old wooden hexagonal lighthouse, first built in 1870 – cottage style. The first lighthouse keeper spent 19 years living in this one room 50 feet above the sea before taking early retirement for reasons of “ill health”. No kidding, what a job!

I want to live here

There were other summertime destination trips by ferry that we couldn’t do before it was time to head up to Northland. Several people recommended the island of Waiheke, still only a 35 minute ride, with numerous wineries, sandy beaches, shops, restaurants and places to stay. The other place that had my attention was a little further still, to Coromandel. Just the first of many things left on the table.

A great beginning to a great trip, with back towards the concrete, facing New Zealand waters.

We returned from New Zealand yesterday – a 22 hour trip door to door – just in time for the Superbowl, which even I watched the last part of. Ouch.

Unlike my last far away trip (Burma) 2 years ago, I return this time energized and happy (rather than ill and disoriented). As I download my photos, I think that this time, I really mean it and I’m getting them off this flat screen to create another photo book, something to touch and feel. So I’ll be living in memory for a little while to come as I create all this. Works for me.

I have a lot to remember about our trip. 765 photos to sort through and tales to tell, which I’ll do here. I know that several of my friends are thinking about going or already planning to go, so maybe I should begin by getting out of the way, from the very beginning, the negatives. Here it is, a list of what’s NOT to like about New Zealand:

NOTHING.

Aotearoa. The discovery by humans of what is now known as New Zealand.

Kupe was one of the great early explorers in Polynesian and Maori oral history.

After weeks at sea Kupe’s wife Kuramarotine noticed the sun being reflected off a long bank of cloud just on the horizon, the classic indication of a land mass. “He Ao! He Ao Tea Roa” she cried out. And so Aotearoa has come to be known as ‘the land of the long white cloud’.

Painting by Sally Burton