April 11th New Zealand

 I woke up at about 6 so not bad considering I usually wake at 6:30 at home!

We decided to try to do a cold plunge in the unheated pool so Dion, Summer and I did that first thing. Summer, of course, got right in! She's such a stud. 

I forced myself to jump in next and Dion made the mistake of trying to walk slowly in. We talked him into just jumping after a minute. It felt really cold!  I kept my arms close to my body because every time I moved them it was too cold. LOL Diane and Ryan went for a run/pastry stop.

We enjoyed a pretty relaxed morning with a breakfast of yogurt and granola.

The plan for the day was to drive into Aukland and see some of the city sites. I went in Dion's car again and driving in the city was more stressful for sure!

We parked downtown and walked along the wharf for a bit and went into a few stores. 

We rented a wheelchair hoping it would work well so Dad didn't have to walk too much. He was a good sport and had no problems using it.

We decided the first outing would be the sky tower. Dion is not a big fan of heights (me neither) and he was not interested in going to the restaurant at the top. But we ended up going up to the 50th and 60th floor for lookouts and then back to the 53rd floor for ice cream. It was an amazing view and we all enjoyed it. Some were braver than others (I had no desire to stand on the glass floor!). We could see the museum in the distance that we planned to walk to. Yikes.

We had lunch in the lobby area of the sky tower at a place called Andy's. The food was generally good and just kind of a burger joint type of thing. I made the mistake of not asking about the chicken strips which turned out to be made of thighs. Gross. I ate the fries. Yes, I'm a child.

There is a walk, it has a name that I can't think of, where you can walk across New Zealand from one body of water to another. Some of us thought it might be fun to try it even if we did a bit each day...turned out we didn't have time for the whole thing but part of the walk took place from the water in Aukland to the Museum of Aukland so we decided to at least do this part of the walk and then visit the museum.  It was a lovely day and it was a nice walk overall. What we weren't prepared for? Aukland is very hilly...and we are pushing a wheelchair! We took turns pushing Dad up hills (usually two people at a time) and it was a workout. We even managed to dump dad out of the chair when we went up a curb once...thankfully he was totally fine but we felt bad and also lots of people in cars saw it happen! We stopped here and there for lovely sites.

We made it to the museum!! Of course it's at the top of a hill

The museum itself was very cool. Lots of Maori stuff, which we all enjoyed. We've heard lots about the Maori over the years since Dad was here in New Zealand for his mission. It was cool to learn more about their culture and history.

There was an area about the natural features of New Zealand including a whole area about volcanoes. We all enjoyed that area as well.

They had a room where it simulated being in a volcanic eruption. Like being in an earthquake but also...lava. Here we are waiting for it to start. Soon the whole room was shaking!!

We saw dinosaurs and there was a big area about New Zealand's part in the world wars. It is always interesting and also heartbreaking to learn more about wars and the people to gave so much. I spent quite a bit of time in there but didn't take any pictures.

Dion, Diane and Ryan took an uber to get back to get the cars (yay!) as no one was up for the long walk again or the wait. The museum closed so the rest of us had to wait outside til they got back. It was pretty windy and chilly but we finally figured out a spot on the side of the museum where the wind was blocked better.

We all loaded in the car and chose a local restaurant to eat dinner. We chose a small restaurant that was Italian/Croatian. The owner was from Croatia and told us that the Italians got their good ideas/food from the Croatians. haha. The food was very good and we enjoyed our dinner. They were super sweet to make room for us in their small restaurant.

Once we were home, we decided to watch the start of the Lord of the Rings trilogy so we'd have the shire in our minds for tomorrow's activity: Hobbiton!

We barely made it through the first part of the movie and we were all very ready for sleep. 

Another good day in New Zealand.