Auckland the 5th (more to follow)

Last night it rained a lot...I'm so glad I'm not camping.... Raindrops on a car roof sound really relaxing. Today the trip to Rangitoto Island is planned, I suffer through 30 km of rush hour traffic for almost 1.5 hours, just to stand at the counter 10 minutes before the ferry leaves...and then the ferry is fully booked!!! I start a conversation with the ticket seller and with the words 'they never all come anyway' I still get a ticket... lucky me and another example of how nice the New Zealanders are here...

The crossing takes 10 minutes, a group of about 30 people leave the ship and scatter in all directions. I choose a path that leads me about 1/3 around the island before I climb to the top of the mountain. Rangitoto is still a relatively young island, a volcano erupted here from the seabed about 600 years ago, leaving behind a barren, lifeless lava landscape after it cooled. Mosses and grasses were the first to settle, forming humus and thereby providing a basis for larger plants. The oldest tree is only 200 years old. In between, you can still see larger, bare lava spots...without moss, nothing's happening...

Partly through winding paths through a mangrove landscape, partly along wide hiking trails like in the Siebengebirge, always further up or around the mountain. This is what I imagine a jungle to be like, everywhere the chatter of birds (who are very quick, hardly to be seen let alone photographed). A side path leads through small cave passages, in the last tunnel I bump my head pretty hard in the dark, as you can only crawl on all fours from there. At the top of the summit, there is a fantastic view of the island world in front of Auckland, what you could discover here with a boat...

Back it goes simply downhill, I don't want to miss the last ferry.

In the evening I take care of the spare parts procurement, Martin (many, many thanks again) has put together a small spare parts package for me and Dieter (many, many thanks to you too) delivered it to the shipping company. The parts that are not available at short notice will arrive on Tuesday, Wednesday is the new workshop appointment.