Arrival in Auckland

On 27.09.16 around 5 pm local time, we safely landed in Auckland. Phew! 5 flights in 3 weeks don't need to happen again so soon :D

Facts: New Zealand has 4.2 million inhabitants, an area of 270,000 square kilometers (Germany has 360,000) and is divided into a North Island and a South Island. This is what it looks like:

By the way, you can click on 'Map' at the top right and see in each post where exactly we are!

The climate here is similar to Germany, just not as extreme. In winter, it rarely gets below 10 degrees Celsius in Auckland, and in summer it doesn't get hotter than 30 degrees (although the sun still has quite some power). But the landscape is very different, completely different plants grow here and everything looks kind of magical. Anette was in New Zealand for 4 weeks 10 years ago and was totally fascinated. She always said 'Most beautiful country on earth'. Hannes hasn't seen much of the country yet, so we'll see if he can identify with that statement after a year ;) We're also very excited about the South Island, where Anette has never been.

It feels really good to be in mild Auckland with air conditioning. It's currently 18 degrees (7 pm) and it's expected to rain for the next few days. Since we're experiencing the New Zealand spring now, rain was to be expected, because it rains here more often except in the summer (January - March). Fortunately, it almost never rains continuously, but it's usually changeable. In any case, we enjoy being able to wear sweaters and socks again after 3 weeks in Bali. Yesterday we even got to enjoy a fireplace fire :D Super!

Okay, now to what you're probably most interested in.. where are we, what are we doing right now? We're Wwoofing. Wwo-w-what? 'Wwoofing' is basically a barter of helping in the garden/on the field/on the farm/in the household/in the hotel... in exchange for a place to sleep & food from the people you help. You work about 4-5 hours a day and don't have to spend anything on food and accommodation - which is very expensive in New Zealand. Plus, you get a much more intimate insight into the lives of the locals, which is very exciting. The original idea was to attract people to farms to help out. Now you can also Wwoof in hotels, in private gardens, etc. If you want to know more about Wwoofing, check here: https://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/WWOOF

We're currently Wwoofing directly in Auckland (largest city in New Zealand with 1.4 million inhabitants; by the way, Auckland is not the capital, but Wellington with only 190,000 inhabitants). Our hosts are very nice! They had already offered to pick us up from the airport in advance via email. Pure luxury! Their names are Jill (web designer) and Amanda (psychologist).

We were immediately fascinated by the two of them. On the first day, as I said, we were picked up from the airport (where poor Jill had to wait an hour for us) and then we already had the first adventure evening a few hours after our landing: We went for dinner at a North Thai restaurant, which we reached by scooter & bicycle. We were already used to driving on the left side of the road from Bali. Jill and Amanda rode ahead on the scooter, Hannes rode on Jill's very stylish(!) bicycle and Anette, for the first time, got to ride on an electric bicycle, which can go quite fast! Very funny!

The streets go up and down a lot - Auckland is very hilly. Jill and Amanda live at the very top of a very steep street. Anette didn't even break a sweat on the electric bike, whereas Hannes had to get off and push after half the way :P

And this is where Jill and Amanda live (and where we live for a week too): In a beautiful wooden house (typical for New Zealand) with a great, big garden, right in the middle of Auckland in the district Mt. Eden: 

Living room:

Kitchen (we get very healthy food here)

Our room:

Garden in front of the house:

Behind the house:

The garden is our 'workplace'. Today we finished our first day of work and our bones ache quite a bit :D Since it rained yesterday and we couldn't work (AND because we spent half the day with Amanda's patient help applying for a SIM card for the mobile phone, bank accounts and tax numbers), we worked a longer shift today (about 6 hours).

We cleared the garden of leaves (sooo many leaves) and weeds, scrubbed the wooden veranda, and cleaned huge seat cushions. Here are some - very impressive, as we think - before-after pictures from the garden.

Without leaves:

By the way, the street we live on is called 'Landscape Road' - that's where you can guess where the name comes from: Great view from the mountain at the very top!

There are also three cats here - quite fluffy, hairy cats. But neither Hannes nor Anette have had any allergy outbreaks so far. Fingers crossed. 

And now it's time for dinner. Tomorrow is day 3 in New Zealand. And we're looking forward to the next 362 days!! :) 

In the meantime, we have spent a week Wwoofing with Amanda and Jill, which was sometimes quite exhausting, but also very educational. And now we finally got them in front of the camera too :)

From left to right: HanNZette, Jill, Amanda. (Hannes can't explain why he's making such a strange face.)

It was definitely great to get to know the two of them! And we each gained at least 300g of pure muscle mass through the gardening work :D 'proudly flex any thigh'. (Joking. You obviously can't see anything. But we haven't gotten sore muscles so far, that can only be a good sign :D)

Here are some pictures from our little trips through Auckland (in the Mount Eden district):

Palm trees grow naturally in the front yard here.

But the most important thing are the beautiful ferns that you see everywhere!! They are (beside the kiwi of course) a typical trademark of New Zealand. You can find the symbol of the fern on the carpet at the airport, on various signs and on the seat covers in the buses in Auckland. Ferns, ferns, ferns. They grow very diverse here, partly giant ('tree ferns') and give the forests a primordial atmosphere.

There are many very pretty houses here...

and also a few less pretty ones :p

What definitely stands out: In New Zealand there are many more houses that are privately owned than rented apartments. The prices for houses used to be quite affordable, but like everything else, it has become more expensive in recent years.

During this first week, we were also looking for a car in Auckland on the side. The two car markets highly praised on the internet were rather disappointing (Backpacker car market and Backpacker world). Very small, few cars, and certainly not self-contained. Self-what? We were looking for a van (mini bus) that officially has all the utensils of a camper so that you can also stay outside of campsites. That means: a small portable toilet, a sink with an electric pump and large water tanks, in order to be 'self-sustaining' (self-contained). 

In the end, we didn't find our van at one of those markets, but rather randomly at a local auto mechanic 30 minutes south of Mount Eden, who has been equipping backpacker vans for 10 years and has a very good reputation. 

And this is it, our new baby car! It's still sparsely equipped and looks a bit unattractive on the inside, but we're still working on that :) 

Here's our 'kitchenette' (white cabinet). Faucet with electric pump, sink, fresh water tank and waste water tank at the bottom of the cabinet. Top left is a camping hot plate with a gas cartridge. In the wooden box behind the driver's seat is a second battery that charges while driving and then provides electricity for the cell phone, etc.

The bed in the back: It can be folded up to become a table and seating. There's a lot of storage space under the benches.

The most important thing: We are considered self-contained and can thus use remote - and mostly free - campsites deep in the national parks!

That's it for Auckland for now, we have reached all our goals (first week Wwoofing, found a car) - and now we're moving on! 

On the left side of the road, we're continuing to the next Wwoofing place in Thames. The next post from there will follow soon :)

Best regards to all readers!

HanNZette