Day 5 - Exploring Auckland City
The agenda today is to have lunch at a The Brewers Co-Operative, then head to Sky Tower to see an aerial view of Auckland City. The structure is 328 metres (1,076 ft) tall, as measured from ground level to the top of the mast, making it the second tallest freestanding structure in the Southern Hemisphere. Next, we will go to an exhibition called Weta Workshop Unleashed. It is listed as a “wildly immersive experience that takes you on a journey through the wacky world of movie making.” It's a 90-minute hosted tour centered on three fully developed and original film concepts: a nail-biting horror, a fantasy epic, and a mind-bending sci-fi.
I will finish this post later tonight with commentary on our experience today.
Back to the blog! All three of our stops today ended up being better than expected even though it was a rainy and chilly day. We started by taking the bus down to the ferry terminal and then taking the ferry from Devonport to Auckland City Center. From there, we walked 20 minutes to The Brewers Cooperative and Hashery. It was traditional kiwi pub and the staff was very welcoming. The food we ordered was outstanding. We tried the Kumara sweet potato fries. Kumara was brought to New Zealand by the Polynesian ancestors of Māori brought kūmara with them as a food plant when they arrived in New Zealand in the 13th century. We had heard about the at the Hamilton Gardens early this week. We hung around the pub for a while enjoying the atmosphere of the locals and then headed to Sky Tower. The first stop was at Floor 51. The sign above was displayed on that floor and shows the comparative height of Sky Tower to other tall building around the world. It was fun to see that I have been over half of the buildings shown: The Burj Khalifa in Dubai (828m), CN Tower in Toronto (553m), the Empire State Building in New York (443m), the Eiffel Tower in Paris (324m), Sky Tower in Auckland (328m) and Skylon Tower in Niagara Falls (160m) (not shown). We will hopefully get to Sydney Tower while in Australia at the end of this trip and I can check that one off too! The next stop was the Sky Deck at Floor 60. We took a bunch of pictures. We were even able to see the place we are staying at using the binoculars on the observation deck.
After Sky Tower, we visited Wētā Workshop Unleashed, a multi-award winning experience, where you can explore interactive and immersive make-believe film sets. The experience focusing on the worlds of horror, fantasy and sci-fi and is presented in a workshop environment as if you are behind the scenes of a special effects movie set. You have a host who takes you on the journey into the world of movie making and through three different genre. The whole experience was very well done and it was hard to believe they were real movie sets.
Finally it was time to head back to the port and take our last ferry back to Devonport. In the morning we will be heading to Sydney, Australia and on Sunday we will board our cruise ship to the South Pacific. It’s hard to believe a week has gone by already since we left Florida. Time flies when you are traveling!