A day in Auckland

With only one day in the city we were keen to make the most of our time. The weather remained wet and chilly but we donned our macs and headed out to explore. The rain became heavier and prevented us from going down to the waterfront in the morning so we made our way over to SKYCITY and had a good look around.

SKYCITY is home to New Zealand's biggest casino and the complex also offers a wide variety of entertainment and leisure options. More than 1600 gaming machines, four casinos and over 100 gaming tables.

The complex is best known for the Sky Tower, the country's tallest structure. In addition there are a number of bars, cafes and restaurants as well as a theatre staging local and international events.

We also checked out Sky Tower which at 328-m is a splendid tourist, broadcasting and telecommunications facility, and has taken over from Sydney's AMP Tower as the tallest building in the southern hemisphere. We had hoped to visit the main observation level for views of the city but, as the weather was not so good and the cloud was low we gave it a miss. As luck would have it though, when the weather cleared later in the early evening we had some quite spectacular views from our hotel room which was on the 19th floor!

Once the rain had abated we made our way down to The Waterfront where there are excellent shops, historic buildings, top restaurants and bars and, last but most, a superb view!

We wandered down to Quay Street and found a lovely little bistro-type restaurant where we had a lovely lunch of skewered snapper and lemon, sea bass on a bed of asparagus and some great wine. Unfortunately, the weather turned foul again so we took our time and had a long and leisurely lunch, making room for apple crumble pie with ice cream (AND cream!), and coffees.

We waddled(!) back to our hotel in the late afternoon.