AUCKLAND BY BUS

The first thing I noticed after seeing the heavenly sailing boats lining Viaduct Harbour was just how friggin cool Auckland, the capital of New Zealand, really is. Many people had told us in advance that we shouldn’t spend much time there because there wasn’t much to see. Luckily, we ignored these warnings and were blown away by its captivating style and beauty. I think four days would be just right.

Auckland’s shiny waterfront makes every other facelift harbor in the world look like a cheap imitation. It isn’t about size or quantity. It’s about quality. It’s just flat-out gorgeous.

I had finally made it to sailing heaven!  The Red Rocket, Steinlager 2, the winner of the 1989/90 Whitbread Round the World Race, was floating at the dock in front of our restaurant. Steinlager 2 is now owned by the New Zealand Sailing Trust. Steinlager, the original sponsor, is one of New Zealand’s most popular beers.

On 22 May 1990, Steinlager 2, skippered by Peter Blake and crewed by 14 fellow New Zealanders, crossed the finish line off Southampton, England, to win the fifth Whitbread Round the World Race, with an overall time of almost a day and a half quicker than the next boat.  Having dominated the race from beginning to end, Steinlager was first to finish and the winner on corrected time of all six legs, an unprecedented and unsurpassed feat in Whitbread/Volvo round the world sailing history.

Steinlager 2 was designed by a native New Zealander and Annapolis naval architect, Bruce Farr.  And I distinctly remember watching the boat arrive in Fort Lauderdale after winning the fifth leg of the race.  She seemed almost alive.  And Blake and his crew looked like shaggy blonde gods.

And let’s not forget the America’s Cup, which New Zealand has won the last three times.

Auckland has converted the former America’s Cup Racing Village into an interactive museum on the water, offering a unique opportunity to participate as crew on an actual America’s Cup yacht.  You can join a professional crew as a part of a team and give you a chance to take the helm, try your hand at one of the grinders, or just kick back and enjoy the show as you sail the beautiful Waitemata Harbour ($115).

At the entrance to the spellbinding New Zealand Maritime Museum in Viaduct Harbour sits KZ1.  The yacht that participated in the 1988 America’s Cup is displayed on blocks, giving the impression that the massive sailboat is flying through the air. KZ1, also designed by Bruce Farr, was the biggest sloop-rigged yacht ever built, taking only 24 weeks from concept to launch on March 27, 1988. The yacht is 120ft long, has a displacement of 39 tons, and a sail area of 6,750 sq ft (17,000 sq ft downwind!) 

The connections between my home town of Annapolis, the self-proclaimed “Sailing Capital of the World”, and Auckland, home to some of sailing’s greatest legends, was inescapable and as I walked around Viaduct Harbour while Inna tried to make sense of why I was almost crying with joy at the sight of some “silly boats”, I realized that sailboat racing is unlike any other type of racing.  The space invariably determines the race. The winner must master a race course that is constantly changing—the currents, wind, weather—and it’s like multi-dimensional chess on a grand natural scale that will sometimes try and kill or maim you and your mates.

Sailing champions are unfailingly larger than life. After retiring from competitive sailing in 2001, Sir Peter Blake was appointed as a goodwill ambassador of the United Nations’ environmental programs.  He was on a research expedition up the Amazon River and was traveling with his daughter, Sarah Jane. Nine people were on board the Seamaster yacht when they were attacked by pirates near a dangerous backwater place called Macapa.  PIRATES!  And Sir Peter was shot to death.

You can go to the Greek Islands or Miami and see fleets of obscene mega yachts owned by oligarchs and other thieves, gargantuan Clorox bottles one and all. But historic boats, colorful fishing vessels, and the Whitbread, Volvo, and America’s Cup winners line the Auckland waterfront like wonderful memories.

The background music emanating from all of the hip but unpretentious restaurants along Viaduct Harbour was invariably Basanova, not headbanger rock or hip-hop rap. We felt like we were cruising through a smooth jazz video.

The people of New Zealand are called Kiwis, named after a brown, goofy-looking, flightless bird, and they are the most laid-back, gentle, and happy people I have ever encountered. There is definitely a Japanese vibe to the place. They are industrious, but not hurried.

Of course, as a general rule, they don’t have hurricanes, wildfires, earthquakes, tornadoes, blizzards, floods, or any extreme weather to speak of. New Zealand has a delightful climate; it’s between 65 and 75 degrees year-round. The government is caring and stable. The political center rules. Immigration is not an issue, and the people are well-educated, tolerant, and embrace diversity. They are the world champions in rugby (All Blacks) and speed sailing (America’s Cup). The country is drop-dead gorgeous. They are deeply respectful of their native Māori population. Their goods and services are quite excellent, and everything is reasonably priced. The food is fantastic. They aren’t militaristic and don’t fight with others. And they aren’t pissed off at anybody or anything.

New Zealanders have a good life, and they are too far off the beaten track for the rest of the world to take notice. Basically, they’re on their own with Australia and Tasmania, and they are quite happy with that arrangement. The rest of the world seems a bit mad to them.

And they aren’t the only ones who think it’s pretty nice. Auckland has always been voted one of the best cities in the world by most international surveys.

We got a late start after sleeping in and then catching a leisurely breakfast at the Giraffe, on the pinch me, I must be dreaming, waterfront. Then we ambled through stately Queen Street Square past the busy Britomart Train Station and headed for the Hop-On Hop-Off bus on Customs Street. We always do the scenic bus tour when we arrive in a new city, so we can get a feel for the place and figure out where we want to visit on foot.

Getting such a late start would come back and bite us in the ass but we started our ride atop the open rooftop on the big yellow and blue double decker bus with great expectations.

We learned all sorts of interesting factoids as we cruised around Auckland on a hot and sunny day.

The Auckland Civic Theater was built in 1929 as the Great Depression began and is a marvelous example of Moorish Revival architecture. It has undergone several major renovations and is still going strong. It even hosted the Beatles and the Rolling Stones back in the sixties.

Kiwis love fireworks and their New Year’s is not only second to none, but they are the first big country in the world to ring in the New Year because they are west of the International Date Line.

School kids wear blue and white uniforms like in Australia. They even have blue shorts when it’s hot. They usually wear sandals. They seemed extremely happy as they walked to school in large groups carrying their bulky book bags.

The University of Auckland is the largest college in New Zealand, and its crest features three kiwi birds running on blue waves. How cool is that?

Auckland is quite hilly and has lots of pedestrian boulevards. Most of the Central Business District (CBD) is closed to cars. Aucklanders are big-time walkers.

There are five sheep for every human in New Zealand. Auckland is located on the North Island. The woolies are mostly located on the sparsely inhabited South Island.

Europeans introduced rats and dogs to New Zealand, which nearly wiped out all the native flightless birds that hadn’t evolved wings to fly because there were no predators.

The Māori culture is celebrated and somewhat revered by most Kiwis. And there’s a lot to like about the cocky, tattooed yahoos. They are a very spirited people, from their fiery, tongue-wagging war dances to their strange myths and legends.

I especially like the koru, which is used in Māori art and culture and has been the symbol of New Zealand since the mid-1800s. It depicts an unfurling silver fern frond and is used in the logos of many businesses and organisations nationwide. Air New Zealand’s logo is made up of two koru. And cooler still, the Māori often light their way in the dark by using the silver ferns, which reflect the moonlight.

The Māori creation myth is one of the best in the business. According to the ancient legend, Earth Mother and Sky Father lay down together and conceived seventy children born in darkness. The kids got fidgety and started crawling around, eventually separating their parents enough to let in the light. And then each child became a god of some aspect of nature, like water or forests.

The Māori are also the kings of the pit barbecue because they customarily wrap their food in leaves and then bake it underground.

There are extinct volcanoes scattered across the Auckland area. They look like grassy hump holes. The Māori used to build their forts atop these rocky natural defenses.

The Auckland War Memorial sits prominently on the crater rim of the Pukekawa Volcano surrounded by the Domain, Auckland’s oldest and largest park, which is home to the Wintergardens, the Cricket Pavilion, grassy athletic fields, lush lawns, concert venues, Auckland City Hospital, a sacred totara tree, and some dainty duck ponds.

It was getting scorching hot on top of the tour bus after about an hour of sightseeing, so we got off at Mount Eden, the highest point in Auckland. After resting in the shade of some large eucalytus trees, we humped it up the very steep trail to the top of the ancient volcano where the views were forever and the ocean and sky seemed to lay down together in twinkling delight.

We returned to the bus stop at around four and waited there for about 45 minutes. Apparently, the bus wasn’t coming. We had probably missed their last stop of the day at the mountain. So, we had no choice but to hike the three miles across town back to our hotel.

We thought about catching a metro bus. There were stops all along Mount Eden Road, and the bus system is a breeze to master—you just swipe your credit card. But the walk was so interesting that we just kept hoofing it. It was fun to see the “other” Auckland where the tourons rarely venture.

And so, while we missed a bunch of stops on the tour bus we had paid to ride, like Kelly Tarlton’s Sea Life whale jail, we ended up discovering so much more on our own.

It was a long, tiring walk back to the harbor, but we were rewarded with another great find, White + Wong’s genuine Chinese restaurant on the water. The Peking duck and hot wok sweet and sour pork were out of this world. And the waterfront scene was dreamy.

See, that’s the thing about traveling. If things don’t work out the way you planned, then you just gotta start dancing.