Days 47 to 48: Auckland

I cannot tell you how excited I was to have 2 days slobbing around at Em's while she was at work. To be honest, just staying somewhere that isn't a hostel and that I can stay for longer than 1 or 2 nights feels pretty heavenly right now.

My first ambition is to investigate the television situation. Oh. Dear. God. The TV in NZ is so very bad. The adverts are strange for starters, with all of them being super cheesy to-camera sales pitches (and I finally get to hear the jingles that Em couldn't stop singing in Australia... New Zealanders sure do love a jingle!). The breakfast TV. which is pretty much as far as I got before giving up, is certainly entertaining. Their equivalent of 'Daybreak' and, I suppose, 'Lorraine', have serious comedy value in the form of two of the dumbest most annoying women I've ever seen. Oh the hilarity. Wish you could see a clip so that this paragraph wasn't so boring for y'all (sorry, too much Beyoncé).

Contrary to what that paraphraph might imply, I did actually leave the house during these 2 days. Right outside Em's place, the jammy dodger has got herself a beautiful reserve, the Kepa Reserve, which you can go in and take some nice walks so I went for a little explore. After nearly peeing myself when some dogs barked at me the whole way there... pathetic... it is beautiful down there. It's really rugged, with the path constantly being taken over by overgrown shrubbery and trees growing seemingly upside down and sideways and in and out of the moss covered stream that follows the path around. 

It's much warmer in Nz than I was expecting, so I took a stroll down to Mission Bay, the nearest beach to Em's place - only 20 minutes walk away and quiet being the middle of the working week. I can certainly see the appeal completely of being 15 minutes drive from their centre, but also 20 minutes from the beach and a protected reserve in your back yard.

For my penultimate night, Em took me an hour out West to the Waitakere Ranges so that we could take in the sunset on Piha Beach. A surfer's paradise to rival Australia I'm sure, if not a bit chilly. The black sand beach weirdly reminds me of beaches in Jersey, and what I imagine the north west coast of US to look like - super beautiful, huge green mountains with golden grasses lining the flat sand with its Kodak-worthy footprints while the huge, brooding Lion Rock stretches out determined into the ocean.