Drivin’ around…

After our simply delightful brunch that morning on our 3rd day with my friend and her family, we went driving around to places outside Auckland that I had never been to before. That day, they took us to the most incredibly beautiful, most breathtaking scenic spots ever.

Our first stop was at Muriwai where at this specific spot, the Maukatia (Maori Bay)…

…we were able to see the gannet colony on a plateau in the midst of the cliffs there…

Everybody else walked to get a closer look at the birds but I did not want to over-exert myself and decided to stick around where I was to take photographs of the flowers and everything else. I loved the toilets…

– they look like some kind of chalets on the outside, don’t you think?

If you visit places like these in New Zealand during the summer, you may be lucky enough to see some exciting sights…

…here, there and everywhere. Unfortunately, I was not lucky enough to see everything…but somebody did. My friend went over too but according to her, they would cover up when a lady walked by whereas if a man happened to come passing, it would be a different story altogether.

There was this sign on the path down to the beach…

…but there were a few surfers having a ball of a time regardless…

…and even Melissa and my friend’s son went all the way down to get into contact with the sea water…

As we were leaving this particular place, I managed to get a shot of the gannets from another angle…

…but I was in the car so the colours did not turn out as nice.

On the way, we had some captivating sights of the Muriwai Beach…

…and the surrounding areas…

We did not stop at the beach itself …

…though as we had a few other places to go to before we called it a day.

After the beaches (Yes, the spelling’s correct!!!! LOL!!!), we headed to the forest – the Woodhill Crown Forest, to be exact, where they have all kinds of activities such as flying fox…

…and canopy walks…

…and lots more or you can even have a picnic there, if you so desire, amidst the amazingly tall trees there.

We were indeed immensely enthralled by all the captivating scenery along the way on the tour that day, so much so that we never even felt the time slipping by and before we knew it, it was time for tea – but that would have to be in the next post, I’m afraid. Do come back to check that out, ok?

Honey and the bees…

We headed out of town in the 3rd day of our stay in Auckland, New Zealand and stopped by this place at Waimauku for brunch…

– just 5 minutes’ drive past Kumeu, according to this website.

It was actually a bee farm, if I’m not mistaken…

…and there were signs telling you what to do should you happen to have the misfortune of getting stung by one.

The cafe there was very nice and these were their specials for the day…

I was attracted by the colours of their peppercorns…

Here, we have either white or black but they seemed to have red ones as well.

Well, this wasn’t mine…

I guess by now all of you would know that I would get terribly sleepy should I drink anything with milk during the day.

I think this was my friend’s order…

…and her hubby had this…

The scrambled eggs were too salty but the members of the staff were very pleasant about it. When informed, they happily took it back and came out with a fresh plate…and it was perfectly done the second time around. I don’t think we would get that same kind of treatment here, I’m sure… Tsk! Tsk!

My missus had this…

…and whatever it was, the presentation certainly looked good.

Melissa ordered something with venison sausages…

…and it was really very very nice. I think this was the nicest of the lot actually.

My friend’s son and I had the Egg Benedict with smoked salmon added…

Well, I’ve seen this in blogs and photos of the ones Melissa had before as well but I never got round to trying it here. For one thing, I don’t think we can get it in Sibu so I made it a point to eat it at least once while in New Zealand.

It was very nicely done – the poached egg was perfect…

– so very nice and runny and I enjoyed that very much. Just look at that look of satisfaction on my face…

LOL!!! Omigawd!!! It wasn’t even 48 hours since we landed in Auckland…and just look at my tummy!!! With that red sweater, people would think that I was Santa Claus after having taken off my costume and wrapping it round my neck, enjoying a little break at this beautiful place and the superbly fine and sunny but cool weather. LOL!!!