Left to our own devices…

My friend’s hubby had something on at Remuera…

…that morning, the 4th (4½) day of our stay in Auckland, New Zealand so he took us there and we went roaming around the vicinity by ourselves. Eventually, we decided to stop by this place…

…for breakfast.

Ooooo!!! Scones!

I did not order those though as I was attracted by what they had in the glass display counter…

…and ended up ordering a pie…

– chicken and mushroom, I think it was, I can’t remember exactly now…

…but though it was nice, definitely nicer than those frozen ones that one can get at the supermarkets and convenience stores especially where the pastry was concerned, it wasn’t something I would be dying to have again.

My missus had a quiche…

…while my friend’s son had his mushroom on toast…

…which certainly looked a lot better than what he had the day before at Matamata aka Hobbiton.

Melissa had their scrambled eggs with toast and hash browns…

…and she enjoyed that very much. My friend had a slice of their fruit cake…

…and she was thrilled to bits that theirs was as crumbly as hers. LOL!!! I don’t remember tasting it – maybe I did or maybe I did not, knowing that hers would be a lot nicer. She gave me a loaf…and of course, I’m saving it for Chinese New Year. Fruits cakes are like fine wine…and people – the older it gets, the better it is. Hehehehehehe!!!!!

More on Remuera in the next post… Stick around, won’t ya?

What’s for dinner…

After our day-long tour of Hobbiton/Matamata and all the places on the way back to Auckland, we stopped by here…

…for dinner. I am quite familiar with this part of Auckland as I was here before when I was in the city in 2005 but of course, I did not get to dine here then, not at all.

If I’m not mistaken, there are a whole lot of Cock & Bull pubs all over in the UK as well…

…and over here in NZ, it certainly looks like it has had its fair share of awards…

We went to the one in Botany, pronounced Bot-ny for some reason or other…

…and while waiting for the food to be served, I walked around the vicinity and I saw these young Filipino girls busking in one corner…

They certainly had a lot of choices on their menu so it took us quite a while to make up our minds. My friend ordered the seafood medley for everyone to share…

…but it certainly looked good and tasted good too!

She and Melissa had the Scottish mutton pie…

…which was very nice as well.

I loved my Yorkshire beef…

…very much and my friend’s son had that too…but my missus had a bit of a problem with  the C.L.T. – their grilled chicken served with lettuce & tomato drizzled with plum sauce…

Somehow it came out served in a bun looking like a burger and the bread was very very hard so she eventually had no choice but to leave it by the side.

I think this was not on their regular menu but was their special for the day…and my friend’s hubby had that…

It was pretty good too.

After that sumptuous and scrumptious dinner, we headed back to the house and thus ended our 3rd day, or 3½ to be exact, in Auckland. Gee!!! 3½ days only? It certainly seemed that we had done a lot more than what people would normally do on a 14-day conducted tour, don’t you think?