Travels and adventures
Covid made its return to daily life, keeping us confined to our neighbourhood. Fortunately there’s a path that runs along the shore and beside the local Papakura Stream for our daily exercise. When spring came we watched as a duck had a massive hatch of 11 ducklings. Gradually this number has dwindled to just one,…
Russell is an historic village in the Bay of Islands. We haven’t been up there for 3 years, although it is one of our favourite places for a few days away. It’s a quiet town with a great view and the best restaurants north of Auckland. It’s one of the few places left with weka…
Our flight wasn’t till 9pm so we still effectively had a full day left in Paris. We packed our bags and left the at Hotel Esmeralda as we checked out and headed out. First stop was Atelier des Lumières – an art light display show in a large warehouse-type building. Most of the show is…
Eiffel Tower Summit After staying out late the night before we had a small sleep-in (not by much) before heading out for our 10am booking for the summit of the Eiffel Tower. Unfortunately we took another RER line which terminated one stop down at D’Orsay. We asked a guard how to get to the Eiffel…
The train from Verona to Paris arrived 80 minutes late. On board we had a “cabin” – a small step up from a “couchette”. This gave us a duvet each, a small bottle of prosecco each, and a basin. The beds were already set up, three levels high. The space was very cramped though, with…
After the opera the night before we had a day to kill before our overnight train to Paris, so we hired a car. Again this was no easy feat. Car rental companies and the aggregators love to advertise a car and how great it is, but with the proviso that they can switch it for…
Given that we were staying in an apartment rather than a B&B we had to set out in the morning to get some breakfast. Our location meant that everything around us was very expensive for what it was, so instead we headed for a supermarket. On the way we stopped in at the most fake…
Rather than head straight to Verona we left our bags at the B&B and went on a shopping spree. There are so many good shops in Venice, and by now we had a better feel for what souvenirs we’d like and what were appropriate prices. There is a hell of a lot of cheap plastic…
After breakfast we headed to Piazza San Marco for our Secret Itineraries Tour. This took you to some of the back areas of the palace, and gave some great history and background to the government of the Venetian government. We learnt a lot about Casanova who was imprisoned here and famously escaped. We also saw…
A hike to the train station and at 9:30am it was already hot. The first half of the ride to Venice, as far as Bologna, was in tunnel. It must have cost a mint to build. Arriving in Venice is pretty cool. The line crosses a crappy causeway. You get off the train and walk…