Auckland: Day Two with the Hoangs

The Hoang / Fructman clan arrived pretty early in the morning from San Francisco (the flight lands at 5:30 am or so!). I was awake and ventured into the lobby to meet and greet them. The goal was to keep them on their feet for most of the day to avoid jet lag and fatigue. After a quick breakfast and coffee in the hotel bar, we headed out. We took a tour of the inner city on The Link bus and went through Parnell, Ponsoby, New Market, Newton before getting down at the quay. We walked around the quay and Viaduct harbor for some time before proceeding to a dim sum lunch. Our original choice was Ocean City dim sum which had received an excellent review in Cusine magazine. On our walk there, we saw Sunshine which had won Best Chinese Restaurant award in 2005 and 2006 and we saw quite a few folks entering this place. We decided to chance it which was an excellent decision. It was quite ironic that their first meal was yum-cha in NZ since the Bay area has got excellent dim sum also. The dim sum was quite good (our expecations in NZ are also a bit lower than SF), specifically the turnip cake, the beef ribs on squash, the shrimp dumplings, the scallop dumplings and the egg tart. This was definitely the best dim sum we've had in NZ (the other two were in Christchurch and Wellington).

We then took the ferry to Davenport to get a view of Auckland from the water. Davenport basically is the Sausalito of Auckland. We spent a few hours at the playground and beach while the adults took turns walking along the beach and upto North Head for some spectacular views of Auckland and the hauraki gulf. For dinner we decided to get fish and chips at FishMongers in Parnell. We had an excellent driver who managed to squeeze us all into his minivan cab. Unfortunately the Parnell location was closed for Easter Sunday so we went to their Remuera location. We ordered a sampling of various fish and chips, grilled salmon and tuna, and a thai fish cake. We also got some Kumara chips. Unfortunately it was late and there was not enough seating out there, so we did not enjoy the meal as much. The food was quite good and well worth a visit. The same cabbie came and picked us up an hour later.

Maya and PJ were quite excited to play with Jason. So the three of them stayed up pretty late playing with play dough. Tomorrow we leave for Keri Keri and the Bay of Islands. I reserved a super shuttle van to take us to the airport tomorrow. I did this online, but did not trust the reservation process, so I called them to double check. It was good that I called, since the online system had messed up both my name the pickup time.