I’ve had fun over the last few months playing on the HealthLink touch rugby team. We suck, compared to all but two of the other teams in the league. But it’s great fun. Prov joined us for the two Thursday evenings he was here.

The rules are pretty simple compared to real rugby, so not hard to pick up. Pass the ball backwards, be sure to pass if you’re the dummy, stay onsides and try to stay with your man on defense.

The most important lesson for me, athletic-wise, is that I can’t run fast or change directions hardly at all, and when I try either of those, it hurts.

As one of the last activities with Prov, we went to Eden Park to see the NZ Blackcaps play Australia in the final match of a 20-20 cricket series.

I’m not a serious fan (or supporter as they say here) of any big stadium sport, but I always enjoy going to a game. I found it at least as easy to follow as baseball. The fish and chips was good, the beer was cold, the fans were just rowdy enough.

We lost, sadly, after a rain shower delayed and finally ended the game.

Must be experienced to be understood… after about a half hour drive through absolutely nothing, you arrive at a totally crowded parking lot.

You walk down to the beach, perhaps renting a spade along the way. You elbow your way in between some other groups and dig yourself a little pit, somehow balancing the super hot water bubbling up from the earth’s core with air and cool sand to create a perfect hot tub experience.

We were prepared thanks to our glass-bottom boat guide Shona, so we just watched until someone was getting ready to leave and took their spot. I alternated between relaxing in the heat and playing in the waves.

At first it was weird to be jammed in with so many people, but after a bit it’s like you’re all in the same club, best of friends. Toward the end we were entertained by a bus load of 20-something’s and all their various posturing. To the one guy who was trying way too hard to impress the girls with his digging and engineering skills… we hope one of them noticed but it sure looked like the guys who just settled in to enjoy were making better time.

I would do this again and again. Supposedly there’s another hot water beach south of Raglan… next time!

This pohutukawa tree has followed its heart and openly declared its love for a palm. A few years ago, this would have been considered a crime, even here in New Zealand, but today most of the other trees accept and support this unlikely pair.

After a false start in September, we finally got a chance to dine at the Sky Tower. The food was good, a 3-course menu with four options for each, so we got to literally order one of each. But it turned out to be more than just dinner.

It was Chinese New Years, so there was a show in the courtyard…

We got the requisite toes shot, 50+ stories up…

And a beautiful view from our revolving perch…

Including the Harbour Bridge lights…

And for dessert, a random showgirl who caused the entire crowded lobby – men, women, and children – to stop and gawk as she simply rode up the escalator…

Whew!

The other night we went to the dinner show at Tamaki Maori Village outside Rotorua.

During the half hour ride out to the venue, our bus driver told us the story of how his Polynesian ancestors made epic sea voyages in their ‘waka’ or canoes and invited us to imagine our tour bus as a modern analogue. Although he didn’t say analogue exactly, now that I think of it.

Prov owned up to some knowledge of cricket and so (but of course!) was elected our Chief. On arriving, he and the Chiefs from the other waka met the ritual challenge of the ‘powhiri’ …

… and were greeted by the hosts with the ritual ‘hongi’ …

… granting us welcome, but coming with a chief-to-chief suggestion nonetheless to keep our hands off their ‘wahine’ :

We heard how the founders of this enterprise sold their beloved Harley Davidson motorcycle to raise funds, but that this sacrifice was worth it to preserve and share their proud culture. This origin story was delivered without any trace of irony, which was almost as miraculous as the whole seagoing canoe thing.

We had games and arts and crafts demos in the village …

… before heading in for a ‘hangi’, dinner steamed over a pit of hot coals. The food was good, better than any of us expected.

There was singing and dancing, a ‘haka’ lesson for the menfolk, and so on. On the bus ride back the driver got us all singing along… he was not a particularly good singer but somehow had a vast musicality under his smoker’s wheeze. We all joined in, especially when he took the wheels on the bus round and round a roundabout multiple times.

So, tourist trap? Yes. Entertaining? Also yes. Educational? I think yes. Culturally uplifting and appropriate? I can only hope. I suppose there are learned and passionate people with lots of views on what ‘Maori culture’ today even means, and on how best to honor it. Hopefully we helped, or at least didn’t hurt, that work.

The health and safety briefing seems to be more of a thing here than in the US. Every event starts off with info about the exits or the life preservers or the meeting place to go if you do have to evacuate.

I’ve been in plenty of places where earthquake preparedness was a thing, but this is my first time to be exposed to volcano preparedness!

An hour or so south of Raglan is the little village of Waitomo, famous for its system of limestone caverns, many with rivers, filled with glowworms. Above is a shot from just inside the entrance.

There are many tour options available, including some where you get in a wetsuit and take an inner tube ride through the cave and some fairly exciting rapids. We opted for a tamer experience, with a walking part and a placid ride in an inflatable raft.

The guide had been on the job too many years, and there were various other details one could complain about. But the glowworms were magical. Here’s the best picture I could get…

Imagine that plus a ceiling covered with tiny fairy lights. It really was mesmerizing.

As part of our first short road trip with the Provs we spent a night in Raglan, a little surf town on the West coast. A couple times a year it plays host to a big music festival but mostly it’s just sleepy. If you wanted to just surf and get away from it all, this is your spot. But if you want dinner after about 8 PM, that’s a different story.

Then again, nightlife might not be the point…

Somewhere behind all those people sits a jazz combo: The Society Jazzmen. They play every Sunday at De Fontein, a wonderful venue on the Strand in Mission Bay. What the Jazzmen lack in raw talent they also lack in craftsmanship and unity of intention. But somehow they make it all up with bonhomie and the warmth of familiarity. The most exotic song they played was Sunny Side of the Street, and everybody sang along and the place was packed. People from the audience came up for a song or two, and it was fun.

This statue was promised a pedestal position at ‘a major venue’ in ‘a hot tourism destination’ and was not pleased to end up at the Winter Garden in Auckland.

So here we are touring the botanical gardens with the Provs, in an effort to keep them awake post-arrival. Suddenly, the woman on my left runs in and shouts “when I ask if your name is Tony, you say yes! Ok, is your name Tony???”

I said yes. She grabbed my hand and off we went.

It turned out that I, as an honorary Tony, was the prize for a scavenger hunt, part of a hen party (bachelorette party in my language).

Big respect to the maid of honor for pulling together an entire full-size party bus full of friends ready to dress up in corsets and fishnets and feather boas for a burlesque themed event.

Waiting for Sherri and Prov to get through customs. They actually put these nice seats here for people to watch for their people to emerge. It’s almost a spectator sport… and seems to offer more action than cricket.