Auckland to Te Kaha

Well, finally, Auckland, New Zealand. After an extremely full, packed to the gills flight from LA with not a seat to spare on the plane, we touched down in Auckland, City of Sails, New Zealand. After a hot shower and activating my cell phone, I was feeling pretty human for a change. The weather was not what I was hoping for...overcast and light rain socked in. After a long layover in Auckland and a ride around to the domestic terminal, I was finally on my last flight of 4. I arrived in Taraunga on the Bay of Plenty. My friend Paul O'Brien met me at the airport and we were off and running to Te Kaha. Now, let me explain the dilemma of having the most popular guy on the East Cape pick you up from the airport. It means stopping everywhere imaginable between every little burb of every town to either see someone or pick something up. Hence what should and could have been a three hour drive ended up being a 7 hour drive!

Life in Te Kaha is much like life where I live in Southwest Montana. I think 60 miles round trip to the grocery store is a big deal...well, try living in Te Kaha. The closest town with a store is a good hour drive away and if you're anything like me, you save up all your errands for your trips to town. Well, I think Paul had been saving up since last January...needless to say, many stops were made along the way. But, it's all good...tomorrow the weather is to be stunning, sunny, warm, and calm seas. That means we're heading out on the Te Kaha Cat (catamaran) for some fishing, diving for crayfish (lobster) and Paua (abalone). We're set up to go catch some big kingfish (aka yellowtail)(50 pounders) on jigs and then some other species of food fish for dinner and of course the creme de la creme...crayfish and paua. I'm ready for a shellfish feast to beat all.

Let's see...the temperature is around 14 C which for those of us who are total ninny's when it comes to metric, = 56 degrees F. Why is it us Yankees refuse to learn metric? Of course it's now 11:10 PM here which is 3:06 am yesterday at home. HUH? Ok, I think it's time to take a soak in the hot tub and then head to bed. Tomorrow promises to be a grand day so more when I know what happened.

Ciao