Student Bloggers

It's 7am, and the sun is just rising over Auckland. Nearly horizontal beams strike sharp, long shadows on the airport road and make golden halos around people's heads, who walk briskly with suitcases, greeting loved ones, waiting for a shuttle. I'm waiting for the Airbus that will take me through the monkey puzzle trees to downtown Auckland and my hostel for the night, Nomads Fat Camel. I’m in Auckland a day early for Arcadia’s orientation, so I’m planning on exploring Auckland on my own for a day before the adventure begins. At a little over a million people, Auckland makes up nearly a third of New Zealand's population. The Maori peoples were attracted to the Auckland isthmus for its fertile volcanic soil, and settled here around 1350.

Our bus trundles out of the airport complex and passes the sea; it's a deep, moody gray in the late dawn light rimmed with lush green banks. The sky is overcast still, but hints of blue and gold peek through the clouds to suggest sunshine later on. We pass through residential neighborhoods lined with a strange domesticated jungle; trees with ropey, twisting branches, that look like they're covered in vines, that clump together in masses of seemingly impenetrable green. Massive palms and exotic looking ferns that look like they're from Jurassic Park fill in any open spaces.

Suddenly we're in downtown Auckland. The glassy skyscrapers and streets are nearly empty early in the early gray morning but for a handful of wandering souls, backpackers in their early twenties with staggering packs and hiking boots on, wandering groggily out of hostels to catch unfortunately early busses and flights. Although I didn't sleep much on the plane, for me it's noon, so I'm pretty awake. Madison, Wisconsin is 19 hours behind New Zealand, or 5 hours ahead, if you ignore the fact that we're in a different day. My flight took off at 9:30 my time, and after one cup of beer, one cup of wine, and watching Grand Budapest Hotel twice in a row, I passed out for what I believe was a solid seven hours. The flight attendants woke us up at 5 am NZ time, which is 10 am my time. Now the challenge is staying up until a respectable bedtime.

My stop was Fort Street, a narrower, stone-cobbled avenue lined with youth hostels, bars and ethnic cafes that branched off of the larger Queen Street. I located Nomad's hostel and was informed that check-in starts at 2pm, seven hours in the future. Luckily they have a storage room, in which I dumped my bags and split off to explore the city in my favorite way: running.

Explorunning is slower than driving and faster than walking, no gear is needed, and a run can easily be turned into a swim, tree climb, back alley wander, city jaunt, or low key rock climb without fuss. I was stoked to find a long and scenic running/biking path that begins at the Auckland port and lines the shore, passing by a harbor, a handful of public beaches, over a bridge, and along miles of vast ocean freckled with kayaks like elongated skittles, sprinkled among the waves. As I jogged by, the choppy sea that was so gray in the morning came out of its shell: clouds burned off and the water heated from a clear blue to a searing turquoise. A deafening whir of tropical bugs and birds (cicadas?) buzzed from viney trees lining the pathway.

Everyone in Auckland seemed to be outside and active that day. I passed mobs of uniformed bikers, women running and chatting, two guys running while chained together (some stride matching exercise-?), hordes of kayakers, fleets of cruising sailboats, swimmers, skaters. This was no park in LA, where hollywood mamas trot in pink velvet sweatsuits with their ribboned yipping yorkies. The farther I ran, the more the city receded into lush jungly green canopies and the wider the sea stretched on into the horizon. I could have gone on forever but stopped to check out the Waka Ama race.

The Waka Ama race is a traditional Maori canoe race, also called the The Portage Crossing. It's done on outrigger canoes, and retraces the path Maori settlers took when they discovered Manukau Harbour. From a distance the rowers looked like crew teams, but as I came closer I realized they were wielding short, stubby wooden paddles that they flicked from their right to left hand sides with incredible speed. Crowds of Maori parents and coaches field a sandy beach where about seven built, tattooed Maori team members in colorful uniform tanks sat in their vessel. They blasted music while the last one waited farther up the beach. At the whistle he sprinted towards the water and shoved the canoe on its way, taking off in a contained tornado of muscle and oar.

Rowers start in Okahu Bay, gun 15km down the Tamaki River to the Auckland Rowing Club at Otahuhu, where they have to pull their canoes out of the water and portage them 5km across to Mangere, and then paddle 5km more to Waterfront Reserve. Waka Ama is the Maori word for outrigger canoes, or canoes with lateral support floats fastened to the main hull (Catamarans are outriggers with a double-hull configuration). Outriggers were used by Maori and Polynesian settlers in New Zealand, Hawaii, Tahiti and Samoa; they're important the cultural heritage, and Auckland has the largest Polynesian population in the world.

Once they were off the crowds drifted away and I drifted back into central Auckland, where a farmers market was bustling in a ritzy shopping section of downtown. So far Auckland reminds me a little of a few of my favorite cities: it's got Seattle's bustling harbors, green coastline and athletic populace, San Francisco's white buildings and boutique farmer's market charm, LA's palm lined streets and waterside boardwalks, and masses of backpackers like a European city. Like Germany, the cafes sell Birschermuslie, tiny sandwiches and baguettes. There are kabob shops and McDonalds on every corner. But the Kiwis, their accents and quirks, are different from any other culture in the world. The plants and animals completely unique and bizarre. And this is just Auckland; I am sure I'll find endless oddities as I continue to explore.