Its bark was worse than its bite.

Here is a brief look at a storm that came, seemingly out of nowhere and went on its way, almost as quickly...

Looked like it might be intense. The clouds came up so fast and were so dark. The sun disappeared...

It downpoured, and it departed...

A fine day...

Hmmm, clouding up a bit...

Whoa, look at this...

Hey Hon, we could lose power with this one, I think...The wind is coming up too, I'll put the deck chairs under cover.  

It's getting closer...

But look, there's a bit of a rainbow. Hope that's a good sign...

 Not the sun returning, just a street light that came on in the gloom...

A double rainbow like a wave good-bye as the storm leaves us. It wasn't bad at all.        -djf

Western Springs

Western Springs is a natural, spring-fed lake and once provided the young city of Auckland with its drinking water. Its Maori name is 'Te Wai Orea,' and means 'waters of the eel.' The lake still abounds with eels, although I didn't see any the day I wandered its many pathways. 

Besides the park, this area of Auckland is home to the Zoo, MOTAT (the Museum of Transportation and Technology, a golf course and a speedway. 

Let's walk a bit.

 Great place, and chock full of birds to admire. But watch where you put your feet. You know birds...especially big ones. 

 An idyllic setting

 There are so many trails and paths, and walk ways that it's hard to do them all.

 Fishing for the lake's eels is forbidden.

I believe this is a pied cormorant. Looks like he's taking a bow. 

 The 'Ubiquitous Chicken' of Auckland

(Gallus gallus domesticus, 'ubiquitous')

 I learned that black swans are native to New Zealand. They were here when the first humans arrived and were described by the first European explorers when they in turn arrived. However, the birds were later hunted to extinction. They were reintroduced from Austrailia in 1860, but their numbers grew so rapidly and in so many locations, separated from the reintroduction sites, that it was thought that they may have occasionally immigrated  on their own from Australia.  This has not been confirmed. 

They are now doing very well here and there is a hunting season on them. About 7,000 are harvested annually. 

As I left Western Springs, I came across this warning sign set in the sidewalk. Trams from MOTAT make a trip back and forth in front of the park twice and hour.  

 The chances of being hit by a tram are not high. They procede at about a fast walking pace, clinking and clanking noisily, and the driver is right out front. 

 Here's another photo of a stationary one.

 As I crossed Great North Road to the bus stop for the return journey home, I saw this colorful sightseeing bus go by.  Although this one was almost empty, when the cruise ships are in port you often see them packed full.  

I've told you several times about the small storms that sweep across our island, sometimes many times a day during the winter.  Here comes a perfect example of one now. They are fast-moving and can dump a surprising amount of water in a short time. I don't think this one will hit Henderson though so I should stay dry when I get there.                -djf

The White Lady

With all the walking I've done in and around Auckland, I can't believe that I hadn't run across The White Lady before this. It's true that she's on a street that's a block beyond my usual route. I'm a little embarrased that I apparently follow such predictable paths. Nevermind.

I know about her now and intend to give her some business every now and then. She's the grand old lady of Auckland nightlife. Come and meet her. I'm sorry I can't buy you a hamburger of some sort. We could find a bench nearby, watch the crowds walk by and eat our fill. 

Here is my very own 'white lady' standing in front of Auckland's White Lady.

 There is a recipe in this cookbook for The White Lady Hamburger.

 This is Jeanne's copy of the cookbook...

 and the recipe as it appears.

Jeanne and I tried burgers slightly smaller than The White Lady Burger, but equally as delicious.

Here's her menu:

 https://www.zomato.com/the-white-lady-food-truck/menu

I'm pleased that Jeanne and I are now part of the history of The White Lady. Check it out. 

https://www.thewhitelady.co.nz/

What do you think Dianne? Shall we do lunch?        -djf

3rd part of Oneroa

It's now the middle of the afternoon and Jeanne and I have been either traveling to get here, or wandering on the beach, or climbing over the cliff from the northern part of Oneroa to this southern part for several hours. We're starting to drag a bit. Spotting this little store was the answer to recharging our batteries. 

What we need is a rejuvenating beverage FULL of caffeine. A couple of diet Cokes later, we walked back across the road to the park. 

I'd guess the temperature is about 75 and there is just enough of a breeze.

Here is another arch. If the boys were here, they'd have to crawl under it. I had enough crawling in the cave and that looks too low for me anyway.

A dinner plate-sized jellyfish

Quite a few seagulls are nesting. They didn't seem upset by our presence at all. 

After we got back from our first trip out here, I was surfing Youtube and came across a video by some guy, young and spry enough to climb to a hidden portion of these rocks and discover an opening or tunnel through to the other side. I vowed I'd try to locate it when we returned. Well, there it is. To get right up to it, I'd have to splash through some water, and climb up and over some rocks that don't appear in this picture. I'm holding my camera over them while I stand on tiptoe. 
Not gonna happen. Too old, stiff, chubby, etc. 

But at least I found it. I walked around to the other side but could not approach the opening at all. A person might have to get to it by coming from the sea side of the rocks. Beyond my abilities. 

We spent the last bit of our day at the beach quietly strolling through the sandy paths between the outcroppings of lava. 

One thing I noticed and appreciated was the number of benches that had been placed around the park and beach. Most of them were labeled by the donor. It must have been a project undertaken at some point. We made use of several of them.

The best of days has to end and we finally called it quits. The 50-sun block we had slathered on this morning had worked. We spent 5 or 6 hours in the sun but felt no sign of overexposure. That's good stuff. 

We caught a bus back to the ferry terminal and had to wait only about 15 minutes for one to arrive. This is a video I took while standing on the pier. You'll see Rangitoto out there, a bit of Auckland in the distance, and our ferry approaching. You'll see people heading down the ramp to get into line. Jeanne and I joined them just before the ferry arrived. 

www.youtube.com/watch?v=lNrld_R0qvE&feature=youtu.be

Here it is. Not much of a crowd returning yet. I'd guess that between 6 and 8 pm it'll get nutsy again. We'll be home and relaxing by that time. 

I don't normally like to travel on the top deck of a ferry. If it's rough, you get a lot more motion up there. The other reason is that these ferries fly. It's way too windy up here to be comfortable. I'm surprised there are so many people up here way tougher than I am.

The view from the top deck. No mystery ships chasing us this time.  I didn't really think the Dread Pirate Roberts* operated in these waters anyway.      

* The Princess Bride came out in 1987 when Allie was young and became an instant classic for us. I've made a couple of references to it in these three Oneroa posts. If you haven't seen it somehow or you haven't for a long time, I urge you to find it. Amiri and Arram resisted it at first, when we told them we had an 'old movie' for them to watch, but fell hard under it's spell before very long. Now we own it and it gets watched regularly. Peter Falk is wonderful and Billy Crystal beyond words.     -djf