Parnell and 2 Bonuses

Parnell is a historic first suburb about 2k from downtown Auckland, a charming and very distinctive up-market village shopping area.
We walked the street looking into all the charming quaint little shops selling very opulent gifts and furniture, things one could only imagine in your home...huge light shades and very expensive seats!!!. shops dedicated to paper products that were amazing.Fashion designers showing all their art. Lots of restaurants of different taste sensations from all corners of the world...Italy, Japan, India to name but a few and lots of small cafes.

View From the Sky Tower

We walked the street stopping for a coffee to help recharge ourselves, and soak up the different atmosphere.
Further along we could see the building known as the War Museum that we could see from the sky tower...Mark thought this was further away and was thinking of taking a bus....... but what a bonus it was within walking distance of where we were, so off we went.
Bonus No1

Look Daffodils 

This building was up one of the steepest hills in Auckland and steps too! I took a rest at the top while Mark took photo's. We noticed the admission $10 donation each and decided to go in.  We purchased our tickets, checked in our backpack and armed with map started our day of discovery!

The museum is situated in a very impressive building. There are 3 floors that tells the story of New Zealand, the diverse cultures that make New Zealand today.


We start our adventure in the Maori Court were there was a huge war canoe that was used in battle, that could hold 100 warriors, it was made from one huge tree trunk...it was very impressive!!! We removed our shoes to sit in a Maori chiefs house..its respectful to remove shoes for this.

The natural history room that showed unusual wildlife and plants and some birds that i have never seen, they were so big..one of them stood over three metres and looked like an ostrich. We experienced a volcanic eruption in a interactive room..that was quite frightening the room actually shook.





Bonus No2
Walking back from the War museum through the shopping area, we looked for refreshments and found ourselves outside the Chocolate Boutique..in we went, the list of chocolate drinks was extensive 22 different ways to drink chocolate, I had the Italian one which came with cream and chocolate curls..it was so thick that you could not drink it, I had to use a spoon, Mark said " do you want anything to eat" I said "surprise me" and he did, the lady arrived with two chocolate covered éclairs filled with chocolate cream..almost 'Death by chocolate'. the whole shop although small was filled with chocolate products all in glistening bags.

What next?