We entertained ourselves in Auckland for a few days, with a casual fish and chips dinner one night at Swashbucklers' Bar and Restaurant and a more upmarket meal another night at SPQR, one of the "in" restaurants in Ponsonby.
On Thursday we had a fabulous day on Waiheke Island, taking the car ferry over and enjoying an outstanding lunch at Mudbrick Vineyard. It was our only sunny day so we could eat lunch on the terrace, even though the wind was cool. The restaurant setting is magnificent, with tall French windows overlooking the topiary and vegetable/herb garden, with the city of Auckland in the distance across the sparkling water. Perfect.
Entrees of grilled scallops with tempura prawns or of pork belly were as yummy as the mains of 3 styles of lamb, or grilled snapper with spanner-crab dumplings, or sirloin of beef. The Mudbrick Rose was an excellent wine, enjoyed with all of our food.
Yesterday, Saturday March 20, at last we had suitable weather to go away on the boat. So I scuttled off to the Parnell Farmers' Market to stock up on food and we left the marina at about 11.00, with a 10 knot south-westerly and some sun mixed with clouds. We headed out into Hauraki Gulf and travelled north about 30 nautical miles, under sail all the way to Kauwau Island. Bon Accord Harbour has many little bays and we selected School House Bay on the southern side of the harbour to anchor for the night. Kawau Island only has a population of 300 so there are obviously many holiday homes, with plenty of them in Bon Accord Harbour, with jetties for the boats. A "mail cruise" boat comes across from the mainland each week day, delivering mail to 76 jetties and it's also possible to come from and to the mainland by water taxi. In 1860 the Governor of NZ, Governor Grey, bought the home that had belonged to the manager of the copper mine that was operated in those days and then developed the two-storey home into a luxurious Mansion House right on the water's edge. This is now operated as an historic tourist site, which we visited by dinghy today.
We were fortunate to wake up to another blue sky this morning and at last could have breakfast at the cockpit table. The usual grey clouds gathered during the day but the wind is light and the late afternoon weather is pleasant enough for us to stay another night before returning to Auckland tomorrow. New Zealanders are very lucky to have such great cruising grounds, with so many islands to visit, but we are not sure about their luck with the weather.
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