Category: Review

Searching for locations: From the Presidential Suite to almost walking the plank, Auckland, New Zealand

This is something you don’t see every day of the week, or once in a lifetime, perhaps.

We arrived at the Hilton Auckland hotel somewhere between one and two in the morning after arriving from Australia by plane around midnight.

Sometimes there is a benefit in arriving late, and, of course, being a very high tier HHonors guest, where the room you book is upgraded.

This stay we got one hell of a surprise.

We got to spend the night in the Presidential Suite.

The lounge and extra bathroom.

Looking towards the private bathroom.

A bathroom fit for a King and a Queen

And the royal bed

There was a note to say that we should keep the blinds closed for privacy and that a ship would be arriving in the port, but I did not expect it to be literally fifty feet from our balcony.

aucklandhotelandship

Searching for locations: From the Presidential Suite to almost walking the plank, Auckland, New Zealand

This is something you don’t see every day of the week, or once in a lifetime, perhaps.

We arrived at the Hilton Auckland hotel somewhere between one and two in the morning after arriving from Australia by plane around midnight.

Sometimes there is a benefit in arriving late, and, of course, being a very high tier HHonors guest, where the room you book is upgraded.

This stay we got one hell of a surprise.

We got to spend the night in the Presidential Suite.

The lounge and extra bathroom.

Looking towards the private bathroom.

A bathroom fit for a King and a Queen

And the royal bed

There was a note to say that we should keep the blinds closed for privacy and that a ship would be arriving in the port, but I did not expect it to be literally fifty feet from our balcony.

aucklandhotelandship

Searching for locations: Auckland, New Zealand – Another city that has a tower

Nearly every city has a high building, a tower, or a large Ferris wheel.

London had the London eye
Paris has the Eiffel tower
The Galata in Istanbul
The CN Tower in Toronto
The towers of San Gimignano
Pisa has a leaning tower

We’ve managed to see all of the above bar the Galata in Istanbul.  One day we might get there.

But, on this side of the world, there are two, the Sydney Tower, and the Sky Tower in Auckland, which we just visited recently.

20140522_153338

It’s not a tall tower, but it definitely gives great vies of Auckland, particularly to the north

20140522_150952

The mountain in the background at the top of the photo is of a volcano on Rangitoto Island.  When we were visiting, there were reports that it might become active again.

20140522_151039

To give a height perspective, it didn’t seem all that far down to the apartment building and gardens nearby.

In a word: Over

It’s over!  What is?  Well, almost anything.

A relationship, a bad day, a friendship, a long, monotonous lecture, and dinner.

It’s basically the light at the end of the tunnel, when it’s not the 6:32 express from Clapton, entering the other end of that same tunnel.

You could go over the top, which means, in one sense, over and above the expected, or way beyond the expected but not in a good way.

You could go over the waterfall in a leaky boat.  Not advisable, but sometimes a possibility, if someone fails to tell you at the end of the rapids there is a waterfall.  Just make sure it’s not the same as Niagara falls.

Still, someone has gone over Niagara in a barrel.

Then we could say that my lodging is over the garage, which simply means someone built it on top of the garage.

Branches of trees quite ofter grow over the roofs of houses, until a severe storm brings them down and suddenly they are in your house, no longer over it.

You can have editorial control over a newspaper

In a fight, the combatants are equally trying to shout over the top of each other

And sometimes, when trying to paint a different picture to what is real, you could say the temperature is sometimes over 40 degrees centigrade when you know for a fact it is usually 56 degrees centigrade.  No need for the literal truth here or no one will come.

Then you could say I came over land, assuming that you took a car, or walked when in actual fact you came by plane.  And yes, the whole flight was, truthfully, over land.

I don’t accept my lot in fife, nor do I want a small lot on which to build my mansion!

But the oddest use of the word over is when we describe, in cricket, the delivery of 6 balls.

I’ve listened to cricket commentary, and aside from trying to pronounce the names of the players, if you were unfamiliar with the game, being told this ball was outside leg stump, one of  several deliveries, the last of which was the end of the over.  If the delivery hit the stumps, it is then a wicket, and the batsman is out.

Wow!

Searching for locations: Auckland, New Zealand – Another city that has a tower

Nearly every city has a high building, a tower, or a large Ferris wheel.

London had the London eye
Paris has the Eiffel tower
The Galata in Istanbul
The CN Tower in Toronto
The towers of San Gimignano
Pisa has a leaning tower

We’ve managed to see all of the above bar the Galata in Istanbul.  One day we might get there.

But, on this side of the world, there are two, the Sydney Tower, and the Sky Tower in Auckland, which we just visited recently.

20140522_153338

It’s not a tall tower, but it definitely gives great vies of Auckland, particularly to the north

20140522_150952

The mountain in the background at the top of the photo is of a volcano on Rangitoto Island.  When we were visiting, there were reports that it might become active again.

20140522_151039

To give a height perspective, it didn’t seem all that far down to the apartment building and gardens nearby.

Searching for locations: Auckland, New Zealand, a rare day for the port

We were staying at the Hilton and advised there would be a large cruise liner berthing next to the hotel.  There was the Arcadia.

2013-03-08 11.51.48

This is the view from the other side of the hotel.  Where our room was, we could almost walk onto the aft end of the ship.

We were also told this was a rather extraordinary day because there were two cruise ships in the port. particularly because it was near the end of the cruising season.

The other ship was two berths along, the Sun Princess.

2013-03-08 11.56.17

Not as big as the Arcadia, up close it was still very impressive.

Searching for locations: Auckland, New Zealand, a rare day for the port

We were staying at the Hilton and advised there would be a large cruise liner berthing next to the hotel.  There was the Arcadia.

2013-03-08 11.51.48

This is the view from the other side of the hotel.  Where our room was, we could almost walk onto the aft end of the ship.

We were also told this was a rather extraordinary day because there were two cruise ships in the port. particularly because it was near the end of the cruising season.

The other ship was two berths along, the Sun Princess.

2013-03-08 11.56.17

Not as big as the Arcadia, up close it was still very impressive.

Searching for locations: The Maglev (Magnetic Levitation) Train, Shanghai, China

So, the first treat for the day is the high-speed magnetic train, something we only learned about after arriving in China and was not on any of the pre-tour documentation.

The train line connects Shanghai Pudong International Airport and Longyang Road Station (in the outskirts of central Pudong).  It is the oldest commercial maglev still in operation, and the first commercial high-speed maglev with cruising speed of 431 km/h (268 mph).  At full speed, the journey takes 7 minutes and 20 seconds to complete the distance of about 30 km.

Construction of the line began on March 1, 2001 and public services commenced on 1 January 2004.  It was built by a joint venture of Siemens and ThyssenKrupp from Kassel, Germany.

But, like visiting anything from a hotel, first we have to drive to the station and because we are leaving at 8, its peak hour traffic, and it takes 1 hour 10 minutes to get there.

The train also has a practical use and that is to take passengers from Shanghai to Pudong international airport as well as for those train enthusiasts, which is what we are.

On the train, it has the same sleek look as the bullet trains, but it is completely different, and you are able to see from the front of the train to the back.

Reputed to travel at 431 kph we take a seat and it is not long before the doors shut, and a loud humming noise is soon replaced by what sounds like an engine, then we start moving.  It sounds just like a normal train, and is a lot noisier than a normal bullet train.

Seating on the train was nothing special, as one might expect

It didn’t take long before it hits the advertised speed of 431 kph.  This is not sustained for very long, because the distance is on 40 odd kilometers, and the whole trip takes about 7 minutes.

We go to the airport, and then we come back.  Is it worth the price, yes.  If you are a train enthusiast.

Searching for locations: The Maglev (Magnetic Levitation) Train, Shanghai, China

So, the first treat for the day is the high-speed magnetic train, something we only learned about after arriving in China and was not on any of the pre-tour documentation.

The train line connects Shanghai Pudong International Airport and Longyang Road Station (in the outskirts of central Pudong).  It is the oldest commercial maglev still in operation, and the first commercial high-speed maglev with cruising speed of 431 km/h (268 mph).  At full speed, the journey takes 7 minutes and 20 seconds to complete the distance of about 30 km.

Construction of the line began on March 1, 2001 and public services commenced on 1 January 2004.  It was built by a joint venture of Siemens and ThyssenKrupp from Kassel, Germany.

But, like visiting anything from a hotel, first we have to drive to the station and because we are leaving at 8, its peak hour traffic, and it takes 1 hour 10 minutes to get there.

The train also has a practical use and that is to take passengers from Shanghai to Pudong international airport as well as for those train enthusiasts, which is what we are.

On the train, it has the same sleek look as the bullet trains, but it is completely different, and you are able to see from the front of the train to the back.

Reputed to travel at 431 kph we take a seat and it is not long before the doors shut, and a loud humming noise is soon replaced by what sounds like an engine, then we start moving.  It sounds just like a normal train, and is a lot noisier than a normal bullet train.

Seating on the train was nothing special, as one might expect

It didn’t take long before it hits the advertised speed of 431 kph.  This is not sustained for very long, because the distance is on 40 odd kilometers, and the whole trip takes about 7 minutes.

We go to the airport, and then we come back.  Is it worth the price, yes.  If you are a train enthusiast.

Searching for locations: The Maglev (Magnetic Levitation) Train, Shanghai, China

So, the first treat for the day is the high-speed magnetic train, something we only learned about after arriving in China and was not on any of the pre-tour documentation.

The train line connects Shanghai Pudong International Airport and Longyang Road Station (in the outskirts of central Pudong).  It is the oldest commercial maglev still in operation, and the first commercial high-speed maglev with cruising speed of 431 km/h (268 mph).  At full speed, the journey takes 7 minutes and 20 seconds to complete the distance of about 30 km.

Construction of the line began on March 1, 2001 and public services commenced on 1 January 2004.  It was built by a joint venture of Siemens and ThyssenKrupp from Kassel, Germany.

But, like visiting anything from a hotel, first we have to drive to the station and because we are leaving at 8, its peak hour traffic, and it takes 1 hour 10 minutes to get there.

The train also has a practical use and that is to take passengers from Shanghai to Pudong international airport as well as for those train enthusiasts, which is what we are.

On the train, it has the same sleek look as the bullet trains, but it is completely different, and you are able to see from the front of the train to the back.

Reputed to travel at 431 kph we take a seat and it is not long before the doors shut, and a loud humming noise is soon replaced by what sounds like an engine, then we start moving.  It sounds just like a normal train, and is a lot noisier than a normal bullet train.

Seating on the train was nothing special, as one might expect

It didn’t take long before it hits the advertised speed of 431 kph.  This is not sustained for very long, because the distance is on 40 odd kilometers, and the whole trip takes about 7 minutes.

We go to the airport, and then we come back.  Is it worth the price, yes.  If you are a train enthusiast.