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Devonport Ferry

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stomps
stomps
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4 out of 5
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Devonport Ferry

  • April 28, 2006
  • Rated 4 of 5 by stomps from Houston, Texas
Devonport Ferry

Although this was not an actual boat tour, it was in the vein of a ride like the Interislander Ferry, which takes you across the Cook Straits between the two islands, or the Manly Ferry in Sydney, which takes you through the harbour. This ride was really meant as transportation between two places, but also served as a mini sightseeing tour on its own.

We walked to the ferry terminal, located at the very end of Queen Street. It was rather a long walk, but we got to see a lot of the city in the process. We luckily got to the terminal just in time to buy the $8 ticket and jump on the ferry. It was pretty packed with commuting kids and other non-touristy looking people.

The ferry ride itself was not all that long; it was only 10-15 minutes to get to Devonport from Auckland City. However, it was long enough to get some pretty good snaps of Auckland City and the Sky Tower towering above it, and the Auckland Harbour Bridge spanning from Auckland across to the area near Devonport. It looked suspiciously like another coathanger bridge in another country Down Under.

The terminal in Devonport was rather deserted when we got there. Everyone on the ferry vacated it pretty quickly, and many of the shops that were in the little shopping centre were closed, aside from a few scattered souvenir stores and the ice-cream shop, which we later went to.

We wandered around Devonport, which was a cute little suburb of Auckland, for a while. It was full of greenery and little shops with interesting things, like the one shop that only sold eco-friendly souvenirs. However, all of the shops that we went into were rather artsy and therefore quite pricey—therefore, we didn't end up with anything but they were nice to look around.

After ambling up the main street for a while, we spent time in the little gardens they had, which weren't spectacular but did have this huge old tree that had to be held up with stilt-like pipes. The gardens go right up to the shore, which couldn't really be called a beach because of the general lack of a lot of sand. We sat down on a bench and nearly fell asleep because of the soothing sound of the waves on the shore. When we finally got up, we walked down the shore a little bit, until we got some very nice shots of Auckland from afar, and then called it a day and went back to the ferry.

Overall, it was a very good day trip, and exactly what we needed. It wasn't too exerting, yet at the same time it wasn't too boring, so we didn't fall asleep from the jet lag too early. It was nice to see such a cute little green area in the midst of such a large, and rather bland, city.

From journal Jet Lagged in Auckland

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