Description: I always like to head to a local museum when I visit a new country so that I can find out as much as I can about the history of the area. Auckland was no different and I soon found my way up to the Domain and the hill (known by the Maori as Pukekawa) that is the base for Auckland Museum. The building has Greek style columns at the front that gives it the look of some sort of Greek haven in the city. The full name of the museum is Auckland War Memorial Museum, which as the name suggests, also has the city's War Memorial to all of the soldiers who have lost their lives in the various wars. If you are interested in this side of the museum then you should head up to the top floor and explore the colourful displays of planes, weapons and war memorabilia.
Personally I was more interested in the Maori displays that dominate the ground floor. I paid the extra to experience the Maori cultural experience, which I thought was very well done. At a particular time you are called into the entrance foyer by someone playing a conch shell and collected by a couple of Maori and led into an auditorium. Here you are shown singing, dancing, important games and a haka. I thought that this was very informative and much better than a later experience I had at Te Puia, in Rotorua.
After the cultural experience you can also pay to have a Maori guide take you around the Maori exhibits. However, I didn't do this and still found the information about how the Maori arrived in New Zealand and lived prior to Eurpoean settlement, very easy to follow and informative. The museum has some of the best Maori treasures that you'll see anywhere, including a full sized meeting house, a food storage whare, a canoe (waka), carvings and many weapons and other artifacts.
I spent a good hour or so looking around the Maori section and then decided to head up to the next level and found a whole section on natural history. I quite liked this area, but felt that it was mainly geared up for children or those that have no background in environmental science. Once I got around to the area with New Zealand's natural history I was in my element, I found it all very interesting and well layed out. You can spend as little or as much time here as you like and still get a lot from it. The area that stands out from the rest of this section is the Maori Natural History section. This area displays how the Maori explained their natural environment. I found this really fascinating and spent a good deal of time there reading the various Maori stories.
There were plenty of other places I could have explored but alas the museum was closing by the time I had got around the above sections. I did have time to grab a quick coffee and slice of cake from the museum cafe, which was very nice and reasonably priced. I also made time to do a bit of shopping, where I bought Maori necklaces for my family members, now these are available in every tourist shop around the city, however at the museum you can pay a little extra and get hand carved ones that are made from bone, shell or traditional stones.
All in all I really was impressed with this museum, I think it's worth a visit if you have time and it gives you a lot of background to both the Maori culture and European settlers as well as natural history. It's just a shame that the building isn't bigger, because I am pretty sure that there are lots of things that are not on display as there isn't enough room.
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