Saturday 15th November 2008

Another Cruise

This afternoon saw me on another cruise, but this time on a far smaller boat, a glass-bottomed boat with just six passengers on board, called the Seafari II. First stop was Shakespeare’s cliff.
Can you see a likeness to the Bard’s profile - top of the cliff? I must admit, I struggled to spot it.


Next stop was Cook’s Bay which has a beautiful stretch of beach apparently often used for weddings.

Captain Cook landed in this area in 1769, much of what he achieved in this region is well known. One thing that was news to me, though, was that on November 10th he and one of his scientists observed the passing of Mercury over the sun, which they measured and timed, thereby locating the exact position in terms of latitude and longitude of what is now known as Mercury Bay.


Much of this part of the coastline is made up of volcanic ash which, being soft, is easily eroded thereby producing some of the interesting landforms here.

Our skipper skilfully manoeuvred his boat into this cave which had lovely markings eroded into the ceiling, but the view out towards the sea was spectacular.

Jean

Sporting Life

Just happened to see that Sky were showing the New Zealand 2000 Guineas horse race on one channel and the New Zealand Open badminton tournament on the other. A glance at the equivalent of the Racing Post , the inFORMant , disclosed that one of the leading sires over here is horse called Generous who won the Epsom Derby at 9-1 in 1991 with some of my money on. My last winner, some say.

On the cycling front, we hitched up for a 30 minute ride round Whitianga and Mercury Bay which have strong associations with my fellow Yorkshireman and traveller, Captain Cook. Dave