Events of 8th, 9th, 10th February 2020
Although travel from Heathrow with an overnight in Singapore was offered by Noble Caledonia, I decided to make my own arrangements through my agents Wexas, so I ended up leaving Birmingham Airport at 20:50 on Saturday 8th February 2020 from my local airport at Birmingham, UK, on Emirates flight EK038 to Dubai, operated by a huge Airbus A380. I was able to take a 'screenshot' to show my aircraft on the ground, viewed from the camera mounted on top of the aircrat tail.
Live view of my aircraft at Birmingham as on TV screen on 8-Feb-2020 in connection with 'Tropic of Capricorn' trip.
This flight was due in Dubai at 07:50 (local time) on Sunday and, after a transit stop of two and a quarter hours, I was then booked on Emirates EK448 to Auckland, due in Auckland at 11:05 (local time) on Monday. This is a long journey by any standards and, flying eastwards, I 'lost' eleven hours, which I would recover during my journey home. To call it a journey of endurance is rather ungracious compared with the exploits of the original explorers by sea like Cook, who suffered months of hardship to reach what is now New Zealand. But it is nonetheless rather taxing for people of my age so Business Class with Emirates is about the best way of lessening the 'ordeal'.
I was very well looked after by the airline and arrived in sunny Auckland full of optimism for the ocean trip ahead. An Emirates car took me to the Crowne Plaza hotel in Albert Street, right in downtown, where I was to join-up with travellers who had travelled from London with a stopover in Singapore.
Office block and Crowne Plaza Hotel, Albert Street, Auckland (Tropic of Capricorn).
Although I was quite tired from the flights, with a few hours to spare before the Welcome Dinner in the evening, I decided to take a walk in the city.
My first visit to Auckland was during my 'Round the World 1' trip at the end of 2001 - I was in Auckland for the New Year. There's a very brief post for that trip here. Visit 2 was only a quick trip into the city by 'bus whilst changing 'planes on 'Round the World 2' (I arrived from Hawaii and then took a domestic flight to Christchurch, on New Zealand's South Island). I visited Auckland again in February 2007 as part of 'Round the World 4' (Auckland is discussed in the post here) with pictures here.
So, I was interested to see what changes the city had experienced since my last visit. I made my way to the ferry terminal where significant development was taking place and some of the ferries had been relocated during this work.
New construction work near the Ferry Building, Auckland, 2020 (Tropic of Capricorn).
A cruise ship terminal, apparently a rebuilt former transit shed at a now-unused wharf in the commercial docks was still called 'Shed 10'.
'Pacific Princess' moored alongside Cruise Ship Terminal 'Shed 10', Auckland, 2020 (Tropic of Capricorn).
The commercial traffic previously handled at this wharf is now dealt with at the berths to the east and at Fergusson Wharf which is equipped with huge container cranes. The ferry routes are always an attraction but, with limited time, I decided not to make a trip by ferry but to see what changes had occurred at the city's suburban station, Britomart.
The original Railway station closed many years ago and a new tunnelled line was built to a terminus for commuter trains in the heart of the city on Queen Street called Britomart. The commuter railway system is now electrified and the City Rail Link project (project web site is working on a tunnelled link to improve connectivity, currently causing chaos at street level with the associated construction work closing many streets.
Queen Street, Auckland in 2020 (Tropic of Capricorn).
Regular readers may not be surprised to read that I decided that a short journey from Britomart to the next but one station of Newmarket and back was essential. Because of what was described as 'a signal issue' the service was rather dislocated with trains to the south having to reverse at Newmarket, causing the passengers some confusion.
Britomart Station. Note the line of automatic ticket gates (Auckland's Commuter Railways in 2020).
After an interesting trip, I walked back to my hotel (uphill as I was moving away from the waterfront), arriving thoroughly shattered and, at last, able to shower after my marathon trip from England.
Related posts on this website
Clicking on the 'Next report' link (where shown) will display the post describing the next events. In this way, you may read about the trip in sequence.
Next report
Alternately, clicking on the 'All my Tropic of Capricorn reports' link displays all the posts on this trip in reverse date-of-posting order.
All my Tropic of Capricorn reports
My pictures
This blog post was first published on the ship via a satellite link with limited capacity so picture links were added later.
Albums from 2020:-
Auckland, 2020
Auckland's Commuter Railways in 2020
Crowne Plaza, Auckland
Earlier albums for comparision:-
Auckland, New Zealand, 2007
Auckland's Commuter Railways, 2007
[Links to pictures added 2-Mar-2020: Minor edits, pictures embedded 03-May-2020]
