I ate one of the biggest pieces of chocolate cake I've ever seen

I was up bright and early again to another beautiful sunny day. I ate breakfast in one of the lovely parks and rang home (Dad's birthday). It's kind of weird in the mornings here when I'm speaking to people at home as it is still yesterday there. Odd.

I headed up to the Auckland museum for a few hours looking round. It had a big exhibit on how civilisation developed in the Pacific and another large Maori exhibit. They were really interesting and there was so many really stunning carvings. There was a massive kayak (waka) actually inside the museum that was one of the largest built, it can fit 100 men into it. There were also natural history exhibits with dinosaur skeletons and information about volcanoes. One of my favourite things in the museum is the skeletons and recreations of the giant Moa birds. They are like really big emu's and were hunted to extinction a long time ago. I wish there were still some alive here.

On the top floor of the museum was a few rooms dedicated to the wars New Zealand have been involved in since the 1800s. The civil wars between the European settlers and the Maori, the Boer war, the first World War, the second World War and the South East Asian conflicts. It was interesting to see these wars depicted from a New Zealand perspective. Half way around the world from us.

Once I was done in the museum I headed back into the city centre to meet a friend from the Kiwi bus who had just arrived back in Auckland. We went for coffee and chocolate cake. I'd been eyeing up the cake for the past few days and decided that it was neccessary for it to be in my life. It was well worth it. After that I went for a long walk to one of the nice suburbs just out of the centre of Auckland. It had lots of lovely looking art and trinket shops as well as actual art galleries. There were more cafes and I just about managed to persuade myself I did not need another chocolate overload in the wonderful chocolate shop and cafe. It took a surprising amount of restraint. I walked a big loop around the edge of the city centre and ended up back on the main strip.

I suppose I should have something healthy for dinner tonight. xx