First week in Auckland

The journey over went smoothly although it was very long and tiring. Getting through the airport and finding the hire car was easy enough and I bought a New Zealand sim card so I could use Google Maps to get to the hotel. The hotel I’m staying in for the first three weeks is fine and has everything I need. It’s very close to where I will be working too, which is handy.

On the morning of my second full day I was taken on an orientation of the city, i.e. I was driven around and shown places that might be of interest to us. It was very useful and gave us ideas about where to live and also places to visit.

Pretty much straight away I started looking for a house to rent, which involved searching online and driving around potential areas. I did quite a few house viewings in the first few days and they were very varied. Most looked nothing like the pictures online and weren’t in very good condition and some of the roads didn’t look particularly nice either.

We had seen one online before I left that looked good and it was still available so I viewed that late on Thursday afternoon. We put our application in for it (along with a couple of other families) and found out on Friday that we had been successful. Assuming signing the contracts goes OK this week we will have the keys from Saturday (6th).

I’ve managed to go out for a few runs and a couple of swims so far. There is a decent pool about 10-15 minutes drive from where we will be living. It’s a 50m pool that seems to mostly be set up as two 25m pools and it always has lane swimming, as there is a separate recreational pool. One thing I have noticed is that it is very hilly here so it is going to be good for running and cycling. I’ll be doing most of my running early in the mornings before it gets too hot.

I’m looking forward to my first day at work tomorrow now.