Today is our last full day in New Zealand, so it’s our last day for exploring. We started the day with a brief walk through Auckland to a lovely little café for brunch. After fueling up, we chose to end as we began, with our animal theme, so we loaded up in the minivan and went to the Auckland Zoo.

The Zoo was lovely. We started the visit with rain, so it wasn’t very crowded. This zoo is more typical in that it has animals from around the world—Africa, South America, Australia, etc. What we were particularly interested in were the New Zealand animals. There have been a couple of native animals that we just have not been able to locate in the wild. The zoo did not disappoint, and we were able to find them both there. First, the Weta. Not to be confused with the Weka, that delightful flightless bird, the Weta are enormous insects similar to grasshoppers. There are about 70 different varieties. They are giant flightless crickets and are some of the largest insects in the world. Our second elusive animal was the Powelliphanta. Powelliphanta are giant carnivorous snails. There are several species with the largest measuring about 3.5” in length. Happily, they do not eat people. They have a particular fondness for earthworms. After seeing both of these animals in captivity, I’m just as happy that we didn’t run across them when we were out and about. Particularly the weta. I’ve just never really liked crickets and grasshoppers, so giant ones were just never going to be my favorites. I prefer the cuddly animals—give me a nice Tasmanian devil any day. Oh, the Auckland Zoo further confirmed that things are different in New Zealand. Greg’s written about that before. Barriers are—minimal—with animals that appear to be less —hhmmmm—potentially aggressive, let’s say. Sure, the tigers are behind glass. But the emu is just right smack at eye level without anything really between him and you. Ryan has a selfie. Much more like the goat enclosure at the Nashville Petting Corral. We were speaking and joking with one of the employees on the way out and said, “It’s ok we pet the emu, right?” and he said, “If you touch something and you get bitten, that’s really your fault.” He’s right, of course. I will continue to mull this concept of personal responsibility.

We ended our last night in Auckland with another walk through downtown for a delicious dinner at Tony’s Seafood and Steakhouse, followed by just a little bit of shopping. A last bit of packing, and an attempt at a couple of hours sleep before we begin the return trip.