Back to Auckland

My postings have got a little out of sinc and this should before the Waitomi Glow Worm Caves. My first visit here was just  an airport arrival and one night before setting off Northwards. An afternoon exploring the city and one further night gave me enough time to learn more as well as take a trip up the Sky Tower to add to my collection of Tower visits in different parts of the world!

Auckland sits on 43 volcanic cones! The Auckland volcanic field is comprised of monogenetic volcanoes. This means it is unlikely that Mt Eden or any of the existing volcanoes will erupt again BUT there is always a constant reminder that this area could potentially become active again? 

Any new next eruptions will probably occur in a new location. Mount Eden is a complicated scoria cone structure with 3 main craters in a row, giving an oval shape. Basaltic lava flowed in all directions to cover an area of 5.6 square kms.

Mount Eden

In 1840 the cone was one of 3 boundary points marking the original land purchased for Auckland. It was named Mt Eden after George Eden (Lord Auckland). Some of Auckland's older buildings and most of the basalt kerb stones that line the city streets were constructed using dressed stone quarried from lava flows at Mt Eden. These quarries were operated for many years, but had closed down by 1928. 

The summit is used as a key lookout point. Mt Eden is a popular park and key stop on Auckland tourist routes hence the pic.  The cone complex is protected as both an archaeological and a geological feature in the Auckland City Isthmus District Plan.

My hotel is the large block with the green top(4 above the one with the red top) overlooking the sea. Rangitoto, the cone almost on the horizon, is the largest, most recent and least modified volcano of the Auckland Volcanic Field. It forms a near symmetrical cone at the entrance to the Waitemata Harbour. 

With little warning, Rangitoto was formed through violent eruptions about 600 years ago. At the time Maori were living nearby on Motutapu Island. The early stages of the eruption would have been excessively violent, due to steam explosions where the molten rock came into contact with the shallow seawater. Large amounts of rock and ash soon smothered Motutapu. Rangitoto finally emerged from the sea as a broad eruption crater with liquid rock building up a number of cones.

Experts differ on the exact pattern of the Rangitoto eruption, some estimating it to have continued violently like this for a decade. Others believe it was built by a series of intermittent eruptions, starting 600 years ago and continuing for perhaps 200 years. 

Either way, Rangitoto produced a volume of lava equalling that of all the previous Auckland eruptions combined.

When the eruptions finally ceased, lava in the base of the cone cooled and shrank. As a result, the entire top of the mountain subsided by 10 to 20 metres leaving a moat-like ring around the summit. These are the small mounds either side of the central cone that gives Rangitoto its nearly symmetrical profile.

With the explosive growth of plant life since it erupted from the sea 600-700 years ago there are now more than 200 species of native plants, including 40 species of fern. Many of the plants are unusual hybrids, like the tree-perching epiphytes which grow on the ground and sub-alpine moss cushions thriving at sea level. The island's predominantly pohutukawa forest is the largest in the country.

This site has been specially designed for school pupils studying Auckland Volcanoes.
http://www.arc.govt.nz/environment/volcanoes-of-auckland/volcanoes-of-auckland_home.cfm

There are several Maori myths associated with Rangitoto. 

One tells of the Tupua, children of the Fire Gods, who inhabited the Auckland area. One night a husband and wife quarrelled and cursed the goddess of fire, Mahuika. Mahuika complained to Mataoho, the god of earthquakes and eruptions, who sent an eruption to destroy the Tupua's mountain home. 

It was swallowed by the earth and became Lake Pupuke on Auckland's North Shore, and Rangitoto rose out of the sea. When mist surrounds Rangitoto, it is the tears of the Tupua couple as they weep over their lost home.

The views from the Skytower are quite superb and I still take far too many photos as each vista looks better than the previous. However, no matter how many times I go to the top of each high building, my knees buckle and I wonder why do do you this?  

Wandering around the landing point some 52 floors high and then up another 8 floors to the 60th I deliberately  look down through the glass window in the floor to the earth far below. Whilst I know / believe? that such windows are equally as strong as the floor itself, I masochistically and terrifying place my feet on such windows as I gingerly hang on to the railings to walk over. Why not just avoid totally? Something cussed in me makes me do this !

Whilst in the lift going down, at the 59th floor, a 5 year old little boy turned to his dad and said, "Daddy that lady is standing on a window. Will she fall through it"? You can imagine....one immediate step to the right!!! 

Feet do not make pretty pictures but just to prove.........!

The city architecture whist dominated downtown with modern skyscraper buildings has a varied style of buildings reflecting its history and development. Some buildings such as the Auckland Museum are particularly grand. 

I have just spent the last hour writing this post and somehow managed to delete it all! Have had to rewrite. We have the ****** technology!