Under The Bridge

What a turnout this week! Every one was keen to see what the underside of the bridge looked like and for once, to walk underneath instead of drive over the bridge.

Auckland Bridge: built in 1959, took 200 workers 4 years to complete. They needed 6000 tons of steel and 6000 tons of concrete for it. Ten years later, they added the famous 'Nippon-Clip-Ons' to increase the lanes from four to eight. Two hundred thousand (200 000) vehicles drive over it in one day, which makes it over 6o million per year. The length of the bridge is a little over 1000 metres. In comparison, the sky tower is approximately 360 metres. So if you were to lay the tower on it's side along the bridge, it wouldn't even reach half way. The highest point of the bridge isn't in the centre, it's over the deepest part of the harbour. And with any famous monument, the bridge has its own urban myth. According to this myth (=untrue), a construction worker fell into one of the supports, the concrete set fast around him and it was too expensive to get him out. But as I said, this is just a myth. :-)

Photos from http://cmi.transit.govt.nz/html/cmi/history.htm

We enjoyed some of those little facts standing underneath the bridge before looking for the geocache which was hidden near by. We encountered one major problem though: no signal underneath the bridge. Our GPS didn't work! We had to rely on a map on my iPhone and the clues given on the geocaching site. And after some floundering about, and including being puzzled over a road which didn't exist, we managed to get to the right area. One clue gave us several possibilities, but with our ever keen and clever kids, it didn't take them long to find the right spot and the geocache!

With so many kids, the swapping part took a while and it was fun being in the centre for once, seeing how the trinkets kept changing as the kids took one and put in another. We had marbles, McDonalds toys, cars, even coins, erasers, stickers, bubbles, plastic bugs and lots more. And it was so good to see every one being fair and nice to each other! Well done!

After putting the cache back in its spot, we took the long way back to the playground, where we enjoyed afternoon tea and the kids had fun playing, while we, mums, got to chat. It was especially nice to see new faces this week!