Best Western President Hotel, Auckland

This was also posted by me on The Undercover Bloggers

Photo from Google Images

Our Family went up to Auckland for a couple of nights this weekend. I had front row tickets to the Designer Selection Fashion Show and NZ Fashion Week (oooerrrrr!)

We mulled it over for ages, then decided that even though hotel stays with an 8 month old teething baby and an almost 3 year old boy are rarely ever relaxing, we never get to go away, so we thought we would stay in a hotel for 2 nights, and make the most of it.

Photo from Google Images

After trawling Wotif.com for what seemed like hours, I chose the deal at Best Western President hotel on Victoria Street in Auckland City. The deal they had was $129 a night for a King Size bed and buffet breakfast daily for 2 people. I'm a big fan of Hotel breakfasts, so this was pretty exciting. Parking was $20 a night which brought our 2 night stay up to basically $300, so a big outing for a family who never goes anywhere!

Anyway, we arrived there on Friday afternoon and got checked in. I had seen photos on the website, it looked like a nice place, but sometimes appearances can be deceiving. I had a horrible feeling we were going to be let down, especially since their rating on Wotif was a self rated 3 stars.

Well, my worries were quickly proved wrong. It was a lovely hotel, all staff that we encountered were great, the room was bigger than we expected, had a view of The Atrium on Elliott, and the buffet breakfast was AWESOME. 

Nice bathroom

When we first arrived there was a problem with the air conditioning in our room, but we called Housekeeping and 2 staff members came up quickly and had it fixed straight away, and any staff we came into contact with throughout our stay were always lovely and more than helpful, and the very central location was perfect for us, and if we ever get to go away over night on our own, without the kids, that will probably be our choice of hotel.

The view from our Room

Review - Classic Flyers, Mount Maunganui

Posted by The Spy

We recently purchased tickets to go to Classic Flyers at Mount Maunganui, via a deal on "Grab One". The deal was 2 adults entry into the museum, as well as 2 breakfast/lunch meals and 2 small drinks.

It was a grotty blah day when we got up this morning, and we had bribed our 2 year old that if he slept through the night last night, and didn't get mummy or daddy up, he would go on a special adventure today. He loves planes, so this was somewhere we have been dying to take him.

I had it on good authority that it was an ok place to go in the rain as it is pretty much all undercover, so we chucked our 8 week old into the front pack and away we went.

When we got there, the cafe was absolutely packed! We wandered past them all and went into the museum. As we entered the lady on the counter said as it is raining and they can't display their outdoor exhibits properly, we were welcome to keep our receipt and come back another day to have another look as well. Great news!!!

I'm not a huge plane/military etc fan personally, but even I thoroughly enjoyed having a look around. There was so much to see, and there is plenty of planes that you can actually get in to and imagine you are a pilot or in the war etc. They even had little ride on planes for the littlies to play in, which went down a huge treat.

Awesome "Fluffies!"

After walking around the hangar a couple of times, it was off to the cafe. If I'm honest, if we didn't have the voucher, I'm not sure we would have purchased any food as it was a bit more expensive than our 1 income family can afford, however that said, when we got our Bacon and Eggs, hot drinks and a side of fries and a fluffy, we were completely satisfied at our selections. Excellent food, the hot chocolate and mochacino and our little man's "Fluffy" were excellent, and all staff we dealt with were very friendly and welcoming.

Yum! Tasty Hot Chocolate

If you live in Tauranga or are visiting some time, I would highly recommend a visit, it was a unique place to go, the service was great and food was excellent. All in all a great outing!!