Walking around on a platform, on a tower high above Auckland is appropriately called the Skywalk.

Auckland’s Skywalk is on a tower which is taller than the Eiffel Tower in Paris.  It is the tallest tower in the Southern Hemisphere.

Suffice it to say that when you’re up on the Skytower, you’re WAY up.

Doing the Skywalk, you’re way up, and outside as well.

You get to wear a special prison orange jumpsuit to partake in the Skywalk activity.

For Carrie and I, it was a bit of a decision whether or not to be skywalkers, as it’s NZD $135 (USD $93) per person.  We’d just spent NZD $110 for our tickets to go out to Rangitoto Island.

And we found ourselves wondering if the Skywalk would really be worth it.

To sweeten the deal (and since it’s fall moving into winter here low tourist season), Skywalk had a 2 for 1 special.

To sweeten the deal even further, after doing the Skywalk, you get a ticket to go back up to the enclosed observation deck on the Skytower, including the highest observation point open to the public (30 feet above the observation deck), the Skydeck.

So for NZD $135, Carrie and I both could do the Skywalk, the Skytower, and the Skydeck.

We went for it.

It was not only worth it, it was AWESOME!

Our guide Lee pointed out lots of points on the horizon and in the city below us, and we learned a LOT about the layout of Auckland and the nearby islands.

Walking around at 600 feet above sea level though gets quite chilly, especially on a cloudy day like the one we experienced.  It was 50 degrees Fahrenheit, but with the wind chill, it was nearly freezing.

The Skywalk takes you 180 degrees around the tower and lets you see pretty much all of the sights of Auckland from an incredible vantage point.

We also got to watch someone do the SkyJump from the launch point.  The SkyJump is a 180 meter (500ish feet) near freefall from the Skydeck to just above the ground level, which takes about 8 seconds.  Maybe we’ll do the SkyJump on a return to Auckland, but it’s NZD $195/person/jump, and to be honest, having seen both the SkyJump and done the Skywalk, I’d rather do the Skywalk.

Not that I wouldn’t also love the thrill of falling from that height with nothing but a cable holding on to me… seriously.  (Carrie and I are thinking about bungee-jumping here in NZ somewhere – bungee jumping was, after all, invented here in New Zealand.)

So, with the Skywalk, we spent NZD $135 for both of us. We might not have done it at $135/person, but it would have been worth it I think.

The lady at the registration desk (whose name I’ve forgotten), was so helpful and nice.  We got delayed by 30 minutes from the time we were supposed to go up (10:45 AM instead of 10:15 AM), which meant we might be late for our trip out to Rangitoto… In compensation, she gave us free photos and a free DVD of our experience on the Auckland Skywalk.

To say it once again, the Auckland Skywalk was awesome.  When you’re in Auckland, I highly recommend you take a walk in the sky as well.