My daughter Alexandra is drawn to the view of the harbour from the master bedroom of Mansion House, a colonial residence on Kawau Island near Auckland.The house and grounds were the home of Sir George Gray, a former Governor of New Zealand. The Department of Conservation says: "he spent a fortune developing Kawau, planting hundreds of different plant species and introducing many exotic and native animals including wallabies, kookaburras, weka, peacocks, zebras and monkeys."