Queenstown, Bottom Bus and more Queenstown

Thursday - Free day in Queenstown

With a day free in Queenstown, I couldn't think of anything better to do than to jump off something high. So I signed up for the Canyon Swing, run by the amusingly named "Not your average backyard variety swing". After waiting around for half of the day to think about what I'd signed up for, I was picked up and driven to a remote carpark next to a large canyon. After walking up a track which didn't really appear to lead anywhere obvious, we reached the canyon swing. Basically this is a very large swing which you have to jump off a ledge to start. The jump point is 109m above the ground, and you fall for 60m of that before starting to swing round. You can jump in many different styles. I opted to try and jump off forwards, although ended up nervously stepping off the edge! It was such a rush that after being winched up at the end, I opted for the much cheaper second jump. I wanted to do something backwards, which I'd been told was much more fun. However, the staff interpretted this (and managed to persuade me) as doing the "Elvis cutaway", being hung over the drop horizontally with legs wrapped around the cable, then being released at random upside down and backwards. Again, lots of fun. After buying the obligatory T-shirt, I headed back to town to catch up with everyone else.



In the evening, we headed out to a couple of bars again to catch up with the people off the bus behind us.

Friday - Queenstown to Dunedin

Today was the first day on the Bottom bus, a shorter tour round some of the places in the south of the south island. This was on a much smaller bus, similar to the East As trip I went on earlier. Most of my original bus were being left behind here, with only two girls, Linde & Julia, coming on this trip. The first destination was Dunedin, which we reached pretty early on. We immediately headed out to a couple of local points of interest, the first being tunnel beach, a secluded beach reached only through (yes, you guessed it!) a tunnel carved through a rock. Apparently it was cut out by a wealthy local who used to own the land, as a private beach for his children. The beach itself was nice, but it was at the bottom of a very steep hill. After the very hard climb back up, we were all quite tired. This meant that the next stop, the world's steepest street, was just looked at from the bottom!

Dunedin is the largest university town in NZ, with 20,000 students (in a town of 120,000 people). When we got there, it was the end of freshers week, so there were many signs of parties in the houses that were more obviously student houses than the ones in Portswood! In the afternoon I went to the Cadbury chocolate factory, which I thought I would do since I hadn't ever visited the one in my home town! Originally the factory was owned by someone else and made biscuits, but was bought by Cadbury and now makes the same chocolate as we get at home. Still gives free chocolate on the tours anyway!

In the evening, Julia was too tired to coming out, leaving Linde & I to try and find some lively bars. Didn't really fancy walking all the way to the University, and fortunately found a bar not too far with a live band that was packed very obviously with students.

Saturday - Queenstown to Curio Bay

The next leg of the trip was to Curio Bay, a very remote part of the South coast. We stopped off for a couple of walks on the way, including a trip to a lighthouse at some rocks covered with more seals (I've seen so many seals this trip!). We also stopped at another beach where we saw Sea Lions, close enough that you could walk right up to them (if you wanted to be chased off!), and some more nice waterfalls. Curio bay is a beach where we stayed in a small lodge. After a trip out to see some penguins and take many pictures (not even pete-style spot the penguin ones), we headed back inside for a big group meal.



Sunday - Curio Bay to Te Anau

For the final day of Bottom bus, we headed off to Te Anau, the closest town to Milford Sound, which we would be doing the next day. After a brief stop in Invacargill, the most southern city in NZ and also the setting for the current film "The World's fastest Indian", we made our way through, stopping again at a few beauty spots, and for some people to take the stereotypical photography of the sign at McCracken's Rest with their arses hanging out! In Te Anau just went walking along the beach and looked around, before watching the second Kiwi film we'd been told about, Once Were Warriors.



Monday - Milford Sound

Today was our day trip to Milford Sound, which I was expecting to be the scenic highlight of my NZ trip. With a new KX driver that actually used the slow vehicle bays on the windy roads to overtake slow cars (!), we got into Milford Sound quite quickly. Where it started raining. A lot. We were assured that this made Milford Sound much better, making it come alive. Indeed it meant that the number of waterfalls we could see was increased many many times - I saw literally hundreds running down the rockfaces. We made a few stops on the way, including one to a big waterfall (The Chasm). However, it was raining too much to get my camera out.

Eventually we made it to Milford Sound where we boarded a boat for a cruise along the water. Milford sound isn't actually a sound, it's a Fiord. A sound is where a sunken riverbed has filled with seawater; a fiord is where a glacial valley has done the same. Which our boat captain, amusingly named Fjord, pointed out. Milford Sound was incorrectly named by a Welsh bloke from Milford Haven. Anyway, with it still raining, we got to see many many waterfalls. Apparently there are only 2 permanent waterfalls in Milford Sound - most of the rest dry up an hour after it stops raining. Fortunately this boat had a large covered outside bit, so I was able to take many photographs. Apart from the bit where I went to the front of the boat while he drove into the waterfall as far as possible, making us all very wet.

Milford Sound has got to be the first experience I've had in New Zealand that has actually benefitted from the nasty weather. While it would have been nice to see it on a dry clear day, I think seeing all of the waterfalls was much better.




When we finally got back to Queenstown after a long ride in the bus (which was leaking quite badly and falling apart), we checked into a new hostel, Southern Laughter (as the previous Discovery Lodge was a bit too busy for our liking!). Food tonight was provided by Fergburger, a must-try burger place in Queenstown. Although Julia & Linde said that they had previously shared a burger (they are quite large!) we managed one each, before going back to the bars to meet up with even more people who we'd met earlier in NZ, but had jumped off our bus to stay somewhere a bit longer.

Tuesday - Queenstown

Having a small 3 bed dorm between us meant the first lie-in for ages, but when we did get up we realised that it was possibly the best weather that we'd had in the whole trip so far. Queenstown is set against a mountain range called the Remarkables (so called because they run exactly North-South), that you may have seen in Lord of the Rings. Most of the time I'd been here so far, we could see them but the tops might be covered with cloud, or it would be a bit hazy. Not so today, it was incredibly clear, and not a cloud in sight.

After managing to convince Julia to get over her fears of heights and confined spaces, we went up in the Gondola to the top of the hill overlooking Queenstown, for some spectacular views. This was also the location of the luge, a downhill track ridden on 3-wheeled sledge-type things. Lots of fun also! During the time spent luging I came up with a plan to hire a car and drive up to Lake Matheson, a mirror lake which we'd previously missed due to bad weather. The next hour was thus spent trying to find a hire car - unfortunately most of them didn't have any available at short notice, and the one that did had quite a nasty mileage surcharge. After abandoning the plan, we sat in the sun for a while before watching Lord of the Rings (had to be done really!) and having some dinner.



Now it's the day after, and it's another rainy day where I'm not doing very much. However, have booked today to do the Nevis bungy tomorrow, so will probably start getting nervous at some point tomorrow!

Franz Josef to Queenstown

Monday - Franz Josef Glacier Walk

Today was a day off from travelling on the bus, so that we could do a walk on the glacier. I'd signed up to do the full day's walk. This meant collecting a load of equipment from the glacier guide centre, including boots, crampons and a waterproof jacket. It was quite strange going to climb a glacier wearing shorts & t-shirts, but it was still fairly warm!

To start with, the walk was through rainforest to get to the terminal face of the glacier, which took an hour. Then we attached the crampons and started climbing up steps carved into the glacier by our guides. This first part was pretty steep and well-used, being part of all the guided walks on the glacier. Once we finished this part, we were offered ice axes (but told we wouldn't really need them). All of our group declined, and we proceeded up the glacier. This part of the walk involved our guide making a new track at times, going through crevasses and ice caves. Some of the crevasses were pretty tight, with us being squashed between the two sides!

Unfortunately towards the afternoon the weather started to turn colder, and it began to get cold, especially in the crevasses. The guide in front had also decided to try a new route out, which involved going through a long crevasse. Unfortunately, he couldn't find a way out and we had to turn around (difficult in a crevasse barely wide enough for a person!). Eventually we made it back down, most of us quite tired (more from the walk in the rainforest afterwards - the glacier walk was surprisingly easy as it involves so much stopping and starting while the guide cuts a path).

Tuesday - Franz Josef to Wanaka

Today we had an early start, intended for us to get to Lake Matheson, which is a lake normally offering mirror reflections of the mountains in the background on a nice day. Unfortunately, it was definitely not a nice day! We didn't even bother stopping there, as it was raining and misty. Instead, we just went through quickly to Wanaka, with many photo opportunity stops on the way. These also provided lunch stops for all the sandflies waiting at these stops!

On arrival in Wanaka, the weather had improved and it had become a really good day. Wanaka is a gorgeous little town - sometimes described as Queenstown 30 years ago. It is set on a lakeside (Lake Wanaka) with mountains in the background. I would really have liked to spend some more time there, but unfortunately all of the buses behind me were busy, and I wanted to stay with our bus into Queenstown anyway. I opted for a spot of swimming in the lake before going out to a couple of bars, as LJ had a few friends there running the bars!

Wednesday - Wanaka to Queenstown

Today would be the last day for me with the group I've been with since Auckland, as my next step is a separate tour. Our first stop was Puzzling World, full of illusions, puzzles and suchlike. Highlights included a sloping room, where the floor is at an angle but everything else in the room is the right way relative to the floor. Water appears to flow uphill, and everyone has difficulty keeping their balance. They also have a full size 3d maze, which you have to find the 4 corners (preferably in order!) before finding the way out. It was getting pretty tight finding the exit before the time we were supposed to meet back at the bus!

The next stop was AJ Hackett bungy at Karawau bridge - the first bungy site. Normally this would be for any of the passengers who wanted to do the jump, but noone on our bus did! It was also where everyone had to sign up for the other bungy sites. Noone on our bus wanting to do a bungy was going for anything less than the big one - the Nevis bungy (134m). Personally, I am not doing any of them this time in Queenstown - I'll be back here after visiting a few more places, and will have more time available, so will decide what to do then!

Our first night in Queenstown was alwas going to be a big night - partially because more of LJ's friends would be celebrating his birthday with us. We started in the Red Rock bar before moving to Altitude.

It's the morning after now, and I don't expect to see some people for quite some time. I'm off now to jump off a cliff!

The start of the South Island

Thursday - Wellington to Nelson

After an early start from Wellington, we left the North Island behind and got on the Interislander Ferry back to the South Island. Pretty much as soon as we left there was nice weather, a welcome change to the unpredictable weather of late. On arrival in Picton, we boarded a new bus and headed towards Nelson. Our stop on the way was Pelorus bridge, where there was a nice little river for swimming in and jumping off rocks. The bridge itself had a sign attached saying "Jumping from this bridge HAS caused death or serious injury". To be honest, as it was easily 30m up, I wasn't even tempted! It was enough jumping off the rocks. In Nelson we stayed at the Prince Albert hotel (converted for backpackers), where we had a roast dinner before heading out for some drinks, as a few more people were jumping off the bus that day.

Friday - Nelson to Westport

One of the main attractions of Nelson is its proximity to Abel Tasman national park, making it a suitable base for activities such as walking, kayaking and boat cruises. These were the options available to us at our first stop, Kaiteriteri. As I didn't fancy half a day's kayaking yet, I opted for a boat cruise. We were taken into Abel Tasman, which has stunning beaches, lots of wildlife and nice scenery. We saw quite a few seals basking in the sun on the rocks.

Back onto the bus, we headed for Westport. The road to Westport was extremely windy and narrow, especially running along the Buller gorge. In places, some of the cliff had actually been chiselled out by hand to make room for the road. The river running along this road would be the setting for my next activity - Jet Boating! We got into a jet boat powered by two 5.6l Chevrolet engines, putting out a total of 820hp! This boat could accelerate and turn incredibly quickly, and needed only a few cm of water in which to travel. On the way up the river, we were chasing Shags (the bird!) - they would be startled by the noise of the boat and start flying away down the river, and Doc, our pilot, would chase them. They were a bit too stupid just to fly up, and we were able to chase one for easily over 1km. On the way back down the river, we were put through a load of 360 degree spins and sharp turns, getting us all quite wet. It was a bit strange riding in a boat behind a tractor though, at the start and end of the journey!

Saturday - Westport to Lake Mahinipua

After a reasonably timed start (first for a few days!) we stopped off at Cape Foulwind to do a coastal walk. The scenery on the walk was impressive enough, but the point of the walk was to get to the fur seal colony at the other end. Although I've seen a few seals on my trip so far, I'd never seen anywhere near this many in one place. Plenty of seal pups with their parents, and some in the "learn to swim" rockpool!

The final destination for this day, Lake Mahinipua, has almost nothing there. It is a small pub (known as the poo pub) between a lake and the coast. So to provide some entertainment, it is always the scene on the Kiwi Experience trips for a fancy dress party. We'd decided the theme by a vote yesterday - Pimps & Whores (cross-dressing). However, we'd secretly arranged another theme, dressing as Little John (our driver). Everyone on board knew about this, apart from LJ. So at our next stop, Greymouth, we all went into a big shop to find our outfits. These consisted of boardies and tank tops, with either a sun hat or something to make us bald. When LJ went in to purchase his whore outfit, he was a little worried when he questioned whether the cashier had seen any foreigners buying cross dressing outfits and she looked blank! Still, he didn't catch on.

On arrival at Lake Mahinipua, I went down to the lake to do the compulsory photography, before heading back for dinner. After dinner was the fancy dress party, and we all had to get dressed up and into the bar without LJ catching on. This was especially difficult as he was getting some of the girls to help with his makeup! Finally we were all assembled in the bar, the majority of us dressed up in some way like our driver, before he walked in wearing a tight top stuffed with balloons, tights and a pink cowboy hat. He was apparently quite confused why we were all dressed as rather strange pimps, and it took him a while to catch on what our theme really was. Still, it was a very good night!

Sunday - Lake Mahinpua to Franz Josef

Again, we managed a reasonably timed departure today, although many people on the bus were feeling rather the worse for wear. We weren't on the road for very long before we reached a Bushman museum, our first stop. This was mainly focussed on how Kiwis used to make their living before tourism became such a big industry - catching deer. Originally, NZ had no mammals. When it was settled by foreigners, they introduced many mammals, including deer and possums. Both of these came to be quite a pest, destroying the natural vegetation. The deer population was out of control as they had so much lush countryside to graze on. Then, a market for Venison was found in Germany. Hunting deer became big business, and helicopters were the tool of choice for this, making recovery of the corpse easy. Initially the deer would be shot out in the wild, and carried somewhere to be sold. However, as a significant dent was finally made in the deer population, some Kiwis decided to start farming them. This required catching them in the first place, for which they had some interesting methods. The best one was for a helicopter to fly in and chase the deer, then another person would leap from the heli skids and jump onto the deer's back, wrestling it to the ground! Eventually they started developing net guns things were a bit easier.

The museum also had quite a humourous take on their food - they had many amusing slogans up, with quite a few criticising vegetarians (vegetarians are just piss-poor hunters!). Their food was amusingly labelled - pig & unborn chicken sandwich (bacon & egg!).

The next stop was Okarito, where we could climb up loads of steps for impressive views onto the mountains and a lagoon. Walking down was significantly easier! After this we headed into Franz Josef to book our glacier walking activities for tomorrow. I did consider changing my walk to a heli-hike, as I wanted to go up in a helicopter, but the group was full. However, my luck was in. After checking into my hostel, I was just chatting to our driver when we were approached by a guy from a scenic flights company who wanted to fill his last trip of the day at $50 a seat! Considering these flights cost upwards of $250, I jumped at the chance. We were flown up for a 30 min flight around the glaciers, getting nice views of Mt Cook and Mt Tasman. We landed on the snow at the top of one of the mountains for a short walk around before returning home!



Tonight I'll have an early night, as I've signed up for a full day's glacier walk tomorrow (8 hours!). I suspect I will be tired and sore by this time tomorrow!

A few changes

Just a couple of changes to things - due to Vodafone messing up the phone they sold me over here, I've now got a new NZ number - +64210386644. Again, I'll still be texting from my UK number, but that's the number to use if you needed to ring me.

Secondly, my previously posted itinerary is now incorrect - I've made a few changes to flights. Mainly because I needed a few more days in NZ, but it means I'll be staying a few days long overall now. I'll put up an updated itinerary when I remember to bring it to an internet cafe, but my flight from Fiji leaves on April 25th, so I guess that puts me back home on April 26th. I'll be leaving NZ for Australia early on March 6th.

Oh, and I can be officially called Dr Richard now :)

Taupo to Wellington

Sunday - Free day in Taupo

As I had a free day in Taupo, I used this as a quiet day, due the the previous heavy night. However, we did manage one activity as a group - a trip to the local hot springs. These had a big advantage over the other hot springs we've visited before - they didn't stink of Sulphur! It was a very hot stream running down to join a river. You could only just about get into the stream - it was like a very hot bath. However, where the stream and river met, the water was a comfortable enough temperature, and consequently there were many people there.

Although we'd been out the previous night, tonight was the last night we would see some of the people on our bus as they were leaving for other trips, hence another night out was required, albeit significantly quieter than the previous night.

Monday - Taupo to River Valley

Today was pretty much the longest lie in we've had on a bus pickup day - 9:30! Although I'd not been able to do the Tongariro crossing, a one day hike in the Tongariro national park, we did stop off on our journey to do a shorter walk through the park to Taranaki Falls for lunch. On the way we could see some of the volcanoes in the park, including Mt Ngauruhoe (Mt Doom!).

Our final destination for today was River Valley, a lodge on a river (yes, in a valley!). This was probably the most remote location I've stayed in here, and was really nice. Our reason for staying here was to do whitewater rafting the next day.

Tuesday - Whitewater Rafting & Return to Wellington

Although I did whitewater rafting at the start of my trip in New Zealand, I enjoyed it enough to do it again with the people I've got to know on the bus. So early in the morning, we all got suited up in wetsuits and squashed in a bus to head upriver. This rafting company seemed to do more training than the previous company I'd been with, which I didn't appreciate too much as it involved flipping the raft and pushing us out so we'd know how to handle it if we did fall out! Again, the river was bloody cold! After a few short rapids, we reached our first big rapid. However, as we were about to start, we heard a whistle from the photographer, who was nipping about in a little kayak. He'd gone downriver to take photos, and noticed a tree had fallen into the river and was blocking the path. We had to walk down that bit (this is the reason the photos contain some pictures of an empty raft - we hadn't all fallen out!). This wasn't the only bit of drama - one of the staff (the trainee) who was out in a smaller raft had cut his finger quite badly on a rock, and we had to wait for them to sort out first aid stuff. However, after that it was on with the big rapids again! I've put all the photos from our boat up here.

We left River Valley after lunch to go back to Wellington, ready to end my time in the North Island. Our only stop was a small town called Bulles, who are quite proud of their name, and have called many of their business after it - e.g. the police station is consta-bull, the toilets were relieve-a-bull etc.

Whitianga to Taupo

Thursday - Whitianga to Rotorua

Our new driver, Little John, had introduced a game on the bus on our first day with him. The game was called the M-I-N-E game, as we are not allowed to say the word "mine". Anyone who does say the word, normally accidentally in conversation, has to do 10 press-ups. Anyone refusing to do the pressups can be called on later to do 50 star jumps at any point, most likely in an embarassing location. After being caught fairly early on with a simple "whose bag is this?" question, I became more alert! Since the game started, barely an hour goes by without someone having to drop to the ground and do pressups! This game became quite an inconvenience to Little John at one of our stops today - a gold mine! After trying for a while to talk about a hole in the ground, he gave up and had to do 50 pressups.

Our next stop was Karangahake Scenic Reserve, where we went for a walk in a gorge. To cross the river, we had to go over a bridge, on the other side of which was a warning saying maximum load 10 people, which we found after all 30 of us crossed it! Still, an interesting walk in some pitch black tunnels! After a brief stop in Matamata, a town which has only got on the map due to it being the setting of Hobbiton, we finished the journey to Rotorua. On arrival there, our first stop was the Zorbing centre. For those of you who haven't been exposed to zorbing, it involves climbing into a huge inflatable ball and being rolled down a hill. Most of the options included having some water in the ball so you slide around rather than get thrown about as you do in the dry! However, I opted for a wet option. Impressively, some people have managed to stay running the zig zag course with water in it! Not for us though.



After being picked up from the zorbing centre, we headed up another Gondola (cable car!) in Rotorua, to get to a luge track at the top. This was lots of fun - if we hadn't been short on time, I'd have probably done quite a few more runs! However, our evening's entertainment was fast approaching - an evening of Maori culture in the form of a concert and Hangi (meal cooked in an earth oven). And avoiding the very heavy rain. Which we seemed to be getting quite a lot of over the past few days! The concert was quite impressive, and was nice to have loads of nice food available! At the end of this, we headed back to the hostel bar to celebrate the birthday of Paige, a girl from the bus.




Friday - Rotorua to Waitomo

Our first port of call this morning was Te Puia, a geothermal and maori cultural centre. Of course, it was bucketting down with rain again. Fortunately the place provided umbrellas! After walking round the various cultural buildings, we went through a Kiwi house, as this was going to be the only chance I'd get to see the national emblem of the country - a nocturnal flightless bird. Unfortunately this has largely been wiped out in the wild due to the introduction of animals from abroad. After seeing the Kiwis, we wandered out to see the hot pools, mud pools and geysers. Unfortunately, the geysers weren't exactly being impressive today.

We arrived in Waitomo (Wai meaning Water, Tomo meaning Cave) early in the afternoon to stay at the Kiwi Paka YHA hostel. After checking in, we headed to Marokopo falls, apparently the third largest in the country. Made for nice pictures anyway! Also went to check out a natural bridge formed by the walls of a cave falling away.



Saturday - Waitomo to Taupo

The reason for coming to Waitomo was in order to go Blackwater Rafting, essentially caving with a big rubber tube to float down underwater rivers. The water was pretty cold, though we had thick wetsuits. We had lights on our helmets, but when we turned all these off, we could see loads of glow worms on the cave roof! We also jumped off a few waterfalls in the caves. Upon exiting the tunnels, we had time for a warm shower before departing to Taupo!




Having had lots of bad weather recently, I was very apprehensive about this trip to Taupo, having already spent a few days there earlier! I really wanted to get a skydive done, and a phonecall made to the skydive centre from the bus informed us that they were currently jumping! However, we could see clouds ahead, so all was not certain yet. However, when we reached the Skydive centre, it was still nice weather! Half of the bus immediately got out to do a jump - me included (wasn't taking any chances with the weather closing in!). I had to wait for the third group, but I did it! Strangely, I didn't feel very nervous. Perhaps it was the fact that I had already been here previously (even got suited up) without jumping. However, as the first couple of people jumped, the speed at which they disappeared from view made me a little nervous. This increased my tandem guide was sitting on the edge of the aircraft, me dangling outside by the harness for a few seconds, before he jumped out also! For 45 seconds, we were freefalling! It was incredibly loud with the air rushing past, and after the first few seconds to get our orientation, I looked at the view! From up there, you could see all of Lake Taupo (big enough to fit Singapore in it!). I could see the airfield approaching very quickly. As the bloke I was strapped to pulled the chute, everything went very quiet and slow. After giving me the cords to steer with for a while, I got my feet back on solid ground! It was definitely the best experience of my trip so far!

Due to everyone being on a high from their skydive, and also because Little John was celebrating his 30th birthday, we all went out for drinks in Taupo when we got back. Originally I was intending doing the Tongariro crossing, a 1 day walk across two local volcanoes (one of which is Mt Doom from Lord of the Rings). However, this leaves at 5:40am. Fortunately, the weather had cancelled this trip - apparently it was going to be very windy. This was quite lucky, as by the time we got back to the hostel it would've been time to leave!

Today I have a free day in Taupo, which I'm using to sort out various things, including my skydive photos.

Bay of Islands to Whitianga

Bay of Islands (cont)

At the end of my last post, I'd had to move hostels. This is because New Zealand was celebrating Waitangi day, a national holiday celebrating the signing of the treaty signing NZ over to Britain. This meant that lots of people were heading to the area for the weekend. When I tried to stay an extra night in my original hostel, I was unable to. However, the place over the road (Mouse Trap) was much nicer. For the rest of Saturday, I met up with Nicola and Simon, two friends from earlier, and walked over to Waitangi to see what was going on. We didn't see too much, as entry to the treaty grounds wasn't free (and would be on Monday!). However, we did see the Navy practicising their 21 gun salute from a frigate out in the bay.

On Sunday, I took a ferry across to Russell, a previous capital of New Zealand! Russell is a much quieter and less touristy affair than Paihia. Quite hilly though, as I found when I took the walk to flagstaff hill. This gave quite nice views out over the bay. It also showed me that it was too far to walk to the beach on the other side of the peninsula! In the evening, went out with a friend for a nice meal, as a change from BBQs and pasta & sauce!

Monday was Waitangi Day, and upon checking out of my hostel and catching up with the others from the hostel over the road, we headed down over to Waitangi to watch the celebrations. These were all based around the treaty grounds, the area where the treaty was originally signed. When we got there, there was a navy band playing (strange to hear a Robbie medley from a navy band!), before a 21 gun salute. Originally, the NZ prime minister was supposed to put in an appearance, but after previous years turning into protests and him being egged, he pulled out of this spot. Instead, we watched some local bands and groups performing for a bit. This included more from the navy brass band, and the youngest haka performers I have seen so far! Unfortunately, the next part of the day was too late for us to watch, as we had a bus to catch back to Auckland.

Auckland

Upon arrival in the big city, we headed down to the bar to celebrate the last night of Nicky & Jeff, and the last time we'd see Nicola & Simon. We stayed in the Globe Bar until nearly 3, but were all tired due to spending the day in the sun! Our hostel in Auckland, ACB, was a strange affair - it was massive, but most rooms had no windows! However, this meant you could sleep in (unless the other two in your room got up early!)

On Tuesday, I did the free Kiwi Experience tour of Auckland - meant for people who haven't yet signed up for any tours to give them a taste of what's in store. To me, it was a convenient free bus to a few sights - we went up a couple of volcanoes on the north shore of Auckland, and a beach. In the evening I had an earlyish night, as I was starting the main part of the Kiwi tour the next day, which would probably involve lots of staying up drinking!

Whitianga

For the first day of the tour south of Auckland, we got a new driver (Little John), who would be staying with us for the rest of the trip if we did the minimum journey times. On the way out of Auckland, we went up another volcano with impressive views of Auckland. We then left Auckland, our first stop off point being Hot Water beach. This is a beach where you can dig holes in the sane which will fill with hot water, making your own little hot pool. If you get there at low tide, which we didn't. However, we still went for a little walk on the beach. Until it started spitting (at which I turned back with about half of the group). Then it started really raining, and everyone left on the beach got soaked! Unfortunately, the rain stayed with us for most of the afternoon, meaning that our next stop, Cathedral Cove, was also a washout. We were supposed to be spending 3 hours kayaking through a marine reserve, but this was cancelled due to the weather! Although we had a quite look around in Cathedral Cove, there wasn't much point doing the 1.5 hour walk that was possible instead of the kayakking as the heavens were threatening to open on us again! Instead, we headed to our hostel (Turtle Cove - the nicest hostel I've stayed in yet!), where we spent the night playing pool, having a BBQ and a few beers.

Auckland & Bay of Islands

To Auckland

I left Rotorua on Tuesday on the Kiwi bus headed for Auckland. For many people on the bus, this was their last journey as many trips start or end at Auckland. We only had one stop on the way today - Mt Maunganui, a seaside town with nice beaches and a big hill (definitely not a mountain!) which we climbed. Although this was only 230m, it seemed a lot further as today was the first day for a while we'd had good weather. From the top of the mount there were some pretty nice views. Back down with enough time for an ice cream, we headed onto Auckland.

Auckland is New Zealand's biggest city (although not the capital), with 1.3 million people (1/3 of the people in NZ!). Didn't do very much here as got here quite late, but did manage to get a trip up the Skytower, the tallest building in New Zealand, to watch the sunset.

Bay of Islands

On Wednesday, I started the next bit of the trip, heading up to Paihia at the Bay of Islands. The Bay of Islands is comprised of 148 little islands, and Paihia seems to have grown up as a purely tourist town - unless there is a hidden section somewhere, the town centre seems to consist entirely of tour operators, travel centres and souvenir shops! Still, there is enough here to keep me occupied.

Originally I was intending doing a dolphin swimming trip on the first day, but due to date restrictions on another trip I wanted, I postponed this. Instead, on the first day in Paihia I got on board a boat called The Rock, an old roll-on roll-off vehicle ferry that has been converted into a houseboat, to do an overnight cruise. The cruise would consist of going out to some of the more remote islands, and anchoring there overnight. The first highlight of the trip didn't take long - we were looking out to the side of the boat at a small lone penguin when someone spotted dolphins ahead of us. We immediately changed course to follow them, and they started playing with the boat, jumping out of the water and giving us quite a show. They stayed with us for quite some time, allowing a load of nice photos!



After the dolphins left, we had a shooting competition from the back of the boat, trying to shoot a plastic bottle tied to a rope dangling behind the boat with an air rifle - not very easy I can tell you! However, I managed 1 hit out of 3, along with one other guy and 2 girls. As there was a prize each for the best guy & girl, I only had to beat the other guy. Sudden death round to finish off (sounds interesting for a shooting competition!), but neither of us could hit the bottle (the sea was a bit rougher now than earlier), so it was concluded with a game of paper-scissors-stone!!

When we reached our final destination for the night, we anchored up and got the fishing rods out. Most of us just tried fishing from the back of the boat, but a few went out in a little boat for a bit more space. Unfortunately I didn't catch anything, but fortunately dinner was comprised mainly of BBQ food, with the fish as an extra. The little boat managed to catch a fair amount of snapper, which was added to the dinner. Once we'd finished dinner and it had got dark, we got the kayaks out and went for a little night-time trip. This was really cool, as the water was again full of the phosphorescence I'd seen at Te Kaha previously. However, this was much better here as it would be stirred up by the paddles, the boats, and most impressively, all the fish in the water! They would shoot between the boats, and jump out of the water leaving green trails.

The next day, we took the boats to the beach, where we had lunch and went for a walk. There was some snorkelling available, but I wasn't in for long before deciding that it wasn't worth the effort - there had been a cyclone in the area recently and visibility still wasn't very good at all. Eventually we made it back to Paiahia, where I checked into my hostel in time for a big BBQ (I'm going to have so many BBQs on this trip!).

Cape Reinga Day Trip

On Friday I had a very early start to catch a day trip bus up to Cape Reinga, the most northerly point of NZ. This bus was a different one to normal - equipped to deal with driving on a beach! It wasn't long before our journey took us onto "Ninety Mile Beach" - which is actually a public road (although apparently most insurance policies are void here!). The beach is not actually 90 miles long, but the name comes from a guy who used to keep cattle on land at the very north of NZ, and take them down to towns further south to sell. Cattle apparently do 30 miles in one day, and it took them 3 days to walk the length of the beach. Hence the owner figured the beach much be 90 miles long, and lived in ignorance for a few years until someone actually measured it! We had to get along the beach fairly quickly, as the tide was coming in. The dangers of this became apparent when we came across a Mercedes, half submerged in the sand! They'd apparently got stuck by the incoming tide, and tried to drive out up a stream. This would normally work, but on the day in question there had been heavy rain, and the stream actually had loads of water!



At the end of the beach, there are a load of pretty tall sand dunes. So of course, we grabbed body boards from the bus, headed up to the top (quite hard work!) then went sandboarding. Much fun, especially when people don't brake with their feet and keep going over the stream at the bottom! After this, we headed up to Cape Reinga, the most northerly point, where the Tasman sea and Pacific meet. This is a sacred Maori place, as Maori believe that when they die, their spirits travel along the coast before leaving at Cape Reinga for Hawaiki, where the Maori are believed to come from (probably somewhere in Polynesia). Then we nipped over to a beach for lunch and some swimming.

On the way home, we stopped at a wood outlet selling furniture and other things made from ancient Kauri trees - almost the largest trees in the world (after Giant Redwoods). Some of this stuff was pretty expensive - they had a couch for NZ$40,000! They also had a spiral staircase carved out of one of these trees - very impressive. We stopped in a small part of NZ's remaining rainforest on the way home to see some of the younger Kauri trees there - there were only 400-600 years old. They can easily grow to over 4,000 years old!

I'm now staying in Paihia for a few more days, as it is a NZ national holiday - Waitangi day, celebrating the signing of a treaty between the British and the Maori. Lots of celebrations going on apparently, so I'm off now to check some of those out. It does mean however that the hostels are all getting quite full up - I've had to move hostels today as mine was fully booked and I couldn't stay another night!