Andytect

Wanganui and the damn Van W.O.F. debacle.. Strolled around Wanganui. Nice little town. Have found a good spot for a full breakfast. Art colleges and very active local art scene. Quite a few arty Craft shops to browse through. Wonder how many craft shops I've been in now?! Van W.O.F. Dropped van into service station station at 8 to get it's TLC. Mechanic has sourced a 2nd hand windscreen (to replace the existing one with its tiny crack), an exhaust pipe and petrol cap. Using these salvaged parts should bring price down loads. Told to come back at 4pm. Walked around Wanganui to waste a bit of time. Got back at 4 expecting to see the van sitting there all ready but found instead a windscreenless chunk of metal sitting in the mechanics yard. What happened ... read more

Wanganui. Wednesday 27 April 2011 Not particularly much to do here today. Bit rainy but lots of Glass Art studios and art galleries to stroll around. Gonna have to get this Warranty of Fitness (WOF) situation for my van sorted before I get pulled over and arrested. Searched for mechanics that could get the WOF over and done with asap so I can get a more on up to Taranaki and New Plymouth. ... read more

Wanganui. Famous for it’s Glass blowing and art and quite a few interesting Galleries. Visited Glass blowing studio and watched a vase being created by quite renowned local glassblower. Wanganui pics: Wanganui ... read more

Napier Gave myself a little Art Deco tour of the city. Napier pics: Napier ... read more

Journal day ... Napier rising. April 24 Napier & Hawks Bay. Campervan park. Had a great chat with Murray Fields, owner of the park. Daughter in Wicklow, interested in irish. He told me a bit of the history if the 1931 earthquake that destroyed the entire city of Napier. He was able to speak very well about the history and the exact spot where we were standing in the campervan park field was perfect for a little lecture as he was able to point at areas of the surrounding landscape to describe what had happened. It turned out the field I was standing in, close to the city of Napier, was below water before the earthquake occurred. It turns out that Napier actually made 42sqkm bigger by the quake. This large area of ground was raised ... read more

Kayaking around the Taupo lake rock carvings. Kayaked right up to the large 10metre high Maori Rockface carvings. Very impressive. The carvings were created by sculptor Matahi Whakataka-Brightwell in the 70's on the area called Mine Bay. They are only accessible by boat or kayak. The large face represents the great Maori navigator Ngatoroirangi who was meant to have brought tribes to the Taupo region a thousand years ago. There are also some smaller carvings by Matahi and some local sculptor students on the rocks to the left of the main rock face carving. Many sculptures depicting a big lizard and many figures from Maori legends. Amongst then are also a few Celtic patterns showing a mermaid and the face of the southerly wind. Taupo very large lake 238 square miles. The lake is a caldera ... read more

Tongariro Alpine Crossing. And Mount Nguaruhoe....... Mount Doom The Tongariro Alpine crossing is considered to be one of the world's best one day treks. It's approx 20kms of trekking through a dramatic and diverse range of terrain. From volcanoes, through craters, across rocky ridges and through jungle treks. It turned out to be a lot more challenging than I'd originally assumed it to be... and the broken ribs didn't help as my small backpack strap crosses diagonally across my torso nicely digging right into the ribs. The weather changed dramatically throughout the crossing. At the beginning of the trek at ground level I was dressed with a t-shirt, suncream and sweating in the hot sunshine and a few hours later I was battling high winds and snow wrapped up in about 5 layers of jumpers, hoods, ... read more

Up early to head to Taupo. The Huka falls. Water flows from lake Taupo into the Waikato river, New Zealands longest river. 425km long. And at the Huka Falls 200,000 litres of water rapidly charges towards the Falls and plunges 9 metres over the large rock face every second. A number of people of people have kayaked the falls and survived. A number of people have also tried it and died too. So I'm not considering having a go, that's for sure. Explored around the town of Taupo. Pics: Taupo ... read more

Met Nick from around Newcastle, England who's traveling with his girlfriend. And a nice English couple. Matt & Laura. Rotorua museum. Beautiful old buidling which was originally a bath house for the public and people suffering from an array of physical and medical problems. Kuirua thermal park. Free to walk around and full of hot Bubbling mud pools, steaming pools. Strong smell of sulphur. Loads of holes scattered around the place. Each one containing a slightly different thermal bubbling pit of death. Internet to upload pictures. Back out for one Final night at Waikite. Slept outside the gates again but will no doubt have a nice soak in the thermal hot pools here in the morning.... read more

Breakfast with Nigel, Jill & Sally and then said my farewell to headed off to the town of Matamata, or as it is otherwise known.... 'Hobbiton!' I hadn't been particularly interested in visiting Hobbiton as I'd heard that after the Lord of the Rings trilogy was realeased the set had been stripped of all detail apart form the hobbit holes themselves which were each left with just a plain white front facade. But as The Hobbit movie is currently being filmed and I was in Rotorua and not far from Matamata I phoned up just to see what was happening. I found out that the sets were fully dressed and ready for filming to take place. Apparently the Hobbiton scenes should have already been filmed but were rescheduled as Peter Jackson fell ill. Good luck for ... read more