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Published: April 12th 2007
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The 7 metre waterfall
The raft itself is 4 and a half metres long. After leaving a sleepy Alys and Jenny at 5 in the morning, I headed across the Tasman Sea to find Olly in Wellington. When I finally landed it took ages to get through customs and Olly had started to think he had got the day wrong! Luckily he hadnt...
It was great to see each other again and we had so much to tell each other. We walked out of the airport where Laura was almost immeadiately stung by a bee. (Olly blamed my nice new blue dress). Bearing in mind I had managed to survive Australia with all its deadly creatures, my first glimpse of new zealand was a swollen arm.
As a treat for me (Laura), Olly had booked a gorgeous apartment with a kitchen, TV and wachine machine all to ourselves. He cooked me dinner and we chilled watching a film as I was exhausted. We woke up to a text from Laura's mum to confirm that she had managed to get us both Glastonbury tickets. Ledgend!
As the sun was shining we took the famous cable car to the botanical gardens and we chilled and caught up on each others stories. A must
do in Wellington is a visit to New Zealand's national museum Te Papa. It is a huge unusual looking building full of exhibits about the country's past and Maori culture. It also has lots about the geography of the land and all the different hazards New Zealand experiences. We were both very impressed by it. Directly opposite the YHA was the Red Dragon Bar, the southern hemisphere's only welsh pub. Olly got abit excited by this and had to have a photo taken.
When we were leaving Wellington we caught a bus to the coach station and as we weren't quite sure where it was, when we overheard a small boy saying thats where he needed to get off we followed...Big mistake! He was going totally the wrong direction and we were finally pointed the right way by a friendly passerby.
National park was our first stop, we knew that it was supposed to be small but had no idea at just how tiny it was. It was to be our base for the Tongario Crossing, described as New Zealand's best one day walk. The track passes the base of Mt Ngauruhoe which is Mt Doom in Lord
of the rings. You also see craters and stunning views of this volcanic region. It is a baron landscape with lakes dotted around, and at some points a strong smell of sulphur. I (Laura) had been under the impression that this was a pleasant scenic day walk rather than a hearty hike. My borrowed walking boots(which obviously didnt fit correctly) were constantly crushing my toes, however we did see some incredible views so it was worth it in the end. I was very proud of myself for finishing it alive. The forecast had been for heavy rain however we only encountered a small amount, and that was luckily just as we arrived at a hut. We got to the end half an hour before the minibus was due to pick us up. I have to admit that I had a chuckle at those people who had obviously rushed it and had been standing around in the cold for hours! SHAME!
Taupo
From there it was onto Taupo where the first thing we did was book our skydive. This was something we were both dead set on doing and had been for a while. Laura didnt seem scared at the
idea at all due to the fact that she had seen Lauren and Jenny do it, how wrong she was!!!
The next day we were picked up by a limo and driven to the jumpsite. We were quickly introduced to our instructors. Olly had Mike a chilled out guy from London while Laura had Laci a hyeractive Hungarian.
Before we knew it we were in the pink piglet ascending to 12,000ft. Laura against all her wishes had to go first and one of the other instructors kicked open the door, and within an instant she was gone. It was pretty scary seeing Laura vanish out in to the sky and soon it was my turn.
Its hard to put into words that feeling of accelerating through the air. After a while your guts catch up with you. Throughout the freefall you can barely breathe, whether thats due to the speed or just a state of shock who knows!
It seemed to go on forever until at 5,000ft the parachute is opened and you soar down to earth. This is the relaxing part where we were able to see the whole of Lake Taupo whilst getting our breathe back. Laci also
let Laura fly her parachute for a while before we safely landed back on the ground.
I (Olly) have to admit I was quite relieved to see Laura already on the ground as I landed. We gave each other a big hug our legs still shaking and we were buzzing all afternoon. We watched our really embarrassing DVD's before heading back to the hostel.
That evening to calm our nerves we played a round of minigolf. It was close but Olly stole it on the 18th hole.
Whilst in Taupo we also visited the impressive Huka Falls. We walked along the Waikato river to reach them. Unfortunately we hadn't brought our swimmers so couldn't go for a dip in the river.
Rotorua
Rotorua was our next stop and as we got off the bus we realised why it was nicknamed the Sulphur city. Every so often you get a whiff due to the huge amount of geothermal activity in the area. As you walk around town you come across fenced off areas containing hot rocks and bubbling mud pools, its quite unusual.
We were staying in the Lake House a short walk from the centre. It is a
big old house overlooking the Lake and has the potential to be very charming, but what with its lack of guests and crazy landlady it was abit freaky to say the least. It was cheap and convenient and that's what we were looking for to try and balance out our bank balance after skydiving.
There are many thermal parks around Rotorua and we chose to visit Wai-O-Tapu, meaning sacred waters. We arrived in time to see the eruption of the Lady Knox Geyser which although very impressive, was a little fake as we had seen the man set it off. He did so by pouring a bag of soap into it. The rest of the park however was totally natural and was like nothing we'd ever seen before. There were many different coloured pools and rocks, along with craters and steaming fumeroles. We managed to do the whole walk and see everything that was there.
To make the most of the sunshine we had a nice picnic in the Government Gardens.
Our second extreme sport (not quite as scary) was Zorbing. This is basically rolling down a hill in a big inflatable ball. Olly and I went together along
Laura lost in the steam
It didnt smell so good. with a load of warm water which caused us to slosh around inside as we accelerated down the slope.
For our last day in Rotorua we decided to go White Water Rafting, even though I (Laura) was terrorfied by the photographs we chose to do a Grade 5 route down the Kaituna River. (Grade 6 is where people die, or so we were told.) This route contains 14 rapids including the Okere waterfall, which at 7 metres is believed to be the world's highest commercially rafted waterfall. Luckily our boat didn't capsize although we did get submerged several times, some of which were on purpose. It was so exciting and totally worth doing, and a great end to the adrenaline packed part of our trip.
Next stop The Bay of Plenty.
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Anna
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Hey Guys, Looks like you're both having an AMAZING time! Me and Joe are just getting ready for our Italy and Croatia travel - ok not quite New Zealand but it will be fab! Joes just got fab news - he has managed to charm his way into Edingburgh uni after all! As we trecked round SO many other places and this was still the one he loved it wkd news! (Looks like me and you Laws may be on the same easyjet flights together!) Hope you keep having a ball! Much love, Anna xxx