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Published: July 19th 2009
Adam and the 'Big Al'
..the famous Fergburger in QueenstownFrom LA we flew 14 hours overnight to Auckland, North Island New Zealand. It was absolutely freezing (2 degrees) when we arrived at 6.30am in our flip flops and light jumpers!! Straight into the city centre we went to stock up on warm socks, jumpers, hats and gloves!! We spent 2 nights in Auckland, checking out the sights and the busy nightlife, before joining the Kiwi Experience bus for our New Zealand adventure!
The first stop after Auckland, was a place called Mercury Bay where we spent one night. This was a tiny village (one of the many around New Zealand), and here we went to the hotpools at night. It was so cold out we could see our breath in front of us, and here we were in our swim gear getting into the hotpools. While it was about 2 degrees outside, as soon as we got into the 50 degree hotpool we were all of a sudden happy to have the cold to break away from that heat! it was so nice here,w e just sat in the hotpool for an hour looking up into the pitch black sky full of stars. I have never seen so many
stars in all my life, it was an amazing sight!!
From here we made our way down to smelly Rotorua. The reason for the really strong rotten egg smell around the town was beacuse the town was full of natural hotsprings that release sulpher into the air. We spent the afternoon doing luging (small go carts) down the hills in the lashing rain..great craic!! Was happy to leave the smelly town the next day and do the East As trip, across to the East coast of the North island, where the Maouri people now settled.
This part of the country was so sparsely populated and mainly all farmland and fields, with some very very tiny villages along the way. We were supposed to feed stingrays at our first stop but the waves were too rough so there were none around, which was a pity. We then went on to the Maouri village where the filmed the film 'Whalerider' (a Maouri film) and were welcomed on to their land by a local woman. To be allowed on to their land, the lady had to sing a song to us and then we could enter the Munai (the land where they
lived), girlshad to walk first and the boys following behind. Here she told us all bout the history of New Zealand through the eyes of the Maouri people, their beliefs, and their way of living. It was definitely very interesting to learn about. We stayed at a local farm for a night surrounded by only fields and the sea. This was the most Easterly point in the world to see the sunrise for that day! We got up at 6.30am and climbed the hill the next morning to watch the sunrise but it was way too cloudy and rainy to see anything...we still took pictures anyway! We also got to do bonecarving where we carved each other a traditional Maouri symbol from cow bone. On the last night here we stayed with a local Maouri family called the O'Briens believe it or not! Apparantly the Maouri have many decendents from Irish, English and Scottish settlers in New Zealand! Again the father of the family this time, sang us a Maouri song that night and we all then had to sing a group song back to him which we made ourselves. (we just changed the words to Sex on Fire!). That
was East As!
From here then we stopped at a few mre towns and villages making our way down to Wellington. One of the stops was at Taupo which was where i did my skydive over Lake Taupo, the crater of a volcano! It was so much fun. I jumped from 15,000 feet out of the plane. I was so looking forward to doing it that I wasn't nervous at all until that moment when i got to the door of the plane and we had to jump!! My god, were we high up, but there was no turning back now as I was strapped on to the instructer and he jumped straight away! It was so cool! We feefalled for about 60seconds before he opened the parachute and then we just sat back and looked at the scenery around us which was incredible! We then spent the rest of the day hiking up a mountain with a few of our friends, where we then had a view over the whole town and surrounding area from the top...once again, AMAZING!
Another stop on the way through to Wellington was at Waitamo, which is a small town on the
west coast of the North island that is full of underground caves. Adam did black water rafting which I chose not to do. He climbed through tunnels, absailed, jumped into water, and sat in a rubber ring..all in the pitch dark, in a cave, with thousands of gloworms lighting the ceiling of the caves above..i definitely did not fancy that, although Adam loved it!!!
When we reached Wellington, the capital city, we decided to spend 3 nights here so we could have time to wander around without rushing. This was a lovely city, still not very big, but nice. The weather was cold but we were lucky enough to have no rain so we were happy! We had a look around the biggest museum I have ever been in, Te Papa, which was 6 floors full of New Zealand history, then we got a cable car up to the top of the hill that overlooked the whole city, went to the cinema, and of course had a good night out..lots of Irish bars here!
That was it for the North Island, we got the ferry from Wellington to Picton, on the South island.
This was now the beginning
of our South Island adventure. The amazing scenery which we were to see on the south island was definitely uncomparable to anything we have ever seen anywhere before. It truly was incredible. The lakes mirrored the overlooking mountains, the snowy topped mountains were everywhere, and lots of green forestry around. There are only 1million people living on the whole of the south island, and 1.2 million people living in Auckland alone, it was amazing. Whileon the ferry there was a section we sailed through that had so many dolphins. They were all swimming beside the ferry, jumping out of the water..it was so cool to see..there must have been about 30 dolphins just swimming beside us!
When we reached the south island we stopped at a few very tiny villages down along the west coast...Nelson, we did jetboating in Westport, Pu Pub where we had a fancy dress night..anythingn that begins with the letter P, then Lake Manapau, the famous Franz Josef, Wanaka, Queenstown (best place so far!), and lastly Christchurch.
The Franz Josef glacier hike was so amazing and so different. We spent the day hiking up a glacier in the lashing rain. It was just so unreal.
It looked so amazing. We have so many photos from here, which are really cool. The next place where we enjoyed the most out of the whole country was Queenstown. We spent 8 nights here and loved it! There is so much to do here you could spend an absolute fortune if you did everything! The main things that we did here was the Neviis bungee jump which Adam did. It was 134 meters high in a canyon. I went out with him to the platform where he jumped from and I was scared for him.It was so so highand he was first to go from the group! He looked so scared but as soon as the guy counted him down he just jumped straight away, it was so cool watching! He screamed the whole way down and as soon as the pulled him back up he wanted to go again!! crazy!! Afterhe did that we went over to do the Nevis Arcswing which is the biggest swing in the world. This was 160meters high. Adam waas in the zone cos he had just done the bungee but i was freaking out when they were strapping me in!! I had
to sit on Adam faciong him, so he had his back to the drop and I was facing it. After the count down the guy just pulled the cord and down we went! It was SO fun!! After the first 2 or 3 seonds into it you lose the fear! It was a great day! The ski season had just started a few dayus before we got here so we got to spend 2 days on the slopes skiing. This was great. Adam spent some time teaching me, so by the end of the 2 days i was skiing with him down the easy blue slope. The higher one I couldnt do, but now im already looking forward to going on a ski holiday to improve!! It was freezing up here. It was minus 5 degrees and it felt like your face was going to be frost bitten when we were skiing down the slopes. We had a great time skiing. The rest of the ti8me we went on a few scenic walks and played frisbee golf! Of course we had the famous Ferg Burger which everyone was telling us about before we got there. The burgers were huge, i
couldn't finish mine, and Adam just about finished his! Queenstown was so cool, i would defo go back there!
We also got tickets for the All Blacks V France rugby match in Dunedin, so we hired two cars with a few friends for the day and drove down. It was good fun, and one of our friends was French so it made it more fun!
In all New Zealand was definitely the best country so far, so much to do and see there, it was amazing! Would go back again in summer if i could and do some of the things we didnt get to do cos of the bad weather. The people are so friendly and nice, love to say Sweey As to everything!! Great place!
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