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Published: September 30th 2007
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I received an email in Queenstown from Trung: "I'm meeting Krista from The Cook Islands in Dunedin tonight - are you up for it?" I looked at my watch: 17:00. How long a drive to Dunedin? Who knows..? I know its on the opposite coast to Queenstown... Sod it, i'm in! I got to my car to find an ominous, scrunched up piece of paper stuffed under the vans front wiper - a $30 NZD parking ticket! Pretty bad sport given the parking machines were broken :S
That evening, Trung, Krista and I drove 400km from different directions in New Zealand to rendezvous in Dunedin (Scottish Gaelic name for Edinburgh) to within 50ft from each other - think we're developing some sort of ESP telepathy thing. Trung arrived first from Milford Sound and booked us all into Penny's backpackers where we stayed for the next two nights drinking, dancing and reminiscing about our time in Rarotonga. It was really cool to hook back up with someone we'd met on the road. We've met many folk, exchanged emails, been handed addresses and all of that but often, you think realistically that your probably never going to see the majority of the people ever again. So it was cool that we made the extra effort to meet up in Dunedin with Krista, who had driven up from Invercargill and whom we had hit it off with in The Cook Islands.
So those two days were spent sipping Kiwi brew, munching big breakfasts and being coerced into dancing in Dunedin's rowdy nightclubs by Krista, who is quite possibly the most funky dancer in the South Island when bustin' moves. Trung has finally met his match on the dancefloor! There was even an impromptu undie-run around Dunedin's main hub of bars called The Octogon where Trung, Krista and a couple of other takers dressed down for a late night run. During the days, we took some time to visit New Zealand's only castle, which was a pretty impressive country manor and even wen't looking for Penguins!
Before we knew it, it was time-up in Dunedin and we had to say our farewells to Krista and confront the journey waiting for us ahead. We were in Dunedin at 15:00 in the South East coast of New Zealand's South Island and we had to get ourselves and our vans up to Pilton on the
Dunedin Peninsula
Is this a painting or a photograph... Hmmmmmm..... North coast by 07:00 the next morning to make our pre-booked ferry to Wellington on the North Island. That's a mission. Basically, an eight hour drive in favourable circumstances. So when I got that feeling of forgetting something in the hostel about thirty minutes into the drive, it was probably an omen of what was to come. After patting around my pockets and checking my rucksack, I realised I'd left the most important thing I'd arrived with. No, not Trung! - my money wallet, home to my passport and Jason Bourne style selection of back-up foreign currency. So back I raced to the hostel where I luckily found the wallet safely tucked under my pillow!
Sidenote - I'm actually writing this blog two weeks later in Australia and I just received an email from Escape Rentals with an attachment of a speeding fine from the New Zealand Police detailing the offence at this exact point. $300. 😞 If your in New Zealand and tempted to push the speed limits, don't do it, even if you have left your passport in some dodgy hostel... There werent many hours of day light left in the sky so back I
got in the van to restart the long journey North. The drive was pretty exhausting and once the darkness came down, pretty long winded (a bit like this blog I think). Eventually, at 01:30 and after about 9 hours, I parked up in a picnic area road lay by about 50km from the port and caught 5 hrs sleep before getting up at 07:00 to make the boat. While waiting to drive on to the ferry, it was a relief to see Trung arriving through the rain in Soul. We'd made it!
The four hour journey across was pretty cool and it was a nice arrival into Wellington on our arrival to New Zealand's North Island. Once off, we continued our journey North towards Auckland. Not long into the drive, we got split up and made our own ways up through the long country. It was a right laugh to bump back into each other by chance at Lake Taupo where Trung saw me parked in a layby and swung in to see what was happening. After proclaiming to each other that we were both exhausted, we decided to spend the night at a hostel in Lake Taupo. The
following day, Trung wen't skydiving - pics to follow Trung?
That night, we arrived in Auckland and dropped off Walter and Soul. I'd become quite fond of Walter so it was a shame to part - we'd been to hell and back together after all. (see the Christchurch blog, its an action packed tale of man and machine against natures fury... or something like that). The guys at the rental place did their inspections and said nothing of Walter's bruises so we found a hostel nearby to have a pint, managed to fit in a visit to a nightclub, then hailed a taxi to the airport at 04:00 for our flight at 06:00 to Cairns, Australia...
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Matt
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Fergburger Eatings
Dude, I got 2 of these on 2 different days. It only took me about 10-15 minutes for both. How could it take you an hour!?!?!?