Well...

---

So. I haven't written for a long time. Nearly two weeks??? But there is a fantastic reason for this, so want to be let into a massive secret?


I have done bugger all! Well metaphorically speaking anyway. I have been doing things on a day to day basis but all in all, nothing that immensely interesting or exciting, except for a few days of absolute joy.

So after doing the East Cape of Aotearoa, which was amazing and possible, dare I say one of the best parts of New Zealand, although that is unfair, maybe it should be left at that New Zealand, Aotearoa, Kiwiland or Land of the Long White Cloud, they are all the same, was just bloody brilliant(!), we headed back to Rotorua, the evil smelling place for two days. It had got hot! Very hot. Hotter than when we climbed Mount Doom. The kinda heat that would make you go "shit, its hotter than that day we climbed mount doom and boy was it hot then!". We didn;t have much planned and spent our time pottering around. We had done all the essential stuff first time through. I went for a run actually, that was one of the highlights. And we bought each other a Maori necklace as a parting gift. When i say we bought each other, we picked them out, gave it to the other and after the purchase presented it to which the recipient was shocked and in awe that we had picked out the very necklace he had wanted. Good.

We headed up to Auckland. The bus was late, and it was still hot and humid. The last few nights had been hell, trying to sleep. Somebugger kept turning the fan off that was keeping the air moving and some sort of relative coolness to the room, as a result i went to bed late and woke early and maybe slept a little in the afternoon when there were less people in the room and thus it was cooler. Genius. The bus to Auckland was being driven by no other bald headed legend that Spud, our driver from the West Coast of the South Island. He was a bit of a bloody legend!

Ummm. Its hard trying to remember anything of use. That day in a nutshell. Sweated. Sweated some more. Bus arrives. Spud driving. Late. Get on. Rob has lost Credit Card. Spud leaves Rob behind. We pick up people. Pick Rob back up. Card had been handed in at the police station. Rob filled in loads of forms. The journey was bumpy. Suspension buggered. Rocky roads. Get into Auckland. Suspension pops back in place. Fab. Booked Fiji trip. Psyched!

That night i went for dinner with one of the girls of the East Cape bus. We had a good night. Rob took Gemma for a farewell drink, and the genius I am, timed it so that as Gemma and Rob walked one way, we bumped into them, so I could say bye to Gemma too! Genius.

The next day Rob and I went seperate way in order to organise some shit and met up for lunch. We flited the afternoon away by chilling in the basement of the hostel, which was alot cooler than anywhere else on the planet. This is where we bumped into Matt. Bit of a legend.

We went to the bar that night as a farewell drink meeting up with a few people there, including Matt and the chick i had been out with. Me and Matt did a pole dance, as you do. I walked the girl home and then headed back to the bar to find Rob had pulled, the little whipper snapper. So i got talking to this irish lass for company...

The next morning there were no sore heads on our part, only Matt, who we had invited for breakkie. I was cooking up a special fry up as a last breakfast together. We ate it and after washing up caught the airbus.

I checked in, we had a farewell picture and ginger bere, for old times sake and then i passed through the hallowed security doors.

I passed the time in the airport, wrote a few postcards, got told off for walking five yards from my luggage and then boarded. The flight was like flying. Bumpy at times, food was mediocre etc. The landing however was hairraising. We made a few attempts touching one wheel down, or another or neither until the pilot was happy that everyone had soiled themselves enough for him to crash land the plane half on and half off the runway.

Customs was a breeze. The only thing that slowed me down was one of the officers questioning me about my pack size. Having been away for three months i was sure that i could cope two in oz with my bag, he thought i wouldn't and this was a big issue. Not the fact that i had ticked every box on the customs form and they didn;t want to check anything, but the pack was too small. Dick! i could have probably walked through with a kilo of heroin and they would have been more concerned that it was 0.9 of a kilo and that i was lying about the size than the actual fact that its an illegal substance...

Sarah, Huw and Sophie met me at the train station and helped me check in etc. I spent a week with them though we didn't do much. It rained solidly nearly all week. Huw and i got up, the patriots we are, to watch Wales gloriously stuff the English, and on one of the finer days we went to the zoo and saw all the animals. I spent a day with Anna from school on one of the drearier and ended up eating traditional indian curry with her family.

I met up with Steve Taylor, someone Dad knows from work for a few beers on the Friday.

I got up early then on Saturday to go to the blue mountains. The Blue Mountains are one of the most beautiful things i have seen so far in Australia. They were covered with a dense green rainforest and very much looked like the set of The Last of the Mohicans.

We first did a two hour walk around the Wentworth falls. Wentworth was one of three guys who first managed to navigate their way through the mountains. The waterfall was massive! The landcaspe was green and blue with sudden and sheer red rock faces that climbed up. Next we descened down into an area that used to be a mining hub. We reached a viewpoint to be welcomed with a wall of grey cloud. Our guide started explaining the story of the Three Sisters, three famous pinnacles of rock. By the time she had finished explaining the cloud had somewhat cleared and we could see the Three Sisters with blue sky behind. The weather that day had been rather weird. Humid, wet and even thunderstorms.

That night I met up with Mat from work for a few quiet ones and ended up getting truly lashed! I stumbled into bed.

The following day Anna and I had planned to go to the beach, but it was still overcast. I went swimming and met Anna later for the Tropfest, and amatuer film festival for short films. I must say all the entrants were really good and the winner dealt with some good ethical issues.

At 5.30am on the Monday i woke and was sat on the bus headin North up the East coast. The journey can only be described with an action. A yawn. Imagine driving from Cardiff to London, only without so much green and you are half way there. It was also a fairly long slog. We left Sydney at around 6am and arrive at Spot X at 6pm.

Spot X is a surf camp. Our accomodation for the night was in the form of steel shipping containers. They were hot and humid, but airconditioned! We had a BBQ that night with the Jocks. The surf boys loved themselves far too much, but we had the oppurtunity to get to know the people off the bus.

At 6am the following morning, having only got to bed about 4 hours previous, we were woken up for breakfast and our surf lesson. Thank God we didn't have one of these jocks as our surf coach. He was a dreadlocked chill dude kinda guy and very helpful. We had a theory lesson. Focussing on the basics and science behind surfing. Not much! Then the practical began. We did a few standing up drill about the techniques to get standing on the board and then hit the water. It was a lot easier than i anticipated.

We were supposed to head off at 11am but the bus didn;t start. For an hour or so we just chilled out throwing a rugby ball around until the bus started. We piled on, grabbed some lunch in the next town and steamed through to Byron, where the bus emptied, except me and was reloaded. This repeated at Surfers Paradise. Eventually, 8 hours of driving, one time zone change, a state border crossing later, we rolled into Brisbane where my friend Annie greeted me.

He mum was staying too and had cooked dinner, but that night, after such a long day i was asleep by 10.

The following day we headed back down to Byron Bay to stay with Annie's mum and we spent a few days at the beach and suring. The area was beautiful, a lush green creek about the distance Cardiff is from Newport, from Byron. We drove back on the Friday via Mount Warning. We climbed it. This is allegedly one of the big mountains in Queensland. Its about the size of Caerphilly mountain, if smaller...although the last hundred feet had to be climbed on all fours and was very much an exciting scramble.

The last few days have been spent sorting out some of my admin, booking buses and hostels and budgeting thusly and accordingly, so not very interesting there. We went to a fantastic free stand up comedy show last night though and the main act, Tommy Dee, an american, was hilarious. I head off early on Wednesday to Rainbow Beach, heading away from the bigger city life.

Peace out.

xxx

---