When Backpacking Goes Wrong

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I should probably start by explaining the blog title and photo, and reassuring everyone that we haven't been victim of an "American Werewolf in London" style attack, but instead came across a zombie walk (I know!) in Auckland, on what might just have been the weirdest day of our lives. But more about that later...

Having left Brazil on the 17th October, crossing the international date line on the way, we didn't arrive in Auckland till the 19th, something that still pickles Neil's head to this day. (Add to that the fact that we're now 13 hours ahead of home, and can be enjoying the Sunday morning papers with a coffee while Saturday nights out at home are just beginning, and you've got "something out of a science fiction film", apparently!)

Auckland impressed us from the moment we arrived - even the airport! Unfortunately it probably says a lot about our own country that we were so impressed with the standard of the facilities on offer there, the wealth of free tourist information that was available (you really don't need to buy a guide book for this country) and the friendliness of absolutely everyone we had to deal with, but in fairness to the UK, New Zealand has stood out in those respects far and above any other country we've visited so far - even after we left the airport!

We had 4 nights in Auckland, and loved it. It's quite laid back, and might not have the excitement of New York, for example, but as a city to live in, it could just be hard to beat. There is a huge cafe culture, which pleased us - apparently they take coffee very seriously here, and no matter where you go, there'll be at least one, but usually a few cool little cafes to sit in. Everyone, throughout the whole country in fact, is ridiculously friendly - even though New Zealand is inundated with tourists, everyone you meet wants to chat about where you're from, where you've been, and where you're off to next. And the setting is absolutely gorgeous, with a beautiful harbour surrounded by hilltop rainforests, dozens of dormant volcanic cones, and cute islands in the distance in the Gulf. In fact, it was while visiting one of those cute islands that the aforementioned weirdest day of our life began.... We'd talked about staying on one of the islands for a night or two, but as we were enjoying Auckland so much, and had got a great bargain on our hotel there, we decided a day trip to one would do us, and Waiheke, only 30 minutes away by ferry, was close enough for a day trip. We'd no real plans for the day, and so when we were pounced on by a guy offering us a tour as soon as we got off the boat, we thought it sounded fair enough. Especially, as he pointed out, it had started to rain, and we wouldn't want to be wandering around getting soaked. He nabbed an American couple to join us, and we were off....but not very far as it turned out as, despite his sales pitch promising a dry day sight-seeing, first stop was to turf us out of the minibus into the rain for a 45 minute hike! And no, it wasn't an accompanied hike - he pointed us in vaguely the right direction, told us where to meet him later and buggered off!! Waiheke has some very reputable wineries so Tangles (seriously) redeemed himself after our hike by taking us around a few of those for some tastings, along with another couple of Americans he'd managed to pick up when he'd ditched us. But just when things were going almost normally, we found out the next stop on the "itinerary" was his duaghter's house. Seriously. And she was as surprised as we were when Tangles traipsed in with a busload of tourists, breastfeeding at the time, as she was. But we still stayed for some carrotcake - not at all awkward, no! And after that, where else could we go, but his own house! And if we thought the day couldn't get any stranger, we returned to the mainland to find the "Zombie Walk" in full swing!

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Photos

Auckland
From the top of Mt Eden, one of the dormant volcanoes.

A cow!
A whole herd were wandering around freely in Mt Eden.

First things first...
Having waited 4 months for it, Neil enjoyed a mini-fry on our first morning in NZ. With HP brown sauce! He learned his lesson, though, and went for the full fry on day 2.

Waiheke
Managing to enjoy our unscheduled hike around the island.

The winner
Best Auckland Zombie 2007. His prize was a Nintendo Wii, not bad.

Zombie schoolgirls
Apart from all the blood, we suspected these two girls didn't look too different when they were out of character.