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Published: April 20th 2010
Kia Ora! That'll be Hi in Maori. There are lots of photos here by the way and they don't quite match up with the words like they normally do so just scan through the photos after (or before if you can't be bothered to read the words!!).
So after dropping off our Hippie in Cairns we headed for the airport and our 2 flights to Auckland (connecting in Brisbane). As we arrived in very late (midnight) Patrick had the wonderful suggestion of staying at the airport instead of travelling into town for a short night stay. Well I did investigate this on the very useful website all about staying in airports and it suggested the observation lounge for a decent night kip. Well decent night kip I didn't get as it was a little too bright, then too cold, then....anyway, you get the idea. And who comes to an airport at 5am in the morning to see off relatives?? Yes, there was a big family that decided to make lots of noise seeing off their relatives at 5am, so that was the end of that. Good idea, not. Although I can't deny that saved a good $80 or so
on a hostel so given I'm the one that's always trying to save money I can't really complain too much (although I did all the next day as I was knackered).
Auckland So early morning on March 31 (as what else do you do when you're up at 5am) we went to pick up our next campervan from Jucy. This time we went for a little bigger van as we knew the weather would be a bit cooler so we'd actually have to sit in the van sometimes to eat etc. Plus it came with the soon to be seen as all important power and fan heater!
Today we just stocked up on the supplies at the supermarket and went to our first NZ campsite to organise the van. We also decided to sign up with one of the NZ mobile providers and bought a dongle so we'd have internet on the go, something we could have done with in Australia really. We also needed to read our guidebooks on what to actually do given we hadn't read about NZ at all and didn't have a scooby about where to go and why.
We were considering
Doing the haka
Pretty scary huh?going north out of Auckland to the Bay of Islands. But it was fast approaching Easter weekend when apparently the Aucklanders would have the same idea, so we decided to give it a miss and stay in Auckland to see the sights instead. So off we went on Thursday morning to the Auckland Museum which, according to the lonely planet, was a 'must see'. We spent about an hour faffing around trying to find a cashpoint that would take my card before finally getting in and running to the Maori cultural performance. This 30 minute show was actually really good, going through dances and songs of the Maori culture, ending with the famous haka (the thing that the All Blacks rugby team do before each game if anyone didn't know). We then spent another 3 hours at the museum before it closed, which was no where near enough time. Totally recommend it for anyone visiting Auckland.
We ended our first day with a drive up to the top of Mt Eden (Auckland's highest volcanic cone at 196m) with fantastic views of all of Auckland. NZ is full of volcanoes and it's quite weird to see these cones popping up
all over the place. One of the volcano's in Auckland, Rangitoto Island, is only 600 years old. Most are obviously now dormant but activity is still possible, one of the volcano's near where we'd be in a few days time erupted last in 1995. Let's hope none of them go while we're here!
On Easter Friday we figured town would be dead so took the opportunity of the free parking to walk around the downtown area following a walking tour in the lonely planet. I have to say that Auckland's downtown didn't really appeal and doesn't have some of the charm that the Australian cities have, although as we'd see the next day some of the suburbs are quite nice.
Rugby and horse racing So the Saturday started our bumper sport weekend. We'd done a google search to find some rugby union and league games around NZ and it just so happened that the only chance we'd get to see any would be in Auckland, and on consecutive days. But not just happy with that we found out that not far from our campsite was a horse track so on Saturday morning we headed to the races!
Mt Eden and Auckland
One of the volcanic craters in front Patrick had been to a few in London last year, and I think he was expecting the same crowds and experience, not the 100 or so people that were actually there! It was quite fun though, although the only horse that came in for us was on the last race we bet on (ok, so it was Patrick's horse that won), that's 1 in 10 horses, pretty crap! So on we head to Mt Eden stadium to watch the Auckland Blues vs the Bulls (from Pretoria I think, South Africa), one of the Super 14 games (Rugby Union). Unfortunately Mt Eden is being rebuilt for the 2011 World Cup so half the stadium wasn't available, so it kind of dampened the atmosphere a little and meant we could only get tickets way up in the clouds. Pretty good game though and the home team won.
Our next game was on the Sunday further south at Mt Smart Stadium to watch the Auckland Warriors vs Manly Sea Eagles. Auckland are the only NZ rugby league team in the Australian Rugby League. This stadium was a lot smaller although absolutely packed by the start, with us sitting on a grass bank
at the south end. Quite cool game as well although the home team lost.
Mt Maunganui The weather up to now had been a marked improvement on Australia. It was a little cloudy but not a rain cloud in sight. But the next day we woke to a beautiful blue sky day for the start of our drive south. We headed for the Bay of Plenty, passing through a gorgeous Karangahake Gorge where we stopped for lunch, ending in Mt Maunganui, a pretty beachside town dominated by the 232m hill after which the town is named. After checking into the campsite right under the hill we climbed up to the top (me being knackered again, I swear I'm getting old) to see some fantastic views across the Bay of Plenty's coastline. We also watched some guys launching themselves off the hill with parachutes, looking very cool (paragliding we found out later).
Taupo So as we'd hung around Auckland longer than we should have to watch the rugby games, we had to start heading south quite quickly. Everyone raves about the South Island when talking about NZ, which I'm sure is right, but the North Island also
has some spectacular scenery so it was a shame we had to rush through it. But onwards we went and passed through stinky Rotorua, due to the sulpur bubbling through the land from thermal activity, to have a look at the zorbing. Everyone's probably seen the zorbing on TV where people are in a big plastic ball running down the hill, but actually in the flesh it really didn't look all that impressive as the hill was only about 100m long. No one coming out of the balls was saying it was amazing so at $50 a pop we decided to give it a miss, especially as we knew that skydiving was coming up!
We went to see the full extent of the thermal activity at the Orakei Korako Thermal Park. This site is supposed to be quieter than some of the more well known parks but again according to the lonely planet is supposedly the best one. It starts with a little boat ride across the lake to an area full of thermal activity, including geysers, silica terraces, caves and bubbling mud. Unfortunately this was our first rainy day but that probably made the ground steam a little
more anyway. Quite a cool site and well worth seeing.
So onwards to Taupo and after having a look at some websites, Patrick booked himself in for a skydive the next day. I'd done one before in England so I thought I'd save the big amount of cash it was going to cost to do something else like paragliding later on. So all booked we headed to the Taupo hot springs spa, which was on the same grounds as our campsite. The hot springs have been a tourist spot for over 80 years or so, obviously modernised on the way, consisting of different indoor and outdoor pools ranging from 28 to 40 degrees. Very nice and relaxing although this is where we started to feel the cold of NZ as we got out the pools into a 8 degree night. This would actually be the last 'warm' night we'd have!!
The next day, after running into town to buy me a big jumper, we headed out to the airport for Patrick's sky dive. After just about passing the weight limit test (I won't say what the limit was), Patrick was apparently off in the next load up. However,
the wind decided not to comply and all planes were grounded waiting for the gusts to die down. Which they didn't for a while, so we decided to sack it for that day and booked Patrick in for the next day when we knew the weather was going to be better. So instead we went to see the Huka falls, which are only 10 metres high but the water after running down a narrow gorge is so powerful it makes for a quite impressive sight.
Jump! So mid morning on Thursday, after checking with the company that it was a go, we headed back to the airport for Patrick's skydive. This time he didn't have time to think as he was quickly dressed in a jump suit and stuffed into the plane with 5 other jumpers, their tandem instructors and a few camera guys. Though he then did have time to think about what was happening on the plane ride up and I think got a little nervous by the looks of the video! Not long after I completely missed filming his landing on the camera (lucky he had a professional camera guy filming!), but thumbs up and
apparently an awesome experience.
After Patrick's adrenaline had a chance to stop pumping (and a great full breakfast for me), we headed towards the Tongariro National Park.
Tongariro Tongariro was NZ's first national park in 1887, and covers three volcanoes, Tongariro, Ngauruhoe and Ruapehu, all about 2000m (or more) high. The view coming into the park is awesome, although a little cloudy we could see the peaks including the moody looking Ngauruhoe which starred as Mt Doom in the Lord of the Rings. Ruapehu is the most active of the volcanoes having erupted as recently as 2007.
We were here to walk the Tongariro alpine crossing, which is classed as one of NZ's best one day hikes. After reading about the ascents on the hike I was very skeptical about this, but Patrick wanted to do it, so we booked ourselves on the first bus to the start and had an early night.
So the next day, at 7am, we were headed on the bus to the start of the crossing, on a very cold (there was a frost) but beautiful blue sky morning. The walk would take us 19.4km, ascending 765m up through the
Patrick in front of Mt Doom
At the start, still looking pretty fresh! middle of Mt Ngauruhoe (for ease sake now to be called Mt Doom) and Mt Tongariro. The start was fairly tame but soon we started the climb to the saddle up 'the Devil's staircase' which is just a load of stairs having been paved by the Department of Conservation in the last few years. I did struggle a little up this bit, taking my time, with Patrick steaming ahead which he soon regretted as I steadily plodded up the next steep slope with him lagging behind a little. But finally we made it up the top at the Red Crater with fantastic views of Mt Doom and also the Emerald and Blue lakes (coloured so due to the minerals from the lava flows). Those were probably the best views we saw on the otherwise pretty boring trails into and out of that point. The way down was very very long, being further actually than the way up. Anyway though, we did it (in 7 hours) and it wasn't as bad as I thought it was going to be. Was it worth it? I don't know, the views at points were quite nice, but once you've seen it for 5 minutes
you don't really need to see it for the next hour! Thankfully we had a beautiful day for it though because at least we could see the views, I'm sure it wouldn't have been much fun in cloud!
Wellington The next day, with achy legs, we headed on down to Wellington through the rest of the Tongariro national park with some amazing scenery, and still being able to see Mt Ruapehu for miles. It was a bit of a meandering road making the drive for Patrick a little interesting. But we finally arrived at the campsite in Wellington which was at the back of a motor inn so more like a car park than a campsite. However, with fast internet at $4 for our entire stay and Sky TV in the bar area (to watch the Masters), we settled in for 3 days to plan some more of our trip including our flights to South Africa in November (for Gary from Bermuda's wedding).
On Sunday morning we watched the 3rd round of the Masters (well the end of it anyway as it started at NZ time 6am) then headed into Wellington to have an amble around before
going to the theatre to see the musical Miss Saigon which had just opened in Wellington. I'd seen Miss Saigon a few times in London and loved it so thought I'd drag Patrick along. It was actually a very good rendition, although hearing the twang of the NZ accent sometimes was a bit weird!
On Monday, again after watching the last round of the Masters, we headed back into town to see some more of the sights. Wellington is actually quite a nice town, a bit more of that charm I was talking about, with one of the highlights being Old St Paul's which is a gothic style church built in the 19th century, all from wood. It was beautiful inside, with wood carvings and wood everywhere. Just so quaint.
That evening we met up with one of Patrick's sister's (Collette) friends, Sarah Benjamin, who once visited Patrick in Bermuda with Collette, for a lovely dinner at Chow, an asian fusion restaurant. Bit of a treat for us and nice to meet and grill Sarah about living and working in NZ. Although with the cold weather over here I don't think I could actually settle here, as then
I might as well stay in England!
This marked the end of our tour round the North Island as the next day we were headed on the ferry to the South Island where Patrick will continue the tales.
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Kirsten
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Wanaka
Apparantly Wanaka is where Si's family go for the summer. It's the south of the south. Also very interested as to what you may think of Dunedin if you manage to get there! Safe travels! Miss you! k