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Published: December 23rd 2009
HALLO! Greetings from Wellington!
This will be the final ‘travel blog’ of this leg of our travels. It’s been a sparkling few months, full of twists and turns, surprises, disappointments and triumphs. (Ed: Please don’t be put off by the length of this blog - the last half of it is definitely worth a read )
Before we get started - apologies for any occurrences of American spellings - the autocorrect thing is messing with my mind and my opposable thumbs. Away we go then…
We headed from Sydney to Auckland, and stayed with the marvellous Rachel - a lady we met on the DMZ tour in Vietnam. We spoke to her for only a few minutes, at best, but on arrival in Auckland it was enough for her to pick us up, put us up, and feed us up! We even went for dinner with her parents in Pukekohe, which involved some tremendous wine.
We also found time to have fish and chips on the beach - and this was a real highlight. They were the
best fish and chips I have ever eaten. Full stop. Period. Absoluto. Facto definito. Kumara (sweet potato chips), normal chips and 3 different types of fish - snapper being the only of the three that I had heard of - and Watties tomato sauce (move over Heinz!)….. MMMMMM!!!!
Clearly the taste memory still hasn’t left me!
The name of the beach escapes me, but we were looking out over the water directly at a volcano, and there were about 10 lads having a kick-about on the beach, clearly infused with the spirit of ‘soccer’ following the All Whites qualification for the World Cup next year. They were rubbish.
We spent every day on the internet looking for work and accommodation in Wellington, doing little snippets of touristy things in Auckland, and processing the differences between NZ and the UK - to quote an overweight Bolton comedian, “Les Cadbury’s Fingres” anybody?
Auckland has a reputation for being dull and characterless. I have to say that it isn’t a place that you would want half way round the world to see, but it entertained us and the area of Ponsonby is great, albeit very expensive. Lots of little
boutiques and restaurants, housed in turn-of-the-century archetypal New Zealand wooden buildings, line either side of the main road that dissects the area. We found both time and money for a good glass of wine one night.
We managed to set up bank accounts with the Bank of New Zealand, and in completing this undertaking we got a real taste of the classic laid back NZ stereotype. The banks are part financial institutions, part places for small talk. They’re a friendly bunch, that’s for sure.
I enthusiastically cooked curried lamb steaks and roasted vegetables for Rachel and Laura on our last night with her, before catching the train to Wellington on Saturday morning. Rachel gave us a lift to the train station, before 7am (her kindness knew no limits)! We will see each other again soon I’m sure.
Nobody really catches the train from Auckland to Wellington anymore - its continued existence is entirely dependent on an emotional public campaign to save it. Nevertheless, it was the cheapest way to complete the journey, and clearly this was a journey meant for tourists. We had plenty of commentary from the crew along the way, an outside viewing platform, and
absolutely enormous windows. The fact that it was absolutely chucking it down did, however, render all of these luxuries pointless. We couldn’t see what we were being told about, and we certainly didn’t have any inclination to step outside!
Thirteen hours, several volcanoes and a bizarre 30 minute stop-off at a little station café (which could have been in Yorkshire, Wales or Derbyshire) later, we arrived in Wellington. Tired, confused, and weighed down by the pressures of finding work and a home, we made it to the YHA - the cheapest hostel in Wellington. It was like a factory - churning out backpacker clones. There were hundreds of them, everywhere! There were 6 floors, 25 rooms on our floor, six beds in our room alone, and 2 toilets. Splendid.
We had a couple of nights with idiots, on the squeakiest bunk beds in the world. If anybody in the room so much as breathed, the room was filled with the sound of dying mice. On the first night we were woken first at 1am by a girl coming back to the room to get ready to go out, and then at 5am by the same girl again returning
from her night out. She also insisted on talking to someone in the room for what seemed like hours. Grumpy I may be, but some things are just not done in dorm rooms. Consequently, when she awoke at 8am to pack her stuff, which was scattered all over the room and thus took forever, we were more than a little peeved by her arrogance and ignorance. I say, without guilt, that I hope she had an appalling hangover for the rest of the day.
On a much more positive note, we managed to find somewhere to live within 24 hours of being in the city. The hostel was incredibly expensive, despite being the cheapest available, and it worked out much cheaper to stay in the flat-share we had found, on a rolling basis, looking for work.
We bought the most terrible mobile phone for an even more terrible sum of money (cheap phones haven’t reached NZ yet), and sat in Starbucks on their internet (it was cheaper than the hostel’s), absolutely attacking TradeMe.co.nz - which has lots of listings for flat-shares. We then walked across the city several times over going to impromptu viewings, before deciding to go
with the first place we had seen.
It’s a small room in a fantastic flat, with two lovely people, for a really good price. Seeing as we don’t own anything, a small room is not really a major issue. The flat does have a balcony, and this particular balcony has a view over the Basin - Wellington’s cricket ground. So come February, when the Aussies are here - whoop de doo! BBQs and cricket, with a quick dash inside to see the replays on tv. Happy times ahead….
Laura has got herself a job as a receptionist already, which is a bonus as we did not envisage that either of us would find work before Christmas. My tasks are to pick up items of food for Christmas dinner, email agencies, listen to Dylan, as I am doing right this second, and write blogs detailing our experiences in the hope that you find them interesting.
We have enjoyed writing these blogs. I know I have written the majority of them, but that has been a result of chance as opposed to anything else. If Laura wasn’t so employable, it would be her writing this right now.
I
sincerely hope that you have enjoyed reading the blogs and looking at the photographs. I’m really rather gutted that it will be a long time until I have cause to write more. We have friends whose exploits put our 3 months of travelling to shame, but I must say that we were ready for a break and to settle down for a while.
Russia was utterly stunning. I feel justified in saying that its faults are obvious and its virtues less so. Regardless of which, the energy and enthusiasm with which we approached that entire leg of our journey meant that we were able to see past the ugliness, the inaccessibility, the food, the barrenness, and the general melancholy that must accompany such characteristics. What a cheery place I make it sound! Nevertheless, those Stalinist monstrosities, that incredibly grand and ornate metro system of Moscow, those statues of Lenin, the bronze figures striding forward atop every monument, and that oh so blindingly beautiful Lake Baikal make it a place like no other. It doesn’t bend at the knees like a Thai shop assistant, it doesn’t bow with clasped hands like a Lao waiter, and it doesn’t greet you with
a “no worries bro” like a New Zealand customs official. It ignores you, dwarves you, and feeds you stodgy bread. The Russians will ignore you then hug you ten minutes later. Characters like Ivan and Alexander will shower you with generosity, but then say goodbye with more restraint than a 1940s BBC World Service broadcaster. Liberal hostel owning young ladies such as Katya will bemoan the dictatorial nature of the nation, but then say that there is no other way to govern a country as broken and fragmented as Russia.
We will return to Russia, I have no doubt. We dearly want to do the Trans Siberian in winter, slicing through the snow like Dr Zhivago and his family (David Lean’s film was actually shot in Spain - heartbreaking!). So much of our experience this time round was dependent upon the people we met - both the Russians on the train and the backpackers at the isolated old-fashioned hostels. However, it would be foolish to imagine that such encounters cannot be bettered, let alone equalled.
China was a monster of a country, and we only saw the Roald Dahl side. The darker, frightening, dictatorial side was shielded from
view. Thankfully, such shielding was not done by screens and illusions as during the Olympics, but instead we created our own shield by virtue of our route and choices. We stayed in the middle of the Hutong in the heart of Beijing: the very areas hidden from view during the Olympics - sure some were opened and people were actually encouraged to explore them - but where we were most certainly was not one of those areas. One 7am walk brought me into contact with escaped fish flapping on the street, steamed buns being flogged to all who passed, hair being cut on the street, and tens of pointing children, all amazed by my white skin and blonde hair (perhaps even the rubbish beard got a point). Smiles abounded, and there was a real sense of joy; so much so that it was intoxicating.
We are now in a thousand Chinese families’ photo albums, sometimes we’ve been asked to pose, and occasionally we are in there without contemporaneous knowledge of our involvement. We cannot complain - I can’t photograph a guy getting his haircut whilst he orders his fish breakfast then sound off about sneaky photos being taken of
myself.
Beijing was our favourite Asian city - it ground all others that we visited to dust. Beijing can laugh at the sprawling disorder that is Saigon, it can pity Hanoi’s narrow old streets clogged with modern cars and scooters, and it can express both alarm and distress when told of Bangkok’s popularity. If people want to taste and smell Asia, go to Beijing; for a start, its municipality is the size of Belgium. The fact that you can never see more than 400 metres in any direction because of the claustrophobia-inducing smog is an irritation, but a manageable one.
Xingping, on the Li River, need not be discussed in detail. A quick look back at the photographs says it all. I saw recently that the Guardian had included it in some kind of run-down of the 10 most beautiful places on Earth at present. The travellers we met there are among the nicest and most interesting people I have ever known, and I think that it is no coincidence that such meetings took place in Xingping.
Hong Kong was an experience, and not a bad one, but I would not go back. There are a thousand
other places in the world that I would far rather spend time (even Wales).
Vietnam provided great times and terrible times. We have since said that Saigon was the most disagreeable destination of the entire trip - and despite what we heard and read prior to visiting it, everybody we have seen subsequent to leaving Vietnam has expressed a similar dislike for the city. Dalat, Mui Ne, Hoi An and Hanoi were all superb. The people were great, the food was incredible, and the scenery equally so.
Laos was a mixture - in equal parts beautiful and tragic. My advice to anybody heading to Laos would be to avoid the beaten track. It just so happens to be so well trodden in Laos that the fun and excitement has been trodden flat.
Thailand was better than expected - Pai offered something different, and the food was consistently very good. Koh Tao was stunning, and the isolation we managed to find led to complete and utter relaxation. This was undermined somewhat by the odd shark sighting, but it’s something to make the parents shiver isn’t it?
Bangkok, like Vietnam, engendered mixed emotions. First time round we had a fantastic hotel room and were able to enjoy some of the comforts of home such as a bath and a comfortable bed, but despite all our efforts the charm and magic of Bangkok alluded us. However, on returning from Koh Tao, we discovered an area probably as untouched by the direct effects of tourism as anywhere in Thailand can ever be. There was superb street food and great markets - even one dedicated entirely to fancy dress!
So now, like Winnie the Pooh and those Heffalumps, I have caught up with my own tracks, and have arrived at Sydney and New Zealand.
Last night we walked down to the front (Wellington is a city set around a crescent shaped bay, with volcanoes framing the limits of the city), and looked out towards the large mountains many miles away across the vast expanse of water. Laura said that it made her excited about seeing what New Zealand truly has to offer. I echo such sentiments whole-heartedly. The South Island is like some mythical other world (pipe down, that is not a reference to those terribly dull films shot there) - it’s just across the Cook Straight, yet right now it might as well be a thousand miles away. We have come first to get a taste of New Zealand life in the wonderfully cultural city of Wellington.
Personally I am already feeling its effect (I mean that allegorically, despite the earthquake we had this morning). So much of it feels like home, but people are friendlier, the food is a hundred times better, it’s Christmas in the summer time, and there is a chance that, like our flatmate Dave, we might bump into Flight of the Conchords’ Brett at the Sunday fruit and vegetables market.
Also, we’re ten minutes from a ‘supermarket’ that can be best described by the following statement: “If Hugh Fearnley-Whittingstall did supermarkets…” Seriously - it’s like an episode of River Cottage in there. There is a literal wall of brie! The accompanying alcohol store has about 40 different brands of gin. What more could you want in the world?
Right, on that happy note, I’m off now. Laura is about to get home, and she has had her hair cut after work. I must avoid the following situation: www.youtube.com/watch?v=XE2hA8qCS40 (make the effort - it’s perhaps the funniest sketch of all time).
Enjoy people. Have a fantastic Christmas and New Year. I saw a flier for a New Year’s party in a bar in town that said simply - DJ playing Bowie, Belle & Sebastian and others.
Walls of Brie and David Bowie....forget the South Island!
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SamandLaura
Sam and Laura
It is true about the wall of brie!!
It's Laura back from the hair dressers. Happy Christmas everyone, have a great few weeks. We love and miss you all xxxx