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Published: January 20th 2008
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Alright people,
AUCKLAND
As karen told you, the Killers were on our flight to Auckland so that was quite a cool way to start our Kiwi adventure.
Our first stop was Auckland which is New Zealands biggest city,we both thought it was ok but not great, the only good part was we went to a small island thats just across from Auckland called Russel and i had my first pint of Guiness for three months in a cool scottish pub, I even had a packet of scampi Fries. On our last day in Auckland we found some really cool shops at the top of the city that sold really nice clothes from local designers.
BAY of ISLANDS and CAPE RIENGA
We left Auckland and headed south to the bay of islands which as the name suggests is a bay full of islands, 145 to be exact.
me and karen rented some Kayaks and went exploring the islands, we just sailed up to a few of the islands, hopped of our Kayaks and went for a walk. At one point we got stuck in some shallow water which was covered in trees and the more we tried to make
the kayak go a certain direction it went the exact opposite, it was well funny.
The next day we booked up to go swimming with dolphins, after about 4 hours out at sea we still had not seen any dolphins and me and karen were well pissed off. We did see a whale which was quite cool and we got to see an albatross bird which we were told is pretty rare. After that we went up to Cape Rienga which is the very top of New Zealand and it was just amazing, the main highlights of the day was a visit to 90 mile beach which is actually the most amazing golden beach which goes on for ninety miles(funny that) and my favourite was the sand boarding, We went to these huge sand dunes and we all got a boogie board each and got to slide down these dunes face first on these boards, you reached more than fifty miles an hour.
Our last day me karen and our two friends from Canada chartered a small fishing boat and went deep sea fishing for the day, soon as the boat left the harbour i was violently sea sick and
stayed that way the whole trip, Karen caught 6 huge Red Snapper and the two canadians caught loads as well and big b caught sweet FA but the captain said with me being sick over the side it brought all the fish round the boat so in a way i contributed in my own special way to catching the fish, the captain filleted the fish for us and we took them back to the hostel and cooked up a feast.
MERCURY BAY and ROTORUA
In Mercury bay we went to a place called Cathedral Cove and its one of the most beautiful places i have ever been, the pressure of the sea over thousands of years have made a huge hole in a cliif face and when you walk through you end up at the most amazing secluded beach. After that we headed to Rotorua which is the geothermal and cultural centre of New Zealand.
We all got to go to a Maori Hangi which is a sort of ancient ritual of the maoris. When other tribes would come into there village they would have to find out if they had come to fight or had come in
peace so the warriors of the tribe would go and confront the visiting tribe and do the haka in front of them and then lay down a piece offering and if the visiting tribe pick up the offering then they come in peace and are then invited into the village for a feast, if they dont then all hell breaks loose. I was nominated as chief of my tribe and had to lead my tribe to this village, then these warriors came down to try and intimidate me but it didnt work(Im from the east end of Glasgow) they then laid down this peace offering which i picked up then me and my tribe went got invited into there village for some awesome Grub.
WAITOMO , RIVER VALLEY and WELLINGTON
At Waitomo i got to explore the black water caves, At first we absieled about 50 metres down into the caves and then for the next 5 hours we got to explore underground walkways and climbed up some waterfalls and when you turned off the lights in your helmet you could see millions of glow worms.
River Valley was a really nice lodge in the middle of the
country and the group got to go white river rafting but me and Karen and a few others just chilled out for a few days and swam in the river that ran through the valley. our last stop on the North Island was Wellington, this was quite a cool city and me and Karen took the gondola to the top of the city and strolled through the Botanical Gardens. All through New Zealand we had been staying in Base Hostels and if you stayed in them for six nights you got your seventh night free, wellington was our free night and the room we got was amazing. It had great wiews of the city and our own private terrace, it was absolute bliss.
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nicky
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hi
hi u 2,happy new year,just read your blog,looks amazing,keep safe n xx