New Zealand

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hello everyone.

We havent done a blog yet for New Zealand, time is just flying by! We are now in the south island at Greymouth. Its on the west coast between the southern alps and the Tasman Sea. The scenery is beautiful, its full of national parks and unspoilt landscapes.

But lets start back in Auckland. We werent there for long, only a couple of nights. We had a stroll around the marina, found an Irish pub that did roast dinners and showed the football and settled in for the sunday afternoon. We are due back there at the end of our trip for 4 nights. We got the magic bus ( not something out of Harry Potter) and travelled to Rotorua. Rotorua is situated on geothermal activity. This means the natural phenomenons are amazing with steam rising out of drains and pools of water up to 120C. We went to Hells Gate and saw some sulphur pools and Geysers. We even had a mud bath and soaked in a sulphur pool which apparently is good for the skin. The only trouble was it stunk of rotten eggs. It was in the water too so our hair and clothes stunk for days.

We also went to a Maori evening. That was good fun! They put on traditional costume and danced and sang. They even did the Haka which was scary. We also went hobbit hunting at Matamata, also known as Hobbiton. We found 17 hobbit holes including Bag End and the party tree. We also met ben a cross between Maori and Orc. He was in the film so we got a bit of behind the scenes gossip. We also saw the production crew marking out the new plots for the hobbit movie. I also got to hand feed a lamb, which was cute, we had pork for dinner that night. lol. Andy found a new hobby, pool. He has played it at all opportunities since Rotorua and is getting a lot better.

We only spent 1 night in Taupo, got there late. It had a big lake the size of Singapore and not a lot else.

We then went to Wellington for a few nights and were straight back on the hobbit hunt. We met an elf this time who took us round film locations like Rivendell and Helms Deep. We could have tried on elf ears but resisted. We saw loads of props from the filming at weta caves, which is where they make the creatures and do all the special effects. We also saw Peter Jacksons house. We then spent the nxt day at Te Papa Museum. There were 6 floors and had exhibits including Pompeii, an eartyhquake reenactment house and 2 simulators. Andy loved it there was a free pool table in the bar next door and we got a free meal each night. bonus.

Then up at 6am for a ferry across to Nelson the day after a tsunami warning. Luckily the wave missed us and we only got 30cm waves at wellington. The ferry was great we got loads of photos which will be on facebook in the next wk or so. We went through the Marlborough sound and it was pretty. We had to pay for our own breakfast though which was a bummer.

We only stayed one night in Nelson, again not a lot to do unless you want to go on a 6hr hike and thats not really for us. We then ventured onto greymouth where we are now. We had a lovely roast dinner tonight and staying in a room with a cat theme. We are off to Franz Josef glacier for a few nights next and then Wanaka followed by queenstown.

Talk to you more then.

Andy and Caroline xx

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