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Published: August 22nd 2005
Greetings from Wellington, New Zealand, the capital city. We've had a busy few days travelling through the north island. We flew from Sydney to Auckland, NZ on Saturday and immediately rented a car to drive south to Rotorua.
Don't tell anyone, but I was doing 100, 110 even.... of course, that's k/hr so, not all that quick. The drive that first evening was a bit hairy, hard getting used to driving on the left side (I'd done it once before), shifting with my left hand, and using the turn signal when I meant to use the windshield wipers (and vice versa). But with the help of Sherry's navigating skills and in total, four very alert eyeballs, we made it.
We spent 2 nights at the 'Funky Green Voyager' hostel in Rotorua. I'm not sure where the name came from, but it was a pretty nice hostel and we had our own bathroom w/ a heat lamp in it... very key b/c it's pretty darn chilly here. Sherry is salivating about the prospect of a NZ wool scarf/glove set!
Saw great volcanic 'stuff' around Rotorua and we also took a dip in thermal pools. Very nice stuff. The volcanic
highlights included mud pools, big thermal pools, vents, steam, 'terraces' built up from the mineral deposits, you know, just run of the mill stuff.
The entire town of Rotorua pretty much smells like sulfur, but you get used to it.
Other highlights:
* Seen a lot of animals (hence today's headline). There are a lot of sheep and cows here in NZ. Today we even saw a dead sheep. I'm not kidding. I was just looking out the window and I saw one on its side. I'm pretty sure that it was dead because: a) it was laying (lying?) on its side and b) all 4 of its legs were sticking straight out. It was like it died on its feet, rigamortis kicked in, and then the wind blew it over!
* Father's Day is coming up. That's right, it's a different date over here in Aus/NZ. There's a big ad campaign on the radio (no we didn't bring any cds with us and YES we were driving today for 8.5 hours and YES there are a lot of commercials on NZ radio). Anyway, the gov't is pitching customized license plates as a Dad's Day gift. Thought
that was kind of interesting.
* Sherry didn't take a turn on the wheel this time around, but perhaps there'll be another rental in our future. Our trusy Civic (160,000 kmm and still going) served us well and Sherry is a very, very good map reader and navigator. We hit Wellington just during eve. rush hour and it was gnarly, but she was able to juggle 4 maps (including one out of date Lonely Planet guide) to get us here.
* Glow Worms. Look it up online, the name of the place is Waitomo. It's a cave tour (walk/boat) and there's these glow worms that live on the roof of the caves. They glow, just like little green LED lights. They hang a 10 inch sticky 'fishing line'/web down to catch and eat other insects (including their own kind). Anyway, kinda cool, and also keeps w/ today's headline.
* Traveler's budget was completely blown in Australia. Only 5 days thankfully, but we were more than 200%!o(MISSING)f our anticipated spending....
Tomorrow we set sail for the south island of NZ. It's going to be spectactular. We saw a pretty massive volcanic snow covered peak today, but we expect the
Dinner Time!
We cooked our own dinner at the Funky Green Voyager hostel in Rotorua: leftover Indian food, cheese and crackers, and some red wine.s. island to provide even more scenery. We take a ferry, then a train to Christchurch.
We're getting picked up by Frank and Pam Thomas, good family friends of the Eichers. Looking forward to seeing them and spending some time in and around Christchurch and the south island.
Out,
-Cory
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fav aunt
non-member comment
wants to be there
wow those were not cheap gloves and hat.. the thermal pool sounds good.. by the way done the driving thing myself not easy.. wish i was there luv ya fav aunt jackie