TravelStream™ news feed for member lynnetempleton on TravelPod's free travel blogs service http://www.travelpod.com/syndication/rss/lynnetempleton en-us Copyright ©2009 TravelPod.com Sat, 15 Jul 2006 13:11:33 -0400 http://www.travelpod.com http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1149388200/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1149388200/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1149388200/tpod.html Sat, 15 Jul 2006 13:11:33 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Airlie Beach, Australia

I'm really on a mission to try and get up to date! Photos are now on the previous entry - sorry for the slight delay but our photo hosting website went down half way through adding them. Anyway it's all sorted now.Following a pretty uncomfortable day at Australia Zoo I decided the best thing to do would be to get myself to the doctors as soon as possible. We asked at reception if there was a 7 day medical centre nearby (it was Saturday I was pretty worried I'd have to endure another few days before I could get an appointment somewhere) and luckily there was one in Noosa Junction. By the time we found it it was after 4pm so it seemed unlikely I'd get seen that day. Instead, we walked in to find the waiting room empty and I was able to see the doctor almost straight away. That doesn't happen often in England on a Saturday afternoon! We did find out it was going to cost me $100 just for the consultation but after a week of agony I'd have paid just about anything.After a couple of minutes of waiting, Dr White came out and called me in. I followed him into his office and told him my symptoms, how long I had had them, that I assumed it was a UTI and that I had taken some Ural in the hope it would get better by itself but it was now worse. I then realised that after talking for about 5 minutes he still hadn't said a word. He then walked over to the cupboard, got out a urine sample jar and proceeded to silently bowl it (over-arm) toward me. Thankfully I managed to catch it and trotted off to the toilet. I hate giving urine samples. It feels so undignified. Still it confirmed I had a kidney infection and the bright blue pH test emphasised just how much of that bloody Ural alkaliniser I'd managed to drink. He gave me a prescription for antibiotics and told me they were 95% effective, so 1 in 20 found they needed to try a different type of antibiotic. If I wasn't feeling a lot better in two days I should come back. Two days! What bliss - I could be back to normal in just 48 beautiful hours.Or not. The next day I woke up to find that, if anything, I felt worse. We'd hoped to drive up the coast having lost a lot of time already, but there was no chance I was going to be 4 wheel driving on Fraser Island in this much pain. We were going to have to give up doing the 3 day trip and do a day trip from here in Noosa (most trips leave from Hervey Bay). It was a bit disappointing but what could we do? Take any 7 month period in two people's lives and chances are one of you will get ill. The day trip would still be great.I gave it the full two days to make sure I wasn't getting better and on the Monday we went back to the surgery to see Dr White. It was quite a bit busier this time so we made an appointment for the afternoon and went to a nearby internet cafe to research the trips to Fraser Island and the Whitsundays so that we could book it the moment I started to get better. When my appointment time finally arrived, I went back to see Dr White who was slightly chattier this time but still rather strange. He prescribed me another antibiotic which this time was 98% effective. Hopefully I wasn't going to be one of those 1 in 50 unfortunates but, just in case, I was bowled another sample jar to send off to the lab for tests. Dan had suggested as a joke that once I'd finished I should bowl the sample back to him. I must say I was tempted but my kidneys and future happiness was relying on him and after almost 2 weeks of feeling like I desperately needed the toilet I wasn't going to take any risks! Besides, the last thing someone with a sore bladder needs is to get the giggles...We went to the chemist and paid a fortune for my miracle pills. These tablets were significantly more expensive - no standard NHS charge here sadly - which is why they try the other first, but by now I was past caring about the cost. The chemist came out to give me the prescription and rolled off the rather long list of things I needed to avoid while taking it which included alcohol, dairy products, iron and any kind of sunlight. Sounds like it could be fun.The next day I woke up feeling a lot better but hadn't yet felt the relief the doctor had promised me so I didn't count my chickens. I spent the day resting, taking tablets (never before have I so looked forward to taking some pills) and drank 3 litres of cranberry juice which I assure you takes quite a lot of effort. That night I had the first undisturbed night's sleep for almost a fortnight and woke up feeling a lot better. What blessed relief! We wasted no time and booked our day trip to Fraser Island for the next day, wincing slightly at the 5.50am pick up time. Then, after some lunch, we set off on our first proper outing for days and started to head toward the Big Pineapple. We got about half way before we realised we'd forgotten both our cameras and turned around to come back again. Oh well, it was still more exciting than anything else I'd done recently! We got back, decided on what Whitsundays trip we wanted to do and went ahead and booked that as well.We didn't manage to get to sleep that night until 1.30am which made our 4.30am alarm absolutely delightful. Our driver Chris met us walking through the caravan park and addressed us as Mr and Mrs Templeton, which amused me no end. Dan wasn't impressed but so many people seem to have problem pronouncing Dewey that I've given up trying to spell it out over the phone to people who spell it however they like anyway.We drove out of Noosa on what looked and felt like a dirt track through a rainforest. The journey was fairly dull but we did see some kangaroos in the wild which was nice after we'd been so close to them a few days ago. We got to Rainbow Beach almost 3 hours later and drove onto the barge to take us over to the island. It only took about 10 minutes and then we were off and driving up Seventy Five Mile Beach on the wonderful Fraser Island.That day wasn't only the first day of Australia's winter but was also the first day of the company's new itinerary which included more of the island for the same money. I was quite chuffed as I hadn't known this before then and was disappointed to miss out on so much the island had to offer. The only downside was that the day would be long and hectic but it wasn't too much to put up with to see a bit more of Fraser Island.We drove on Seventy Five Mile Beach for quite a while, a novelty that had been spoilt somewhat by having already driven on Ninety Mile Beach (which ironically is shorter than Seventy Mile Beach) in New Zealand. Fraser Island quickly nosed in front when we found ourselves driving alongside a dingo, trotting happily up the beach. Dingos are mainly nocturnal, or at least more active once it gets dark, so I didn't think we had any hope of seeing one. The dingo was called Bluey on account of his blue identification tag in his ear (they don't like to complicate things too much here!) and ran at quite a pace so Chris had to keep speeding up to keep up with him. We also got to see some dolphins frolicking around in the sea just off the beach and only a matter of metres from our bus, not to mention billions of different birds of prey.After some tea at a beach resort we drove down a boneshaker of a road to Lake McKenzie, the jewel of our trip. The sand there is made up of something like 97% silica making it bright white and the water a beautiful crystal blue. We only had half an hour here which I was disappointed with as we could have stayed so much longer. I was still pleased to be there for any length of time though, particularly as it was almost deserted (thanks to it being off season) and a lot of tour companies avoid it in preference to other lakes on the island that are less crowded.We had a little paddle in the very "fresh" water, which was enough to make Dan chicken out of swimming in it for fear of certain parts of his anatomy retreating inside his body never to be seen again. I was braver and after a superman style change I gingerly got into the water. It might have been freezing (is there a word for colder than freezing?!) but there was no chance I was going to miss out on the opportunity to swim in one of the most beautiful lakes in the world. The water actually warmed quite quickly and I doggy-paddled my way through paradise. I had the lake almost to myself until one chap got in a few metres away and found it so cold that it aggravated his asthma and he started to have an attack. He waved to his friends for help but for a while they thought he was just joking and I prepared myself for my best Pamela Anderson impression (as a Baywatch lifeguard, rather than getting my boobs out which frankly wasn't going to help anyone). They helped him out eventually and I felt sorry for him having to sit on the beach while his friends had fun without him.We then made our way to Central Station and took A Short Walk Through A Rainforest(tm) to look at the ancient trees and giant ferns. I was glad that Chris told us <i>afterward that there were so many poisonous spiders in the forest that there was one for every square metre! They're nocturnal and live underground in holes so chances of seeing one in the day are next to nothing, but that still wouldn't have consoled me much. The walk was nice and the highlight was one of the girls screaming bloody murder when a leaf landed on her shoulder and made her think it was some kind of gigantic bug. I was just glad it wasn't me for a change!After a buffet lunch we drove north to the Maheno Shipwreck, a rusty ship half buried standing upright in the sand. It was massive and quite impressive but there were a lot of people there which stopped us getting the perfect photo. We then drove further north and visited the multi-coloured cliffs at Coloured Sands before driving back down to Eli Creek. We played with the sand and watched some kids make a sandcastle while people paid to go on a scenic flight around the island. I'd have loved to have done it but it was too expensive, even if it was only $60. I regretted not splashing out a bit afterwards though as it sounded brilliant.We drove back down the beach to the barge and Dan and a few others spotted a turtle in the sea. I'm sure they were just imagining things as I was damned if I could see it and had to console myself with a few more dolphins. The rest of the journey back to Noosa was pretty uneventful and very boring, save the odd swerve from the new grumpy driver who'd taken over from Chris who had used up all his legal driving hours. We got back to the cabin just before 8pm and collapsed in front of the TV, happy but exhausted.The next morning we were up bright and early to pack our stuff and say goodbye to the place that had been the closest thing to home over past four months. Before we left, I gave the medical centre a call to get my test results which confirmed the kidney infection and found it was immune to the first antibiotics but "sensitive" to the second lot so they should do the trick. I'd paid $45 to find out what I already knew, but it was good to have it confirmed nonetheless.We left Noosa at 10am and set off on a mammoth 1000km journey (which is roughly 621.371192 miles) up the Bruce Highway to Airlie Beach. We'd originally planned on going to see the Big Pineapple but as the current journey was going to take almost 12 hours we decided to skip the hour detour. Such was our delight, then, when after an hour up the highway we passed what looked a hell of a lot like a large pineapple on the roof of an old garage! After checking it wasn't a mirage, we parked the car and walked over to get pictures of what we like to call The Medium Pineapple. Beauty.We got straight back on the road and pressed on. At 3.30pm we stopped briefly to get shots of The Big Crab (sadly Shep didn't fit between the pincers for the maximum humour shot) and then stopped in Rockville which we had pinpointed at roughly half way. We got some petrol and a Subway which we ate sat in the car parked in the shade. You know you're having a bad day when the highlight of it is devising a plan how to sneak into KFC to use their toilets without having to buy anything.The rest of the journey was a counting game as we watched the kilometres on the signs slowly decrease as we neared Airlie Beach. At 8.30pm we had a brief stop for some coffee and then drove the final hour to our next cabin in Airlie. The entire journey was just over 1002km and took around 11 1/2 hours. The longest and most boring day of my life but surely worth every minute for the Whitsunday trip in just a few days.So that's another week updated for you. Did anyone actually make it all the way to the end?! I'm never sure how a fairly uneventful week can still be this long but I've never been one to be economical with my words!There will probably be a break before I manage to next update so you've got a while to digest the last 3 and take a look back over the photos. I'll get onto attaching some to this entry so that you can at least enjoy the picture book if nothing else!Hope you're all well and keeping busy until I make it back and light up your lives once again! Keep in touch, all of you.x
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1151371800/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1151371800/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1151371800/tpod.html Sat, 15 Jul 2006 10:25:18 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Noosa, Australia

Updating twice in a week - must be something wrong with me! There are now photos on the last entry although not many. Hopefully there'll be more to add to this post!We didn't get much sleep the first night in Brisbane thanks to some Friday night partying and some guy running up and down the corridor at 2.30am shouting, "everybody wake up!" which probably seemed hilarious at the time. Not as hilarious as I found it when I did it at 7am the next morning to get my revenge... OK I didn't really, but I should have.We spent a few days exploring Brisbane (but not nearly as much as we should have done) and doing more complaining to Trailfinders when we found our plane tickets to and from Kenya and Tanzania weren't with the rest of our tickets. We got more appalling treatment from the Brisbane branch so I wrote to our travel agent in London (who surely rues the day he ever laid eyes on us) to let them know how awfully their overseas offices handle their customers. We got a very apologetic response with offers and solutions to our ticket problem. I then found the tickets in the one place I hadn't looked. Whoops. I didn't tell them that though of course. Far too big a coward!!I'm really sad now that we didn't spend more time in Brisbane as it looked a really lovely city. We were pretty road weary and needed a break from doing things for a while so missed out on all the city had to offer. We did find a cheap internet cafe though, explained mainly by the strange people there including a man walking around with a bird on his shoulder who did more typing on the computer than he did. Surreal yet strangely intriguing.The last night of our stay in Brisbane I started to be in quite a bit of pain and knew instantly that I was enjoying the start of some kind of water infection. The next morning it was significantly worse and made our journey to Noosa incredibly uncomfortable. We stopped at a very American mall to get some lunch and went to the chemist in the hope I could get something over the counter so I could avoid paying the extortionate doctor fees. I figured the best approach was to come straight out with the problem, which was enough reason for Dan to hang back and stay away from the embarassment of saying words like "pee" to a stranger. The lady behind the counter took me over to the medicine they had and Dan wandered over, startling the poor woman who was obviously wondering what kind of pervert wants to watch some women choose a urine alkaliniser. We got some Ural and I wasn't convinced it would work as that wasn't really the problem but she sounded like she knew what she was talking about so I figured it was worth a try. We got back in the car, armed with some water and my dissolvable sachets and I spent the next hour trying to drink the foul stuff without gagging. Seemed to entertain Dan which is something I suppose!We arrived in Noosa an hour or so later and checked into our cabin for the next few nights. It was a really pretty park with lovely gardens full of rainbow lorikeets (brightly coloured birds a little bit like parrots) and galahs, prompting spontaneous shouts of "flaming galah!" in Alf Stewart's voice whenever we saw one. We spent a day or so relaxing and sorting our visas out for Kenya and finding that the Ural wasn't doing me much good, pretty much tying me to the cabin as it was too painful to move around. I felt guilty for wasting the days after doing so little in Brisbane so one morning we decided to head out and see a little of Noosa and its national park. First stop was the Big Shell which we didn't even know existed until we'd arrived in Noosa and saw the signs on the way to the cabin. Maybe all the other Big Things were unbelievably impressive therefore making everything else pale in comparison but I must say that we were both rather underwhelmed. The papermache shell was more medium sized than big but I guess that's not quite as catchy. We still wanted to take some photos but in the end didn't stop the car to get them, embarassed someone might see us and realise we'd driven there especially for that!We drove up the hill to the lookout over Noosa National Park and got out to have a look at the view of the town and its golden beaches. It's another one of those times when you know you'll never be able to capture it in a photo but you still give it a try. We didn't stay too long as we seemed to be interrupting a couple getting intimate and didn't want to intrude.With the infection getting worse every day and my reluctance to go to the doctors (in hindsight I wish I'd gone a lot sooner), we spent several days in or very near to our cabin and watching a lot of crap daytime TV. We also treated ourselves to some 3D glasses for the special episode of Medium, making sure all the curtains were closed before we put them on. There are just some things you don't want your neighbours to see.Fed up of being inside all the time (even if the weather was crap anyway and it poured down with rain and hail the size of golf balls) I decided to put up with the pain and discomfort and take a trip to the nearby Australia Zoo. Originally we were going to drive via the Big Pineapple but we decided it would be too much excitement for one day and skipped the 45 minute detour and went straight to the zoo. Before we even got to the entrance to pay, we were greeted by a huge camel and the chance to say hello was too good to miss. I rode one when I went to Egypt but Dan had never been this close so we had a good stroke before heading into the zoo. I think Dan was surprised how soft it was where I was just glad it didn't have as many fleas as the ones in Egypt!Inside the zoo we had a stroke of some kind of lizard thing (reptiles have never been my strong point) and headed toward the "crocoseum" to see the show starting in half an hour. We walked past the famous crocodiles and stopped to look at the huge Galapagus Tortoise called Harriet. She's the grand age of 176 years old and was once owned by Charles Darwin in the 1850s. We spent 20 minutes watching her munch on her carrots and hibiscus plants (probably wasn't hibiscus at all but horticulture was never my strong point either) and watched her rather inadequate legs try to hoof her around. I've always wanted a tortoise but should I ever get one I might give the galapagus ones a miss. 200 odd years is a bit too much of a commitment.The shows in the crocoseum were good fun and we got to see some snakes, the finale of which was one of the keepers bashing one to death with a pipe much to the horror of the crowd until they realised the snake was of the rubber variety. Next up were the tigers who were absolutely beautiful and cheekily playful. It's so sad to hear how endangered they are, with only 5 of the original 8 species of tigers left. The next show was "Birds Live" where we got up close with all sorts of native birds and a couple of macaws who refused to fly to where they were supposed to. Amusing. Lastly the crocs came on and did their thing, jumping and snapping for food held by the rather brave keepers. No Steve Irwin sadly (he owns and runs the zoo with his wife) but the guy was still good and got the crocodile to jump within centimetres of his hands. Rather him than me. The shows were fun and had the crowds up pretending to be gorillas and seeing which side of the audience could shout 'Crikey!' (Steve Irwins's catchphrase) the loudest. We left after about an hour and a half and walked to get some lunch via the ridiculously large reticulated python. I tried to go on a wombat encounter (I've been desperate to touch one ever since we've been in Australia) but missed the deadline by five minutes so missed out.I was feeling pretty sore but didn't want to leave the animal goodness and carried onto the kangaroo enclosure to cop a feel. The last time we'd been in a kangaroo enclosure I chickened out of touching one as we didn't have any food for them and I was worried it would beat me to death for being too rude to bring them something to nibble on. I was much braver this time, finding a kanagaroo half asleep and far too comfortable to bother killing me. It was so soft and friendly, lying peacefully while Dan and I got the necessary photographic proof kneeling next to it.We carried on through the other side of the enclosure and over to the elephants in time for the feeding. I'd expected there to be a huge queue of people lining up for the pleasure but there weren't many at all and I got to line up three times until the sweet potatoes we were feeding them ran out. The experience was quite rushed but it was still lovely to be able to feel the ellies even if we did come out with elephant saliva all over our hands that put dogs breath into perspective.We watched the tigers in their enclosure playing with the keepers and diving into their pool for a swim. I'd love to have touched one of them as well but I'd rather stay in one piece so I restrained myself! Instead we headed to the koalas for another feel and sat at a picnic table so I could drink some more Ural in case it helped. We realised the tree next to us had a sign saying "there is a koala in this tree, can you see it?" and on closer inspection we saw there were actually two. One of them woke up and climbed down the tree, sitting almost on top of the sign and suddenly the challenge wasn't quite the same. It was nice being so close to them without a keeper holding onto them but it did get slightly frightening when one ran across the enclosure toward us and looked at one point like he was going to climb Dan like a tree. Talk about Close Encounters!We walked through the red kangaroo section and had another stroke (these ones were even softer than the others) and then walked through the aviary which was wonderfully peaceful and quiet. The zoo was quite empty by now which was really nice as it felt like we had the place to ourselves. The birds were gorgeous (have to be careful I don't become a bird spotter) and will no doubt make our sparrows and robins look rather plain once we get home. On the way out of the zoo we came across the keepers taking a wombat for a walk and after I took a few pictures I was delighted when they invited me to have a stroke. I'd have been gutted if I'd paid for the wombat encounter and then found out I could have touched one for free! The keepers told me to kneel down behind him so I didn't approach him from his front and he made it impossible by walking around in circles trying to find the perfect bit of grass to munch on. I got him to settle down in the end though and spent a good ten minutes chatting to the keepers while I played with him. He felt quite rough, a bit like a dog but slightly coarser like a pig. Very cute and podgy though. The keepers were great and chatted to us for ages before we thought we'd better leave before the zoo shut.After the 2000th toilet trip of the day, we got back in the car and drove back to our cabin. If I feel as bad tomorrow as I did today then a visit to the doctor is definitely on the cards. Can't stand it anymore! Not much else I can do in the mean time - just have to wait and see.What a cliff hanger to end on, eh! Who needs Eastenders or Neighbours when you've got these updates to read?!That's all for this update, but hopefully I'll be able to do the next one very soon. Possibly even now! You really are lucky people.xEdited to add: Website's back up so photos are now added :)
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1150745400/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1150745400/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1150745400/tpod.html Fri, 14 Jul 2006 07:09:07 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Brisbane, Australia

So it turns out some of you DO read this after all! I get emails moaning about the length of my entries whenever I post and then when I go quiet for a while I get emails nagging me about taking so long to update! Ahhh I never knew you cared! Anyway I'll try really hard to get up to date again. The thought of you all sitting there in silence twiddling your thumbs is too heartbreaking to bear.I last left you in Port Macquarie with yet more animal stories - plenty more of them over the coming weeks I'm afraid! Anyway, we left early the next morning and headed up Highway 1 to Coffs Harbour. We'd originally planned on doing a 4 hour walk (seriously!) but it was incredibly hot and we decided it would be too uncomfortable. Any excuse. Instead, I directed Dan off the Pacific Highway and onto Waterfall Way, driving up to a lookout point over Dorrigo National Park. The views were lovely and we sat on a bench enjoying the sunshine and spotting wild kookaburras (Bill Oddie eat your heart out) in the trees. We were joined by a group of pensioners who made a nuisance of themselves and tortured our starving stomachs with their sandwiches. They asked me to take a photo of them as they "like to get pictures of ourselves in picnic situations" (?!) and after 10 minutes of arranging themselves and making people move their cars out of the way, I was finally allowed to take the photo. Obviously it wasn't good enough though as they spent the next hour taking more pictures of themselves holding sandwiches from every angle possible.Hunger eventually got the better of us so we drove to Dorrigo and had a jacket potato from a health food cafe. It came out with lashings of butter, cheese, chicken and sweet chilli sour cream. I'd like to have seen the unhealthy version! We ate them out on the pavement tables amidst a sudden influx of Hells Angels who appeared out of no where, which is not easy to do in a town where you can see for miles.We jumped back in the car, which Dan had accidently parked bonnet first toward the pavement. This is actually illegal here so when I say we jumped in, I mean it. We drove off like a modern day Bonnie and Clyde and drove out of town to the Dangar Falls. Took a while to find it but it was worth it once I'd elbowed the old people out of the prime viewing position. It was a really pretty creek cascading into a waterhole that the locals swim in during the summer. Very picturesque and worth the million photographs.We got to Coffs Harbour just after dark and checked into the Aussitel hostel. We spent some time online and then went into town to do some shopping. Wasn't a very eventful night as we had a barney and went to sulk in the room. Doesn't work so well when you share a room. Just so you know: when you spend every hour of every day with someone, arguments are going to happen from time to time! Still, we'd patched it up by the morning and headed out to the supermarket to get some picnic supplies. We went to prepare them at the hostel and found a cockroach the size of a small dog in the bedroom. Unfortunately it was only the first of 5 more we had the pleasure of meeting at Aussitel - horrible! It sounds like we're lucky not to have met more along the way though so can't complain too much. I'm not the complaining type anyway though, obviously.We drove for about half an hour up a hill and through some banana plantations which have suffered pretty badly around here (mainly further up the coast) after the cyclones earlier in the year. It was good to see they were recovering, although quite a few of the farms were up for sale. We stopped at the top of the cliff at Sealy Lookout which gave a lovely view over Coffs Harbour and took our picnic down to the tables in the woods. We moved quickly from the first table after interrupting an ant party and only lasted ten minutes at the second after a spider was found making headway for my flip flops. So we retreated back to the car and ate the picnic in there and found it had a better view anyway. It did get interrupted by a car parking right in front of the lookout point, obscuring everyone's view, where the lady got out with her dog who pooed in the middle of the viewing area and then got back in the car and drove off. Charming. Oh yeah, then it rained. The perfect picnic.We left early the next morning after spending the night apologising to the cockroaches for taking up too much room in the bed. We left behind one type of giant creature and quickly swapped it for another, stopping at the petrol station for pictures of the Giant Prawn hanging about next door. Australia seems to have a thing about concrete Big Things and we consider it our duty to get as many cheesy photos of them as possible, including comedy ones involving Shep The Dog. We thought we were fairly unique in our quest to get photos of a random toy in random locations but actually it's more common than you think. Frightening, really. Anyway you used to be able to climb up into the eyes of the Giant Prawn and lookout over Coffs Harbour but it was recently shut. Dan and I left, devastated.It rained all the way to Ballina, stopping us from doing any of our usual deviations along the way. We stayed in another caravan park (homage to Home And Away) which was about half an hour from Byron Bay. We were graced with three solid days of serious rain which stopped us really going out. We spent most of the time watching daytime TV including the American version of Wife Swap where a religious fanatic swapped her family for a week with one that lives their life by astrology. Really it was quite frightening to watch and the woman went insane, declaring that everyone she met was the Devil. She refused the $40,000 money (the climax of the show is the families receiving this money which is aplit up and allocated by the wife of the other family) until she found out the other woman had designated $20,000 of it for the weight loss surgery she'd wanted. Then she decided the woman wasn't the devil after all. Hmm. Good to see she has principles.Ballina was a pleasant enough town and provided the essentials - food, booze and bad tv - so we were happy. We did spent one afternoon finding some weighing scales to make sure we would fit in the airplane seat on the way home and were happy to see we'd both lost a bit of weight. More luck than judgement to be honest, although we had been eating fairly healthily during the past few weeks. Mind you, I already told you what Australia's version of healthy eating is so we couldn't take anything for granted! Plus, it won't last and we both know it.Nothing else very exciting happened in Ballina other than us trying to buy a cooling bag with our shopping and the checkout assistant assumed we already owned it and didn't charge us for it. Dan was thrilled at his new found criminal lifestyle despite it only saving us $2.50 and him still making sure I was the one holding it on the way out of the shop in case we were busted. What a gent.The sun waited until it knew we were leaving before making an appearance. We waved goodbye to Ballina and drove north through Byron Bay. We shot past it to begin with but turned back, meaning we have to drive several times through a stinky area which later turned out to be a chicken slaughterhouse. Nice. We stopped in Byron for a picnic by the beach and it chose that moment to rain again. We ate our lunch in the car overlooking the sea and were surrounded by people doing the same. One campercan had a speaker on the roof and was blasting out some tunes, ruining Nature's attempts to spoil our moment.On the way back out of Byron (and back toward the chickens...) we stopped quickly to use the toilets. This turned out to be a half hour stop due to my fascination with the graffiti which seemed to be a debate by passing (pun intended) travellers over world peace and the evils of power. Only in Byron Bay, hippy capital of the world, could you read this kind of stuff scrawled over toilet walls. Still, the usual level of toilet graffiti was upheld by the exit where a sign stating "More toilets by the pool" was altered to "More toilets by the poo". At least there had been one other person in those loos on my intellectual level. Got to give it to them though - it might have been a crude alteration but it was still accurate. I managed to eventually tear myself away from the artwork after realising that hanging around the toilets with a video camera probably wasn't the best idea.We left New South Wales behind and welcomed ourselves to Queensland and Surfers Paradise. The only thing I'd known about Surfers Paradise beforehand was its reputation of a few of the residents' and visitors' enjoyment of the herbal lifestyle. I left not knowing much more as I took an almost immediate disliking to the place. The endless high rises, hotels and holiday apartments seemed to me to be the extent of the city. No personality or charm, just casinos, strip joints and fast food joints dotted along the highways. I've since heard it described as the Benidorm of Australia and it sums it up pretty well. The hostel was also horrible and had Dan not stopped me, I'd have done a runner and spent the night in the car.We'd initially planned on staying in Surfers Paradise for a few days but quickly changed our mind and left the next day. We drove the relatively short distance to Brisbane and thanks to our terrible atlas and slightly better [but road selective and out of date] local map in the Lonely Planet, we got terribly lost and had to go round in circles a few times until we got our bearings. Twenty minutes later we pulled up at the hostel and were relieved to see it looked a million times better than the last one. Frankly, Alcatraz would have been favourable in comparison. We were there just before lunch and our room wasn't quite ready so we hung around the reception looking at leaflets and giving them our details. Just as we were about to move on, the girl at reception told me I had "absolutely beautiful eyes"! I was really surprised, particularly as I was just thinking how rough I must look with greasy hair (if you think I was hanging around to shower in that last hell-hole, you're mistaken!) and spots on top of spots. To say I was chuffed was an understatement and to Dan's great amusement I turned bright red. Dan compared me to the colour of Ayers Rock and that was enough to entertain him for the rest of the day. I didn't care though as I walked around for the whole day with a smile on my face. A silly little compliment from a stranger may not seem much but it means more than you may think. Next time I think something nice about someone I shall tell them, although perhaps it might be a good idea to choose the right moment. Following them into the toilet, for example, probably wouldn't give the right first impression.Half an hour later we headed to the room to check it out. Ok, so it was nothing flashy but it had a tv and a fridge and its own en suite so we were pleased. The TV had no remote and the channel buttons had been ripped out (got to love those classy backpackers!) but after a consultation with the experts at reception we devised a way of changing channel using a Blue Peter remote involving a lollipop stick and some cardboard. We ate some leftover food in front of the TV, getting up every half hour to change channels. It was a bit of a pain but I didn't care because, for today, I was the girl with the absolutely beautiful eyes and that's all that mattered.Will the travellers good mood and opinion of Brisbane continue? Will the lollipop stick hold up and continue to change the channels? Will Dan ever stop laughing at his own jokes? To find out, tune into the next installment of this exciting blog! Once it gets written, anyway.I'd write next week's now but I'm going to pass in the hope that I may get feeling back into my buttocks by the end of the evening. Hope you enjoyed this week and are busting to email me with all of your latest news. I promise to do next week's and attach photos to them both as soon as I can which should hopefully within the next few days. In the mean time, take care and keep smiling.x
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146347100/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146347100/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146347100/tpod.html Tue, 13 Jun 2006 05:54:15 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Sydney, Australia

G'day!Me again! Still desperately behind so I'm going to try and catch up as much as possible over the next day or so. I can't believe I haven't even started writing about Australia yet and we've been here over a month already. A big slap on the wrist is necessary I think!My last entry left us in Auckland very unwillingly waving goodbye to New Zealand. We wisely decided to leave all our packing to the last minute and, after a late night online, the alarm going off at 7am was definitely not appreciated. I had no idea how we were going to fit all the things we'd stored in Auckland back into the backpacks that we'd re-filled with more junk we'd over the past five weeks but somehow we managed to shoehorn it all in. We even had 20 minutes to spare which I used for a very welcome power-nap to top up the 5 hours from the night before.We checked out of our hostel and said goodbye to Auckland which we liked despite most people thinking it was a hell hole. Just to make sure we weren't too sorry to leave, New Zealand did its best to be grey and miserable and pour down with rain as we huddled under the bus shelter. We mournefully turned down the taxi and shuttles offering good deals to the airport while we waited half an hour for the bus we'd already paid $26 for. It eventually arrived and we piled on, greeted by a cheerful driver chuckling that we looked like drowned rats. We also saw the humour in this. Or not.We drove round most of Auckland picking people up so it took an hour to do a 20 minute journey. About 10 minutes into the journey I suddenly felt rather ill and went white as a sheet prompting Dan to move to another seat. The journey to the airport felt like forever and I even had my sick bags (which I'd "borrowed" from the whale watching boat in Kaikoura) prepared for action. This seemed to do the trick of keeping everyone from sitting next to me despite the bus being packed - must remember this trick for the future. Finally we made it to the airport and checked in. Passport control etc was pretty uneventful and we made it through to the other side pretty quickly where we had to settle with a Burger King for breakfast in lieu of any other choice.We boarded the plane shortly after and found it to be really empty - probably the emptiest plane I've been on at only 1/3 full - and I regretted not being cheeky enough to ask for a free upgrade! Take off was smooth and at 15,000 feet I couldn't help but have a look out the window to remind myself of the view. I'm so thrilled that I got the guts to do a skydive. Although I thought I'd never do it again, I'm already reconsidering and even dreaming about it occasionally.The flight was great and Qantas very impressive. We couldn't watch the film as the screen was too far away so instead we had a palava trying to simulataneously start the Ricky Gervais podcasts we'd downloaded onto our iPods. Was worth it though as the giggling made the flight pass quickly. The food was nice and I took advantage of the free booze. I remember laughing at the podcast, sipping on my sparkling wine, feeling excited about going to Sydney and suddenly realising what a lucky bitch I am. Yes I do get pretty homesick occasionally but it's all worth it for moments like these.After 3 hours we made it to Sydney and piled into the airport. We managed to get through customs, immigration and get our luggage all within 20 minutes of landing which must be some kind of record, narrowly beating the 2 hours it takes in London. We bought a weekly train/bus/ferry ticket and got the train to Central Station. We walked 5 minutes through a small park to our hostel which wasn't far at all (thank God) but it was absolutely back breaking with all our stuff crammed into our bags. Perhaps that kitchen sink was an indulgence after all.First impressions of the hostel were good and we checked into our room which was fairly decent with a TV and video and a tiny en suite bathroom - luxury for any backpacker. It's pretty clean and not too noisy so we were happy. The only problem came when we turned the lights on and found ourselves in a disco with our very own strobe. I walked down to reception and told the bloke that I thought the bulb needed replacing to which he replied, "Thanks for letting me know." I wasn't quite sure what that meant or whether he was actually going to do something about it but I said, rather absurdly, that he was welcome and left him to it. Turns out it didn't mean anything and the strobe stayed for the night.We had a lie in until 9am (!) and tried out our en suite bathroom which is quite nice despite the odd shower doors that don't quite shut together. I attempted to try to make myself look decent and eventually accepted that my hairdryer needed to be laid to rest after Dan had melted it drying his trainers after Abel Tasman. We then consulted our Lonely Planet guide and decided to head to an area called The Rocks for a relatively easy day to start off the week. On the way out I mentioned the lightbulb at reception again and got a slightly more encouraging response compared to the night before!We walked back to Central and got a train to Circular Quay. It only took a few minutes and it felt pretty exciting to step out to the sight of the Harbour Bridge and a glimpse of the Opera House, particularly as apart from the short anonymous walk between Central and our hostel we hadn't actually seen anything of Australia. We took the first of the inevitable hundred photos of the famous landmarks and then stepped out into the city streets.It was time for lunch, so we walked along the opposite side of the harbour to the Opera House to find a restaurant that didn't require you to remortgage your house. We sat down at an outside table overlooking the Opera House and soaked up the view. Eventually we were served and ordered some great food and a jug of proper Ozzy beer (when in Rome..!). We watched an old fellow try to order some food and after asking the waitress to read the menu to him he eventually decided on spaghetti bolognase. About 15 minutes later it was brought out to him and he looked very confused before exclaiming at the waitress that when he'd ordered it, "never in a million years would I have guessed that's what would come out!" I'm not sure whether it was the spaghetti or the bolognase that was the most surprising. Nevertheless he got to order something else but sadly we didn't stay long enough to see what other shocks were in store.After lunch we took a walk around The Rocks and under the Harbour Bridge through Argyle Cut. We climbed up a hill and sat in a park for a while overlooking some of the city. After dodging some crazy people wrapped in blankets (?), Dan persuaded me to go to the nearby free Observatory. It was ok but quite dull with a hell of a lot of exhibits of old telescopes. Would have been fun to look out through the main telescope to see Venus but you had to pay and we were too stingy!We took the train back to the hostel and got back to our room to find a round tubular bulb leaning against the window. We probably would have tried to change it ourselves but the ceiling was too high so I went down to reception. I told the amused staff what we'd found and they decided it must have been the weird guy on in the afternoon who apparently has a reputation for doing odd things. They came up and finally changed it for us, impressing me with what a tall man, a bed and some good gymnastic skills can achieve if he has enough opportunity. That sentence frankly makes it sound much more exciting than it really was, but I was glad to get our light bulb changed all the same.After Dan's day of leadership where we got to look at some telescopes, we both agreed that I would be in charge of the guidebook from then on. We took the train back to Circular Quay and set about finding somewhere for lunch. We ended up back in The Rocks and found a pub called Fortune Of War that claims, along with about 20 others, to be the oldest pub in Sydney having been established in 1828. I'm not sure who can claim the accolade but the woman behind the bar certainly looked like she may have been there since the beginning. Dan and I both asked for the chicken curry but I made the mistake of asking for mash instead of the rice which I can't eat. She ranted about how the meals are pre-dished (probably not something to publicise?) and the chef couldn't/wouldn't change the menu. I said that was fine and that I had only asked because I was allergic to rice. A slight (ok, complete) lie, I grant you, but it was worth it to see her backtrack as her opinion of me changed from awkward customer to unfortunate victim. Turns out the chef could change the menu after all and I had my rather odd combination of chicken madras with mash. I could only eat about 1/4 of it but managed to force the rest down Dan's neck in fear of being shot in the back on the way out.We walked back through Sydney Harbour and watched some of the street performers including some Aboriginees playing didgeridoos and a guy playing steel drums with a crazy old man dancing around him. We thought at first they were part of the same (somewhat random) act but it seems the steel drum player was as freaked out by him as we were. Gotta love Sydney.We decided to put our plans for the day on hold and visit the Sydney branch of Trailfinders. We needed to find out how we could apply for our visas for Kenya and Tanzania as we couldn't get them before we left as they're only valid for 3 months from application. The guy was quite helpful to begin with and told us that for $80 they offer a visa service and would do all the work for us. We were quite pleased as it would be easier than having to go to the embassies which we'd have to do as we couldn't send our passports off as we needed photo ID for our internal flights in Australi. When the guy went off to get the paperwork he was then informed by his manager (who didn't have the courtesy or nerve to say this to us himself) that they only offer the visa service to customers who booked something through that particular branch as it was, and I quote, "too much hassle"! Needless to say they saw the sharp end of my tongue that day but we still had to settle (for the time being) with them telling us where the embassies were, one of which was an 8 hour drive in the opposite direction. I was absolutely fuming that they considered it "too much hassle" to offer us this service - which we had to pay quite a bit of money for! - when we had spent over $13,500 with their company over the last few months. I saved Dan the embarassment of a public brawl and instead sent my opinions to our poor travel agent in London. There's nothing I love more than a good complaint! We celebrated later that night with a meal in Spanishtown where we had some lovely tapas and some even lovelier Sangria.The weather was beautiful the next day so we didn't waste much time before heading out into the sunshine. We got a train back to Circular Quay to continue our plans from the day before and got on a ferry to Darling Harbour. We sailed past the Opera House and under the Harbour Bridge which meant we took several hundred more pictures no doubt identical to the ones we already have. We stopped briefly at an old 1950s style fairground called Luna Park and watched some of the high speed boats do 360s under the Harbour Bridge.We got off at Darling Harbour and walked along the harbour to Sydney Aquarium. We had a mini comedy-style domestic trying to decide which picture we wanted on the cover of our guidebook and eventually settled on the clownfish version. The aquarium was brilliant and well worth the admission fee which was heavily discounted thanks to our student cards. The fish ranged from the beautiful tropical fish native to the shallow Barrier Reef to the massive ugly grumpy looking fish that live in the depths of the ocean. It made me feel quite nervous about scuba diving at the Great Barrier Reef - if I saw some of these fish swimming at me I'd need to pay for a new wetsuit! We walked through the underwater tunnels to see the huge sharks (a few more creatures I'd hope not to come across when diving) and spent some time at the seal sanctuary which we managed to stumble upon just as they were being fed. We had a great day and Dan was chuffed that we managed to make it through the gift shop without spending any money.The next day was pretty lazy and we just wandered around near our hostel doing some shopping and spending some time online emailing home and finding out about our visas.After wasting the day away we took advantage of the lovely weather the next morning by grabbing our towels and heading to Bondi for the day. Managed to get on the wrong train going in the opposite direction so had to get off at Sydenham before hopping on the train back to Bondi. We saw a few blokes dressed as monks come out of Hungry Jacks (Burger King to you and me). Not sure if they were genuine monks or just dressed that way as part of the promotion for The Da Vinci Code which is coming out soon. Was quite random anyway but we're quickly getting used to it here!Bondi Junction was the last stop on the train and we got onto a bus taking us to the famous and beautiful beach. We got off about 100m from the beach and walked along the promenade to get some pictures of the beach and a guy playing frisbee with his dog. We walked down to the beach and looked at some of the spray painted murals, most of which were in memory of those killed in the Bali bombings in 2002 and in particular an Australian girl called Chloe who was only 13. The murals were fantastic but some of them a bit weird - possibly the artist had been enjoying too many 'artistic herbs' when they painted them.After some lunch by the beach we took a walk along the beach and found a spot to sunbathe for a while. Was getting quite chilly but being English we braved it anyway. The beach had been quite busy when we first arrived (although no where near the nightmare it must be during Summer) but it was getting quite empty now. We still got to see some of the famous "body beautiful" running up and down the beach in very skimpy swimwear but much to both my and Dan's disappointment this activity seemed to be reserved for the over-50-Speedo-loving males. We also watched some volleyball mainly played by young muscular men and I took some photos for, you know, education.The sand was so soft and silky, complete luxury even compared to the sand in Fiji which was hard and full of coral. After playing with it for a while I decided to try and do some sand sculptures. Couldn't think of anything to make so I asked Dan and rather predictably he suggested a car. I did quite a good job but it rapidly turned into a hippo's head. It's a more obvious progression than you might think. Dan's next suggestion was a bum (men are so imaginative) and I went one step further by making a sand woman lying face down. It's not that easy making stuff with dry sand so I was quite impressed with my efforts and insisted on Dan taking several photos and video footage of my masterpiece. There were a few mothers with their babies sat a few feet away who I'm sure must have gone to look at what the hell we were making so much fuss over only to find a random pile of sand with a circle drawn around it.It was getting dark and cold so we decided to leave. I was a bit too tempted by the 1/2 price jug of pimms at happy hour at the beachside bar (no Bayside Diner or Surf Club here sadly) so we walked into the bar and found the barman laughing. Apparently he and the manager had just crushed up a red chili into some ice, mixed it with cranberry juice and gave it to one of the waiters to try saying it was their new cocktail. So mean! We sat outside with our jug of Pimms, checked it for chilis and drank it as we watched the sun go down.The next day was our last in Sydney and we decided to venture back into the town centre. We decided not to rush around the Opera House and save it along with the sky tower for when we return at the end of our Australia trip. Instead we walked through Chinatown and to Market City. We had some lovely food for lunch and then had a look around Paddy's Market before taking a walk past the Entertainment Centre and through a lovely park. After a coffee at Gloria Jeans (a coffee place identical to Starbucks) we walked to Darling Harbour and past the aquarium to the ferry. We took one last journey past Luna Park, under the Harbour Bridge and past the Opera House back to Circular Quay. We had a bit of a walk up to the Opera House and then walked back to toward the hostel to cook dinner for the first time since arriving in Australia! We made some chicken parmigiana with new potatoes which got complimented by an Italian guy wearing plastic bags on his feet. I'm sure there was good reason for them but I didn't like to ask. The food was yummy and we watched a film which seemed to be about a man who wanted to dress like a woman and whether his wife was now a lesbian. We went back to the room and improved the film selection by watching Flashdance and Footloose on TV. Not too bad (particularly enjoyed seeing a young John Lithgow and Sarah Jessica Parker) but neither had a very good ending. Fell asleep at some ungodly hour in perfect preparation for our first day of driving tomorrow.You'll all be glad to know that's all for the first week! The bad news is that there's another 4 weeks yet to come.Hope this finds you all well. Now that university exams are over there's no more excuses for the lack of emails - keep 'em coming in! Love to you all.Edited to add: Photos have now been added!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1147414140/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1147414140/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1147414140/tpod.html Tue, 13 Jun 2006 05:47:07 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Port Macquarie, Australia

G'day again! I'm doing my best to catch up and get another week under my belt. Here goes!After checking out of our hostel in Sydney (and Dan being laughed at by the girls on reception when he said he'd look after Wally the wombat teddy attached to the storage key - the boy's been spending too much time with me) we got the train to St James and took a walk through the pretty Hyde Park. It looked a lovely area and made me sad we didn't have a lot longer in Sydney because there's so much left to see. Still, I'm always glad of an excuse to come back.We got to the Thrifty office where we signed our lives away to get our hire car and had a battle of wits with the sales rep trying to spend a ton of money on an excess waiver which was almost as much as the excess. I won. We walked around the corner to the car garage to pick up our car which was even tinier than we could have imagined. As soon as we saw it (her!) we both wished we'd paid a bit more for a car with a boot bigger than a matchstick. We drove back to the hostel to pick up our stuff from storage (and give back Wally) and then spent the next 45 minutes wedging it all in before hitting the road.Dan had printed some directions off the internet but they proved completely useless as we got hopelessly lost in the one way streets of Sydney. I gave up following the directions and went back to reading the map which got us out of the city and on the right road, albeit after a rather long detour! We had an uneventful drive to the Blue Mountains and arrived in Katoomba at around 4pm, finding our hostel without any problems. We rang the doorbell and waited for ages until one of the guests opened the door to tell us the guy was out and we needed to ring him. We trotted off down the road to the phone box and listened in on a live band at a wedding reception. The highlight would have to be the theme to Indiana Jones played on a clarinet - must write that down as a must for when I get married. We rang the hostel owner's mobile and he gave us the code to the door and told us to let ourselves in. We unloaded our stuff and made ourselves comfortable in front of the fire. After about an hour the owner arrived back and broke the news that our room had been double booked and he'd arranged a room for us at another hostel down the road. I didn't mind too much apart from the fact that I'd read in a few reviews that the hostel is known for its spiders...We picked up our stuff and drove to the other side of town to Number 14, a lovely weatherboard house from the early 1900s. We let ourselves in through the side entrance and found the reception closed with instructions how guests can check themselves in. We unloaded our stuff into our cosy room and I drew the curtains, prompting a smallish spider to fall out, bounce off me and land on the bed. I wasn't too happy (polite way of saying I recited every vulgar word I know) but Dan bravely trapped it in a glass and released it outside.We sat for a while in the lounge (no tv here which was initially distressing but actually turned out to be wonderfully peaceful) and then headed into town for some food and supplies. We came back and cooked some curry which we ate with a guy from Milton Keynes and his Norwegian girlfriend. Names are a waste of time with me really, I tend to only remember where they're from! Had a bit of a chat with them and then played a 20 Questions board game with them and a few girls from America and France. It was good fun although the Brits thrashed everyone else thanks to the slang and puns that made no sense to anyone else. Still, we're English and a win is a win so we made sure we rubbed it in their faces. It doesn't happen often.We went to sleep in sub-zero temperatures but awoke in the tropics - the heating in the hostel was somewhat haphazard. We left the hostel early and drove up the highway further into the Blue Mountains. We stopped first at Evans Lookout and took in the spectacular panorama. We could see the blue mist (which I believe is eucalyptus oil evaporating off the leaves) that gives the mountains its name although it does just look like fog on the photos. I regretted being so unfit that we missed out on the walks around the mountains and past the lovely waterfalls and wonderful views inaccessible by cars. Instead we settled with a pretty short walk through the forest where we didn't see another soul and enjoyed keeping the peace and silence for ourselves. It had a similar feeling to the walk we took through Joshua Tree National Park: warm and bright and very quiet. I'm no hiker and I enjoy luxury and comfort too much to be truly converted, but I can still see the attraction of getting close to nature.The view at the lookout was worth the walk and went on for miles. I wonder what the landscape would look like under all the trees and whether it would be similar to the Grand Canyon which the area is named after. In the 1930s they wanted to cut the trees down to use for building materials but a group of locals clubbed together and fund-raised and bought the land to protect the forests. They gave it back to the government who made it into a national park and thank God they did as it would have been a tragedy to lose it.We drove a short way further up the highway to another lookout called Govetts Leap. Another beautiful view greeted us there but we didn't stay long as it started to get very windy and we were being pelted with sand and gravel from the car park. We explored the nearby pretty town of Blackheath before driving back to Katoomba for some lunch. We had the hostel to ourselves which we took advantage of by spreading out on the sofas and reading by the fire.After a bit of a rest to let our food go down, we hopped back in the car and drove to Echo Point - the most famous and developed in the Blue Mountains as it offers superb views over the Jamison Valley and the Three Sisters. We didn't stay long as the wind became so strong it was a struggle to stay upright so we abandoned our plans and decided to come back tomorrow. Minutes after we left the heavens opened so it was a good call. We dropped into a tour office briefly on the way back to use their internet so we could book our hostel for the next few days. No sooner had I sat down I felt a tap on my shoulder and turned round to see someone we'd met while in Fiji! Turns out it is a small world after all.The hostel was freezing cold again when we returned so I took inspiration from some German girls and wrapped myself up in my duvet and sat on the sofa in front of the fire. Dan wrote in his journal and I read a few chapters of Memoirs of a Geisha. Went to bed at about midnight when we realised we were the last ones up for the second night in a row.After another boiling night, we woke to a beautiful day that made Echo Point much more pleasant than yesterday. The lookout was almost empty so we enjoyed having the Three Sisters to ourselves. After taking some pictures we looked around the tourist centre and entertained ourselves with the 6 foot toy koala on display by the door. Simple things. I looked around the shops for a while and Dan got accosted by a coach driver convinced Dan was on his tour. Apparently there was someone on his coach who was the spitting image of Dan and frankly I find the thought of there being 2 of them a rather worrying prospect.We said farewell to Katoomba and drove back toward Sydney to start our journey up the East Coast. It wasn't far to our next destination Newcastle so we decided to take a detour via the nice seaside town of Terrigal. We drove along the coast and then parked by some shops where we got some lunch to eat on the beach. We were immediately surrounded by seagulls and 4 or 5 pelicans - I knew I shouldn't have had tuna.We drove another hour to Newcastle and checked into the lovely YHA there. It's massive with a ballroom full of leather armchairs and a big roaring fireplace. We signed up for the free dinner at the local(ish) Irish pub and put our stuff in our room. We left for the dinner about an hour later still stuffed from lunch but never one to turn down a free meal. We met one of the hostel staff - a 6 foot 4 ginger fella called Tex who insists on calling everyone "groovers". He's absolutely hilarious with a very dry sense of humour and was obviously a born entertainer. We got to the pub and sat down with a load of other people who we chatted to with a beer while we waited for our dinner. I asked one of the girls (from Melbourne - no idea of the name!) what she was here for and she told me she was here for a conference at the hospital about insulin. I asked if she was in medicine before realising it was painfully obvious she was a user rather than an administrator. This is the problem with having a lot of friends training to be doctors and vets. Damn you all.After a very large plate of bangers and mash we went upstairs to the pool tables and entered the free competition hosted by Tex. It is not a secret that I am <i>terrible at pool and I was quite nervous about showing this off in such a public manner. I needn't have worried. To warm up we had a game of Killer Pool - when it's your turn you have one shot to pot one of the balls and if you don't you lose a life. We only had 1 life so if you missed, you were knocked out. Last one left is the winner. I went out (along with most people!) in the first round but Dan continued through with 2 others, all of whom missed their next pot so no one won. Tex was almost crying into his beer by the end of it but I felt much better knowing I wasn't alone! We then started the proper competition and made it to the semi-finals, knocked out only because Dan missed a ridiculously easy pot by being cocky. I got a lot of mileage out of this and like to remind him about it even now.We got talking to a lot of people including someone from Reading and a couple called Mark and Michelle (yes - names!) who were doing an almost identical trip up the coast to us, even flying out of Cairns on the same day. No doubt we'll keep running into them which will be good. We left the pub at about 11pm and went to bed shortly after. There wasn't much chance of a good night's sleep thanks to someone in the toilets across the hall throwing up continuously throughout the night. I have no idea how she could physically have had that much in her body. We were meant to be getting up at 7am for a wine tasting tour in the Hunter Valley but with the girl being sick until 5am (6 hours of being sick is impressive by anyone's standards) it suddenly seemed rather unlikely.We got up at 8.30am to move the car but went back to bed until 10. After a shower we decided to head out for something to eat and on the way out we saw Tex in reception to sign up for the free meal. We walked along the beach to the car and saw some of the town. Here's a little fact for you: apparently Newcastle exports sand to Hawaii! The beach was quite popular with the surfers who were braver in the cold sea than I'd have been.At 6pm we joined the gang and went back to the pub for another free meal and ran into Mark and Michelle. They'd just got back from the wine tour and said it was good fun but quite hard going! We had another big dinner and settled down for the quiz. We teamed up with M&M and actually did quite well. Dan was bitter about a few questions he'd got right but Mark hadn't written down but it wouldn't have made a difference and M&M had got a few questions right (some about port which they'd learnt about on the wine tour!) that we'd never have known. We came 3rd which we were quite chuffed about as we were the smallest team by far (most others had 8 people in them) and 1st and 2nd were groups of locals who had an advantage with the Australia questions. Unfortunately they had a quirky prize system so that the backpacker teams got prizes so awarded teams that came 1st, 2nd and 7th (!) but 3rd prize was vouchers for the pub and we were leaving the next morning anyway.The next morning we squeezed our stuff back into the car and drove up the motorway toward Port Macquarie (pronounced ma-kwar-ee). We took a detour to Port Stephens and got hopelessly lost driving around Nelsons Head trying to find it before realising it was an area rather than a town. We drove up to the lighthouse where I'd heard there was a nice tearoom with lovely views. We weren't disappointed and sat out on the veranda looking out over Nelsons Head. We shared a lovely mexican melt followed by a cream tea some of which I reluctantly had to leave as I was stuffed and threw my napkin on the plate in resignation. We watched a cheeky bird jump onto the tables to see if there were any crumbs and he made a beeline for our table the minute he saw the scones. He threw the napkin away with his beak in disgust and dug in. I'm not sure why but I expected him to go for the scone but he was completely uninterested and flopped his beak into the jam and then into the cream. He was quite methodical hving a little bit of one and then a little bit of the other, over and over. He wasn't impressed when he got cream all over his beak and shook his head around and wiped his beak on the chair trying to flick it off. He obviously learnt his table manners from Dan! Only kidding!We drove a bit further up Highway 1 and turned off down Stoney Creek Road, a 5km unpaved road that Lonely Planet described as a 'bone shaker' and weren't mistaken. We finally arrived at our destination after about 15 minutes - the largest tree in New South Wales, a Eucalyptus Grandis. We had the place to ourselves and took a very Short Walk Through A Rainforest(tm) to the magnificent tree. It wasn't quite on the scale of Tane Muhata (huge kauri tree in New Zealand) but it was still rather impressive. It was absolutely silent there, several miles from any roads or tourists. I enjoyed it until we heard loud cracking noises coming from the woods. We couldn't see anything moving (both checking out of fear and hope of seeing wildlife) but decided it might be a good time to leave..!At Port Macquarie we arrived at the caravan park we were staying in (very Home and Away) and checked into our cabin. We ran into Mark and Michelle who were staying in the dorms there and had a joke about stalking them. Little do they know... (Waiver - that's just a joke, honest Guv!) We made some dinner in our little kitchen and watched TV until we passed out. At least here we shouldn't be kept up by noisy backpackers! Instead it was our turn to wake everyone else up with Dan forgetting he'd put on some toast and made all the smoke detectors go off...The next morning and for the first time in Australia, we awoke to grey skies and drizzly rain. We'd planned on going to the nearby Koala Hospital and the Billabong Koala Breeding Centre but the miserable weather put us both off. We did some shopping for dinner (beans on toast is now banned) and spent the day catching up with our written journals and relaxing in front of the tv.The miserable weather had long gone by the next day and after a late lunch we drove 15 minutes to Billabong Koala Breeding Centre. After paying quite a bit to get in, we spent some time watching the spider monkeys while waiting for the koala patting at 3.30pm. The monkeys were more than happy to show off and even did the moonwalk although only once the video camera was turned off. We then trotted off into the koala house and had a look at all the dozy koalas until the ranger brought one round for us to stroke. The sleepy little thing was so soft and warm (surprisingly not at all like the stuffed one Dan's parents have!) and she clung to the ranger who confirmed that her claws were as sharp as they looked. It was lovely to get so close but after I'd elbowed all the kids out the way and the photos were taken, I very reluctantly left.We carried on walking round the centre and through the legs of a very random wooden giant. We walked through the kangaroo enclosure and regretted not having any food to give them which we didn't realise we could buy from the shop. We tried to get some pictures of them but they thought the cameras were bags of food and got a bit too up close and personal! I really wanted to touch them but I thought the lack of food might lead to a lack of fingers... I really regretted it afterward but I know there's bound to be more opportunities to give them a stroke.By the time we got out of the kangaroo enclosure, we didn't have long left before the centre closed so we zoomed around what was left. We spent a bit of time with a lovely cockatoo who kept saying "hello! how you doing?!" which I thought I was imagining at first (damn those voices in my head) until Dan heard it as well. We saw loads of other birds all native to Australia (as are almost all the animals here) including beautiful parrots and lorikeets and the enormous cassowaries that I didn't even know existed before then. We got 'stalked' around the centre by a couple of guinea fowl and had to avoid a black swan and peacock who took a dislike to us. By this time we weren't sure if the place had actually shut as there was no one else to be seen, but this didn't stop us quickly finding the wombats which I immediately fell in love with. They're a lot bigger than I expected and don't have a lot to them, just a big cuddly fat hairy body with short legs, tiny eyes and a big button nose. I actually know a few people who fall under that description but I won't name names. I would have loved to touch them (the wombats, not the people) but the signs warned that they bit and I was happy to believe them. Sticking arms through animal cages never seems a particularly good idea anyway. I feel it's a good rule to go through life with. We eventually left the centre (them turning out all the lights was a good hint) and we were relieved to find we hadn't stayed past closing time. We went back to our cabin and spent the night relaxing and cooking some good healthy food. I could get used to having our own kitchen again!So that's about it for week 2 of Australia. I'm sure you're not surprised that my highlight of it was yet another animal place but you've got to be used to it by now! Hope you enjoyed our tales and that you're looking forward to the next ridiculously long installment.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146272400/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146272400/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146272400/tpod.html Sun, 21 May 2006 03:53:07 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Auckland, New Zealand

Kia Ora once again! Normally I start off with "I'm afraid it's that time of the week again" or some kind of apology for being a bit late, but seeing as it was only about 4 minutes since I finished writing the last update, I'll skip that. Just assume I've gone through all the pleasantries and I'll jump right to the good stuff.I last left you after a night out in Paihia with some of our new friends. We had no coach to get up for the next day so we were allowed us a lie in and slept until a whopping 10am. All together now: Oooh! Thankfully due to lots of sleep and a lovely hot shower, we didn't feel too hungover and decided to take a walk into town. I'd forgotten quite how far the supermarket was and after we'd been walking for half an hour the heavens opened and killed any desier to keep going. We retreated back to the main street to have a coffee and sat out in the [now] lovely sunshine and gave the passers by the once over. We saw Richard's bus pull up across the street so we trotted over to say happy birthday and make sure Spike hadn't overdone it the night before. Unsurprisingly, he was no where to be seen.We walked into the souvenir shop and spent a small fortune on some new t-shirts for Dan, some sun hats and a cool kiwi to complete the NZ toy collection. The highlight was definitely Dan's new top which says simply "Same Shirt, Different Day". You couldn't really get a more apt slogan for a backpacker. We then popped into the visitors centre to check quickly if Dan's old neighbours (who now live in Kerikeri near Paihia) had replied to his email and then popped outside to phone them. Unfortunately they were actually over in England (something we said?) so we didn't manage to meet up with them. We spent most of the rest of the day relaxing and catching up with our journals in the sunshine. Watched Charlies Angels on TV with some Swedish travellers who had to turn off Moulin Rouge after 10 minutes because they had no idea what was going on. Talked to some of our friends for a while but Dan felt quite ill so we had another early night and read our books.The early mornings came back with a vengeance the next day as we had to get up at 6am for our trip to Cape Reinga, the northern most tip of mainland New Zealand. We met our guide Murray, a 60-something incredibly fit man with no shoes, and jumped on the coach for an hour of hostel/hotel pick-ups. We set off up through the Bay of Islands and had a brief stop at the Puketi Kauri Forest where we took a Short Walk Through A Rainforest(tm) to see some kauris which paled in comparison to Tane Muhata. We stopped at a kauri museum for tea and a quick bit of shopping for postcards. Apparently the date stamp from Cape Reinga is unique and a collectors item. Either that or Murray gets commission from postcard sales.After a few hours we made it to 90 Mile Beach, which is actually 55 miles long, and before we could even make it onto the beach we spotted a campervan stuck in the sand. It seems to happen a lot and before we knew it, Murray was marching people off the coach to give them a hand. Didn't take too much before they were free and we were back on the coach and driving onto the beach. Murray did some great commentary on the dangers of beach driving from getting stuck parking in the soft wet sand to being caught by a "sweeper" - a rogue wave that comes onto the beach much further and faster than the other waves. The change in speed between the sides of your car when one set gets hit by the water can make you spin and tip over and several people have died as a result. We stopped on some firm sand and had a look around, particularly at a Mercedes that had been caught out by high tide and had sunk / been covered by sand almost up to the roof! During the photo-fest of this amusing wreck, a driver from another coach company came and asked Murray if we could help get his bus out of the sand. We all trotted gleefully up to the stranded coach and its forlorn group of passengers hanging around nearby. I took my position as camera woman while Dan got stuck in with the other volunteers. The first attempt wasn't very successful but after Murray ordered a worried group of Chinese girls to sit in the back corner to weight it down, one more heave-ho was enough to push it out of the marsh. It was great fun with everyone cheering and patting each other on the back after their triumph. Another camera woman and I agreed that this was far more fun than just driving up a beach!We carried on further up the shore and pulled off by some massive sand dunes. We parked by the coach we'd just rescued and listened to Murray giving a safety talk on sand boarding. After hearing all the various easy ways of breaking all the bones in the body, I was getting rather nervous about doing it! Still, I'd jumped out of a plane now so I couldn't wimp out on sliding down some sand. We grabbed some boogie boards and joined the masses (aged from 7 to 70) climbing up the dune. What a killer! This was the cloest I've been to literally taking one step forward and ending up 2 steps back. One asthma attack later, we reached the top and watched everyone else zoom down the dune after being pushed gleefully by Murray. I also realised with some horror that I'd decided to wear a skirt that day and as I slid down the dune I would provide and interesting view for anyone standing at the top. Still, I threw myself down the hill before I could change my mind and thoroughly enjoyed it. It doesn't actually look that steep from a distance but when you're zooming down head first with 4 inches between your chin and the ground, it feels like a vertical drop! It was brilliant fun and I managed to reach the bottom intact and jumped out of the way in time to miss Dan flying down behind me. Dan ran - well, wheezed - up to have another go (wasn't much chance of me getting up there again without collapsing!) while I attempted to get him on video, successfully managing to make it look slow and boring.After a competition between passengers to see who got the furthest, we piled back onto the coach and drove to Cape Reinga at the top of the island. The weather was pretty crap but seemed to hold back whenever we got out to have a look around. We walked up a hill and had a look at the point where the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean meet. Apparently at times the meeting can be quite fierce and spectacular but today it was just a white foam with opposing waves washing over each other. We walked down the other side of the hill to the lighthouse and the directional signs pointing to and saying how far some of the major cities in the world were from that point. We took a hundred photos before shuffling back to the coach, narrowly avoiding a downpour.We headed back home by road and stopped in Whangaroa for fish and chips that Dan and I tragically chose to turn down. This was, obviously, regretted the moment everyone climbed back on with their beautiful smelling food. An hour later we stopped by a fruit stall on the roadside owned by "young Steve" who turned out to be slightly older than Murray. They had some free fruit samples so we had some golden kiwi (much sweeter than normal kiwi) and some feijoas that I'd kept seeing around but wasn't sure what they were. Didn't taste too bad but Murray seemed to think they were the Devil's food and would rather starve than eat one! We got back to the hostel at about 6pm and were too tired to cook so went and got some fish and chips from a nearby bar that were twice the cost of the ones earlier and no where near as nice. I'm writing about this almost a month later and I'm still bitter about it.The next day was Anzac Day so most things were shut until lunchtime. After the long day we'd had yesterday, we were happy to have a relaxing day and moped around the hostel for a few hours. We said goodbye to Gemma and Hayley and some of our other friends who were leaving that day and then headed into town to see if anything was open. Got a coffee and some hokey-pokey ice cream which is more or less vanilla with toffee bits and a New Zealand favourite. Very nice it was too.I still had the 3 hours of free internet time that I was given in Rotorua after I lost my email to Mum so we found another of their branches and spent a few hours updating our online journals and emailing home. Dan made one last attempt at contacting his old neighbours with no luck (we didn't know they were in England at this point) and walked back to the hostel. We bought some drinks from the bottle shop and saw some sailors walking around in uniform. I never really know why they have to stay in their suits and hats (the Anzac celebrations were over hours before) other than I'm sure it must guarantee them some female companionship for the night...Didn't sleep too well that night thanks to some, ahem, noisy bed springs in the room next door. Got up early and got our stuff together so we could check out at 9.30am. It was quite annoying to be in a hostel with the earliest check out time in New Zealand when we weren't due to be picked up until 1.30pm. We hung around outside in the sun and wrote our journals. I ran into the people staying in the room next door to ours who asked me if our room was soundproof! When I said no and asked why, they asked me whether I had heard noises last night from "down the hall". I asked them what kind of noises (I enjoy torturing people) to which he raised his eyebrows and I laughed and lied that I hadn't. I'm not sure whether the noises genuinely were from down the hall or whether they were hoping to shift the blame but either way I enjoyed their embarassment!After some soup for lunch we got on our coach with Rob, our last Magic Bus driver of the trip. It was a shame we didn't have him before as he was good and told us, being Maori himself, a lot about Maori traditions. He explained the meaning of their facial tattoos: the patterns on their cheeks represent their mother and father (I forget which cheek represents which), the pattern on their chin represents his own life and the lines on his forehead represent the level of wisdom and respect they'd earnt within their community. These tattoos don't really 'exist' now and tend only to be seen on old chiefs and young gang members, who are apparently rife in certain parts of Auckland.We didn't get to Auckland until 6pm but we still had time to walk to Toni & Guy to book a haircut appointment for tomorrow. I was desperate to have it done as I haven't had it cut or coloured for about 8 months so I looked a mess! We then went to the pub to take advantage of happy hour. Spent a few hours online at the hostel and then passed out in bed.The next morning we awoke to bagpipes which transpired to be from another graduation parade similar to the one we'd seen in Christchurch. We had a quick baked potato for lunch and poked round a bookshop wasting time until I was due at the hairdressers.Despite being initially quite impressed with my hairdresser, I was quite annoyed to be left waiting around for a long time while he finished with his previous client. I had to leave halfway through the cut to have my hair dyed and had a chat with the lady about skydiving. She and her husband celebrate their anniversaries by alternating doing something relaxing (they spent their first anniversary camping up in the Bay of Islands) and doing something that scares them (on their second anniversary they got tattoos of each other's initials). Their next anniversary was a scary one and they were planning to do a skydive so naturally I burst into my spiel of how great it is. It's always great to find someone I haven't bored witless yet!After almost 5 hours at the salon, I was more or less "finished" but was quite worried to see that the way she'd done my highlights made it look a bit like I had grey hair. She didn't appreciate my telling her my concerns but did offer to re-do it. I couldn't bear to sit there any longer so declined and actually in normal light it doesn't look too bad. Anything would have been better than the birds nest I was sporting beforehand! It was quite late by the time I got back to the hostel so we went and got some tapas for dinner and retired back the hostel.The next day was our last full day in New Zealand so we started it off beautifully by having a lie in. We eventually got up and did a bit of shopping, buying a lead for our iPods so we could connect it to the computer and upload more of The Ricky Gervais Show podcasts and some new music to listen to. We had some Turkish food for lunch and then returned to the hostel. The next couple of hours were spent doing laundry and trying to shoehorn all our luggage, including the stuff we'd had in storage for the last month, back into our bags. We went exploring for somewhere to eat and discovered (typically) a huge collection of restaurants and food courts we didn't even know existed. We finally settled on a pub that had only opened that day and were selling their food at special discounted prices. We watched some rugby on the huge screen and then left once we realised we might have been gatecrashing what looked like an Indian wedding. (<i>Edited to add: I read this back and thought this might come across as a racist comment of some sort but it isn't. I really think it was actually an Indian wedding!)We got back to the hostel and foolishly stayed up til almost 2am uploading things to our iPods and emailing home. We walked back up to the room and I did a double take at one of the funniest and most tragic things I've ever seen, so much so that I had to call/whisper Dan back so he could have a look. There, slumped on the floor, was a drunken young man passed out only inches from his dorm with his key still in his hand pointing at the door. I can only guess that there may have been 5-10 minutes of heartbreaking fumbling for the lock before giving up and collapsing (rather skilfully still vaguely vertical) into a drunken sleep. I wanted to run and get the camera but Dan wouldn't let me. I really wish I had now! Still, it gave us a good giggle and seemed a fitting end to our time in New Zealand.This concludes our 5 week journey through a beautiful and exciting country that will always remain one of my most favourite places in the world. It's so similar to parts of England and yet completely different. There's so much to see and do and I have no doubt that Dan and I will come back soon.So this is haere ra (goodbye) from New Zealand. I hope you've enjoyed our tales from this part of the world. Stay tuned for our updates in Australia which will hopefully be just as much fun and just as adventurous.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145743260/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145743260/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145743260/tpod.html Sun, 21 May 2006 01:05:42 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Paihia, New Zealand

Long time no update! Sorry this has taken so long to arrive but the last few weeks have been manic. I was touched by those of you who emailed and messaged me to make sure I'm still alive. It's always nice to know I'm missed. Anyway seeing as I've been gone so long, I'm taking no notice of the groans when you see the notification email land in your inbox. At least this one is "Part 2" so hopefully it might be a short one to ease you back in gently... As if.The last entry saw me floating toward the ground in a parachute, glad to be alive. The rest of the day was a bit of a blur despite jumping out of a plane only taking until 9am. Brummy Dave drove me back to my hostel where I very proudly showed Dan my DVD and didn't even cry at the end bit. We then jumped on the Magic Bus and met our new driver "Cookie" (that's his name, rather than my description) and retraced our previous route to Rotorua, or 'Rottenrua' as it's frequently called thanks to the sulphur. We had a couple of hours spare and as we'd been to Rotorua before so we spent them online emailing our families to let them know what I'd done. I lost most of the mammoth email I'd been writing to my parents and somehow managed to blame it on the internet cafe. They gave us vouchers for 3 hours free internet in any of their outlets to apologise which was really nice.We eventually got back on the coach and met back up with the McCracken twins Izzy and Maz who were dying to know whether I'd finally been able to do my jump. I was wearing the free t-shirt I'd been given but hid it under my hoodie so I could try to pretend it had been cancelled again. They didn't believe it for a minute thanks to my cheshire grin so I whipped out the top in a Superman-style fashion. I revelled in the glory of having done the 15,000ft jump, a fairly exclusive club as most people jump from 12,000ft, and then told them all about it. I then fell fast asleep absolutely exhausted and Dan took a load of pictures. He's nice like that!We drove for a few hours and got to Mount Maunganui in the late afternoon. We checked into our hostel and met the infamous owner Murray who was quite a character as we'd been promised. They fed us free pizza, cookies and tea and then gave us the key to our room. We found out we were in a maisonette round the corner with Kaika - a Japanese girl who worked at the hostel and, Murrey assured us, had a black belt in Origami. Kaika drove us round to the flat to save us carrying our bags and showed us our lovely home for the night. We were quite sad we only had one day there as it was gorgeous and exactly the kind of flat I want at home! Cookie and his girlfriend was staying there as well so we got to talk to them for a bit. We had a wander into town and bought some booze and a burger to share (glad we did - it was so huge we didn't even finish it!) and ran into Maz and Izzy at the take away. Talked to them for a bit, hung around the hostel before bragging to everyone that we were off to our luxury flat to watch some TV.The only downfall to staying in the flat was that 6 of us were sharing one bathroom. I was quite surprised by the queue as everyone else seemed to have a shower before going to bed but still insisted on having another the next morning, meaning I had no time for one myself. Kaika gave us a lift back to the hostel where we met back up with the Magic Bus people including Izzy and Maz who wanted to know how "Charles and Camilla enjoyed their penthouse". We got back on the bus and headed for Thames where we were meeting our connection to Whitianga. We did a quick bit of shopping and ended up having to buy yet another bloody pie for lunch and then loaded all our stuff onto our new minibus. We said goodbye to all the friends we'd made who were carrying on to Auckland and then climbed into the tiny bus with our new (and first female) driver Lisa. She was the most New Zealand person I've ever met (not sure that makes sense but never mind) saying "yeah, nah" before every sentence and ending it with "eh!". She told us countless stories - mainly Mauri legends - along the way, which we came to love as they went on for hours and never seemed to have a point. We started a sweepstake on what time the story would come to and end with bonus points being earnt if it finished midway through a sentence.We drove through some very windy roads and stopped near the beautiful Cathedral Cove. We were told the 45 minute walk each way to the beach took more like 30 even for really unfit people, so we set off up the track for our 2 hour break. As it happened, 45 minutes was pretty much spot on and the track was steep and long. The scenery was nice and the weather was beautiful but I must admit I'm rather tired of the "easy walks" here in NZ! Still, Cathedral Cove was gorgeous with a lovely beach and a hole in a rock which presumably gave the cove its name. We only had half an hour to spend there which was a shame because I could have spent a few hours sitting on the beach. I had a bit of a paddle in the freezing water but retreated when the beach got crowded with the holidaying families. The walk back to the bus was quite miserable and even Dan wondered how a track could be uphill all the way there and still be uphill all the way back.Next stop was a few miles down the road at Hot Water Beach where the water under the sand is boiling hot. You can dig yourself a hole and mix the hot water with that of the cooler sea and sit in your homemade bath. Lovely idea, only we were there at high tide so all we got to see was a dirty beach. Didn't stay there long and we all wished we could have stayed longer at Cathedral Cove.We then drove straight to Whitianga and Lisa dropped me and two other women off to do some bone carving. We were shown some diagrams of the carvings and I eventually picked a comparatively easy hook shape that apparently represents authority and leadership. We sat down at a bench with a sanding drill and were let loose on the crudely cut out chunk of bone (cow bone, incidently) we'd been given. After a bit of an over-eager beginning, I soon got into it and did a fairly good job considering I'm so cack handed. We then sanded them down by hand for about 45 minutes which was a fairly boring job but still fun when you begin to see the proper shape emerge. We then polished them up with a bit of damp sandpaper and a cloth and presented them to the tutor who seemed fairly impressed. She put our carvings put on a cheap bit of black string, bagged it up with a certificate saying we made it and then shooed us out the door back to our hostel.It was quite a nice hostel right on the beach, although the weather was too grey and the tide too high for us to enjoy it. We were in a little flat with 3 other rooms and shared a kitchen, bathroom and lounge with the oldest TV I have ever seen. The remote was as big as a book - you even had to hold it with two hands - and only had 4 buttons on it! Fantastic. We walked into town to find an internet cafe so I could re-type the email to Mum and then got some fish and chips to share for dinner. We had another early night and headed to the room to read.The next day we had a ridiculously early start which was made worse by the discovery that Magic Bus had timetabling problems and we were going to have to go via Waitomo instead of driving to Auckland direct. I wouldn't have minded so much but it meant a 6 hour detour and we'd already done everything there (the glowworm caves) and more besides (only entertainment afterward was watching someone get stung by a wasp and then had to pretend it didn't hurt). Still, our camcorder seems to have decided to vaguely work again for the first time since Abel Tasman's monsoon. I'm gutted we didn't have it for the whale watching or for the ground parts of my skydive but I'm still chuffed we've got it back.On the way to Waitomo we stopped off for lunch in Paeroa, home to the L&amp;P (Lemon and Paeroa) soft drink. I had a horrible sandwich and got covered in tiny spiders so I was happy to leave. We took a look at the 20 foot model of an L&amp;P bottle and then zoomed off to Waitomo, listening to a few more stories with no endings that all seem to involve giants falling over and turning into mountains.We stopped again just outside of Waitomo to go to the Shearing Shed where we watched incredibly fluffy angora rabbits being sheared. We stroked one on "display" who was getting used to being in public in time for his turn for a haircut the next day. They are huge, about the size of a small dog. We watched another being tied to a rack, which sounds much worse than it was, and was shaved to within an inch of his life. The rabbits have no natural way of shedding its fur but would die of heat exhaustion if it didn't so places like these shear them and combines their soft fur with sheeps wool to make angora wool. The rabbits were rather naked without their fur but still looked very cute if not slightly humiliated. We stroked the newly bald one which was even softer than it was before. I want to get one! I'd probably shave it every day though, so maybe best that I don't.We then went to Waitomo and killed time by going to the pub for a pint and some chips. 3 hours later we got back on the bus with a load more people and had a cramped and uncomfortable journey back to Auckland, made particularly enjoyable by the guy sat in front of us who absolutely stank of BO. We got to Auckland at about 6.30pm and checked into our windowless room (costs an extra $10 for a window!!), had some free dinner and then cooked some more in our kitchen. Had another early night - what kind of backpackers are we?! Ones that don't get on too well with early mornings, apparently.The next morning proved another early one in preparation for our 7.45am pick up and made even earlier by our neighbours who decided to blowdry their hair in the hallway at 5.45am. Still, at least we were ready in plenty of time for the bus for once. Our new driver was Richard who had his mum and friend Spike, a Stray bus driver (Stray being a coach company, rather than him being a bus driver wandering the lonely streets), who had come along to celebrate Richard's birthday the next day.We drove to a lovely small town called Matakohe where were were meant to visit the Kauri - huge sacred tree of the Maoris - and Pioneer Museum but was missed in favour of some homemade food (and, in Spike's case, a beer) at the cafe. We shared a gorgeous slice of chicken, brie and apricot quiche and bought a few things for lunch later on.We carried on driving toward the Waipoua Forest and to pass the time Richard started a game of "Tractor". The bus was split into two groups and the aim was to call out when you spotted a tractor and whether it was working and, if not, what colour it was, e.g. "Tractor Working!" or "Tractor Blue!". You also got 50 bonus points if you saw a tractor dealership. Lisa had tried to start this game on the way to Whitianga (throwing in a few bonus points for any possum roadkill we spotted along the way) but without much luck as no one could be bothered. Was a lot more successful this time with the Zorros (our team - Richard's mum chose the name) versus Richard's Tractor Sluts (unsurprisinly, Spike chose that name). It started off badly with "Hawk Eye" Spike seeing tractors 5 minutes before anyone else, but the Zorros soon came back to make it a close game. A tractor dealership (spotted by me) put the Zorros in the lead but RTS came back at the last minute and won by one point. I've never seen anyone as chuffed and victorious as Spike, a 30 something year old man who looks like a tramp.We eventually got to the Waipoua Forest and took another Short Walk Through A Rainforest(tm) to see the largest standing tree in New Zealand, a kauri named Tahe Muhata - "God of the Forest". We didn't see it at first and saw a large tree we thought must have been it, but then we turned the corner and giggled. There stood a tree about 20 foot wide! There really was no mistaking it. It was magnificent and quite weird to think it had been standing there for over 2000 years.The last stop before making it to Paihia was a lovely seaside town on the west coast called Opononi. Richard promised us a film about a gay dolphin and he didn't disappoint. We sat down in the visitor's centre and (after a painful half an hour of trying to help an old man figure out how to switch on the TV) watched a 10 minute film about the friendly dolphin in the 1950s who was so tame she came up close to the shore every day to play with the visitors and let children ride on her back. Unfortunately she was found dead at only 2 years old washed up on some rocks. No one really knows why although they think it may have been because she was ushered to the shore whenever she didn't go by herself and that may have disturbed her eating patterns. They didn't do an autopsy as it would have meant sending her to Auckland and instead they decided to bury her in front of the hotel she swam by.We made our way back to the bus and watched Richard, Spike and another guy from Argentina called Alessandro run off the pier into the sea in just their underwear. Was great fun to watch but was disappointed in Dan who chickened out despite the fact he was already wearing his swimming shorts. Wimp! Worked wonders for Alessandro though who, after being seen in nothing but some very skimpy pants, for some reason became very popular with the ladies.At 5pm we finally arrived in Paihia and stopped at a hostel down the road from where we were staying to pay for a $10 BBQ later that night. We then checked into the Bay Adventurer and were ripped off about $36. Much to Dan's disgust, I had a bit of an argument with the girl about it but it was pointless so I let it go.After hanging around for a while we went to the Pipi Patch Hostel for the BBQ and free pint and met up with the other Magic Bus travellers. These nights are a brilliant way of getting to know everyone. We drank a lot and I "bonded" with some girls from Bournemouth called Gemma and Hayley who have promised to show me around when I move there in September but will probably never remember who I am. We also chatted a lot to Richard who got a bit annoyed when I told some of the newer travellers some of Magic's ways of ripping you off. We then went to a club called "Saltys" for a few more drinks but it was embarassingly awful so we left Gemma and Hayley to it. It was a good night and even nicer knowing we could lie in the next day.Quite glad I did this week in two parts now or none of you would ever have got through it! Congratulations to anyone who actually did manage to read the whole thing, although you probably do have too much time on your hands.Hope everyone's well. Let me know how you're all getting on and what you're up to. A huge good luck to everyone doing final exams (or indeed any kind of exams) at university at the moment. Know there are a few of you. Mind you, if you're reading this instead of studying then the good luck is wasted as you're all doomed to fail.Get ready for more mammoth updates as I desperately try to catch up with the last month's worth. In the mean time, keep in touch and take care.
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146435720/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146435720/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1146435720/tpod.html Fri, 28 Apr 2006 08:53:16 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Paihia, New Zealand

Yes people, it's that time again! Stop your moaning and groaning - this update should be a good'un! I told you in my last entry that this week looked like it was going to be good and I wasn't wrong. As this is likely to be even longer than usual, I'll break it into two parts so it's easier to read at your leisure!After Wellington we got back on the bus and drove to Napier, a city decimated by a huge earthquake in 1931. It was completely rebuilt in the style of the times and is now called the art deco city of the world. Our new driver Scotty took us first to Mount Bruce Wildlife Centre where we took A Short Walk Through A Rainforest - should I ever write a book about these travels, that will certainly be the title - to take a look at the rare birds and animals there. Most of them were hiding in the cages but we finally came across the Kakas which seemed to take a liking to me. This tends to happen quite a lot with birds for some reason but it's good to know I'm attractive to at least one species! It was quite fun to try to walk away and have a bird traverse the cage Indiana Jones style to try to keep up with me.While there we also got the chance to see a kiwi which are normally very difficult to find as they're nocturnal and very endangered. In fact, their numbers have apparently diminished by 90% over the last 30 years. It took us a few minutes to try and see the bird in the pitch black with only infra red light to help see through the glass. When we did find her it was really lovely and we stood there a good 15 minutes just watching her poke around in the leaves an inch away from my face. Of course it would have been nice to see these birds in the wild but we'd never have been able to get so close that we could see the pattern in its feathers or the nostrils on the end of its beak. It's a lovely bird and much bigger than I expected, slightly larger than a chicken. I hope they can be seen for years and years to come and that the next generations don't have to look at pictures in a book to see the bird that gave New Zealand it's nickname. We got back on the bus with the promise of a $2 beer tasting session at the Tui brewery. Devastation quickly spread throughout the bus when we found it shut due to it being Easter Sunday (it's against the law to sell alcohol on Easter unless specifically bought to accompany a meal) and that it also meant the $10 winery tour and tasting we'd signed up for would also be cancelled! Honestly you'd have thought someone had died with that much misery!The rest of the drive was rather long and boring with stops being a waste of time with nothing open. We arrived in Napier over 2 hours earlier than expected and got picked up by a minibus to take us to our home for the night. We'd chosen to stay at a hostel that up until 1993 had been a prison and before that an asylum. Our room was a converted cell where they'd basically ripped out the prisoner's bunks and bunged in a proper bed! It was brilliant if not rather creepy but I knew it would be quite an experience!We made ourselves a snack and I came across some scales for the first time since the beginning of our America trip. Convinced I'd put on at least 20 pounds thanks to our pie-for-breakfast diet (next time someone asks you who ate all the pies, you'll know the answer), I jumped on and found I'd actually managed to lose half a stone. Not only was this a miracle but it also meant I was well under the weight limit to do a skydive... Not convinced they were right, I asked a girl wearing a skydiving t-shirt (who therefore must have been weighed recently) whether she could hop on the scales and tell me if they were accurate. This seemed to spur a queue of people volunteering themselves for the job and all confirmed it was more or less spot on. Crap! I've never been more disappointed to have lost weight! My excuses not to jump out of a plane (other than "I don't want to die", which remains a pretty good one) were rapidly running out.Scotty persuaded us to take a walk down to the town to look around a market we'd passed earlier (along with a pumping Jesus concert) so we headed off down a steep short cut down a mountainside. We walked for 20 minutes at a ridiculous pace (curse these short legs!) only to find it had closed an hour ago and everyone had packed up. We took a walk around the town (which was eerily empty as it was Easter) and ended up in the pub so the starving Scotty could get some food. Dan and I got a bowl of chips to share so we could buy some beer and that was apparently legally enough (for the Easter drinking laws) to allow us to drink for the next 6 1/2 hours! That's got to be one big bowl of chips.After a couple of hours of chatting we were joined by Scottish twins Izzy and Maz McCracken who genuinely have a brother unfortunate enough to be called Phil and another brother Chris whose work email address "C.McCrack" had to be changed as people thought it was spam. They'd been on the bus with us for quite a while now but we'd never really spoken to them before. It was a shame actually because they were really good fun. Eventually the table grew (number wise - I was only joking about the bowl of chips being big) with several other Magic Bus people joining us until there were 11 of us sat there. We were having a great time talking and laughing, particularly when I revealed I was thinking about doing a skydive the next day which prompted everyone to pitch in with their own stories of how amazing it is. Toward the end of the night we were discussing how different nationalities talk after the non-English speakers admitted they couldn't understand anything the McCrackens were saying! Some Irish girls sat at a table behind us (who we hadn't even noticed before that point) seemed to take great offense when Scotty said something in Gaelic and apparently hadn't pronounced it correctly. They became very aggressive and kept telling the "f*cking pommy" to go home. There are several ironies in that comment and even if you ignore the fact that they weren't New Zealanders either (I suggested we all get our plane tickets together so that we could get a bulk discount) it does seem rather unfortunate that they picked the only guy there that was actually from New Zealand. They then spat out some drivel about how backpackers go travelling and then spend their time talking to other English people, which also didn't really stand true as out of the 11 people only Dan and I were from England. In my opinion one of the many fantastic things about travelling is the opportunity to talk to people from all over the world, and with 6 nationalities covered in the 11 of us there I think we'd taken full advantage of that. They continued to pick on Scotty (unfortunately the best insult they could think of was "how can you go out in public when you're that ugly"! Good one!) who behaved impeccably despite being pretty wound up by their unjustified vitriol. He was embarrassed that this would be the lasting memory of our time in Napier which was such a contrast to all the friendly places we'd been to before now. We continued our evening purposefully ignoring them knowing it would wind them up further and they proved us right when they repeatedly tried to calm each other down by saying, "ok, stop it now" but then continued to stage whisper insults and threats of what they wanted to do to us. Had they not ruined a great night I would have found it hilarious.I didn't sleep too well that night thanks to a combination of skydive fear and hearing footsteps out in the prison corridors that made me wonder briefly whether the stories of the prison ghost - several people had been hung only metres from our cell - could perhaps be true. It turned out to be one of the rare moments when I was glad it was just a selfish backpacker who didn't care about making noise.We finally got up at 6.15am and had a shower after laughing at the sign warning us not to drop the soap. I was getting pretty nervous about the jump by that point but ran into a guy in the showers who told me that his 90 year old father had recently done one and loved it. After that I wasn't left with much excuse. We got on the coach and when Scotty asked who was thinking of doing a jump that day, knowing full well that I was, 10 grinning faces turned and looked at me expectantly. I reluctantly put my hand up and he passed me the sign up sheet. I put my name down for a 15,000ft jump, the highest one you can do (in for a penny etc!), and wrote "holy crap!" in the comments section which seemed to make people laugh when they read it.A few hours later we neared Taupo and I was hauled off the coach on my own (meanie Dan couldn't be bothered to come and watch! Charming!) and into the Taupo Tandem Skydiving minibus with the personal number plate "MAXBUZ". The driver Dave was really friendly and turned out to be from Birmingham (where I lived briefly) and he had gone to college in Farnborough and so frequently went out in Reading. After a previous bus driver Eric told me he'd lived in Tilehurst near Reading, I was beginning to wonder if these people were following me around!The weather was beautiful when I was dropped off and I nervously gave details of my next of kin in case I "left my things in the locker". That made me laugh (probably too much) and I wondered how many nervous skydivers would have understood the allusion. I signed up to have a camera person jump with me and then jumped on their scales which proved Napier Prison's set were indeed accurate. Damn it. I was then shown through to the waiting area where I put my stuff away and watched the parachute packers do their thing. I then sat outside and watched the plane take off with 8 scared people and their instructors and 20 minutes later saw them reappear as tiny dots in the sky. It was brilliant fun to watch, particularly when I noticed they'd all made it down alive and came back to the changing area buzzing with adrenalin. Shortly before I was due to go up, the sky suddenly clouded over and I sat with the other people waiting to go up as we listened out for the weather report. After 20 minutes of watching them entertain themselves with acrobatic lifts they'd learnt together (looked good fun!) we heard the bad news that the clouds weren't going to move and the jumps for the rest of the day had been cancelled. I was so disappointed that I'd hyped myself up this much for nothing. The good news was that I could rebook the jump. The bad news was that it was for 7am the next morning. I texted Dan to let him know, got my stuff and Dave drove me to the YHA. We spent the rest of the day walking around town, doing some shopping and having lunch at the pub.The next morning I got up at 5am (which was quite early for a girl like me) following another disturbed nights sleep waiting for the Skydive of Doom. I had a shower and waited anxiously for 6.50am to arrive so I could ring to find out if the jump was still on. Having seen the black angry skies, it came to no surprise to me to hear from another disappointed traveller that it had been cancelled once again. I called anyway to find out if there was any hope of rebooking for later and was told the weather would be "shitty" for the rest of the day. I was left with the decision whether to wait for tomorrow and potentially waste a day of our trip or to carry on to Mount Maunganui and then regret it when we woke up to beautiful sunshine. There really was no decision to make and after confirming we could stay in the hostel another night, I rebooked our coach journey for the next day and signed myself up for tomorrow's 7am jump. Would it be third time lucky? I was beginning to think that God was trying to tell me that jumping out of a plane wasn't a great idea.With a whole day to spare we had a leisurely breakfast and had a chat with the girls who had broken the news to me earlier that morning. We took a walk to the supermarket to get some nice deli food for lunch to cheer me up and spent most of the rest of the day booking things for Australia. It poured down with rain the entire day and I had little hope that it would clear up completely by the next morning.The next day it was another 5am start (which was early for a girl like me) and this time I'd actually slept a bit better, starting to believe that the jump would never happen. We woke up to still pretty cloudy skies but for the first time there were patches of blue - well, navy at that time in the morning! I rang at 6.50am and was told the jump was indeed going ahead. I'm not sure whether I was pleased or not! All I remember thinking was "holy crap!" Maybe the comments section I'd filled out before had been a premonition.Dave picked me up at 7am and was surprised to hear how unlucky I'd been. This time the minibus was full and I listened as Dave gave them the spiel and showed them where everything is, all the time saying "Lynne, you know all this by now!". When we got there, I overheard him having a word with the people behind the desk telling them that I'd already had 2 failed bookings and asking whether they could stick me on an early flight to ensure I went up. I heard them promise they'd get me on the 2nd or 3rd plane. I walked through to the waiting area and was pleased to see locker #7 (my lucky number) was free - I'm happy to be superstitious when I'm about to plummet 15,000ft to the ground! Just as I was locking it up, they started announcing the names of the people on the first plane. After rolling out 7 names, they added "oh and Lynne, we're going to get you on this plane too." What?! Oh. My. God. Five minutes after I'd arrived I was putting on my red jumpsuit and climbing into a harness. I met my tandem instructor Benny who I later found out is the New Zealand skydiving champion - wish I'd known that before we went up! He tightened my harness so 'efficiently' that I was barely able to walk and my legs stuck out akimbo! We were ushered over to a TV where they played a video telling us what to do and I looked around to make sure no one else was able to pay any attention either. None of it sank in whatsoever because frankly there's quite a lot of stuff going through your mind at that point. But before I could worry too much, Benny was walking me over to the plane. I was the only one doing a 15,000ft jump as most people jump from 12,000ft so I had to be first on. While we were waiting I also met Ceri, my camera woman, who was from Wales and very tiny and cute. We waited for 10 minutes while the clouds passed over (had the jump been cancelled then I'd have flown the plane myself and jumped out) and the tandem instructors nagged the pilot to take off as the clouds would be long gone by the time we got to 12,000ft. We loaded ourselves on (with me walking like I'd pooed myself as my harness was so tight!) and the realisation that it was definitely going to happen started to kick in. I didn't really feel any "fear" by this point, just a few nerves and a constant feeling of "is this really happening?"! I was glad to see I wasn't the only one with bad thoughts running through my head when a girl behind me asked her instructor how many jumps he'd done so far which her friend managed to somehow mishear as "How many people have died so far this year?" When the guy answered "over 8000", the poor girl almost fainted!We sat in the small plane straddling a tiny bench and got rather intimate with the people sitting around us. I have never seen anyone more petrified than the guy sat next to me. I tried to joke with him but I think his thoughts of death overcame his sense of humour. After everyone was ready, the door was shut and the plane took off. I mentioned that I wasn't too keen on flying, but they pointed out that if something did happen to the plane we had parachutes on our backs so we'd be ok! You can't argue with that logic. As it happened, the flight was very smooth and very enjoyable. The view was beautiful of Lake Taupo (which, if you remember, is bigger than Singapore) and "Mount Doom" had been sprinkled in snow since the last time we were here. At one point the sun shone against one side of the plane and cast a shadow on the clouds surrounded by hundreds of circular rainbows. I kept thinking to myself, "Please try and remember all of this!" knowing full well there was just too much to take in. It was so fantastic that I completely forgot what it was I was waiting to do and was surprised when 20 minutes later we'd almost reached 12,000ft and everyone was clipping themselves together in preparation for the jump. When we got to 12,000ft, the door was opened and the plane became freezing cold in a reminder of how high we were. I watched excitedly as each pair shuffled over to the door, sat on the edge and then bent round awkwardly to pose for their exit photo, desperately trying to pretend they weren't terrified. The instructor then pulled their head back against their chest and fell out of the plane into oblivion. Unbelievable. Every time someone jumped, the plane wobbled upward from it suddenly getting lighter. I watched it over and over again until I realised that it was just me and my instructors (and the pilot!) left. Next it was my turn. The door was slammed shut and we zoomed up to 15,000ft. After 12,000ft they offer you oxygen as the air thins significantly, but thankfully I didn't need it. I think I'd have freaked out if I had.Ceri kept looking at me and grinning while I kept saying "I must be crazy!" over and over. Later on she told me she couldn't help staring at me because my face looked such a picture! Before I knew it, I felt Benny lift me up and shuffle me toward the door. The moment had come. Ceri opened the door and crawled outside, clinging onto a bar by the door while she waited for us. I don't actually remember getting from the bench to the door (it's about 2-3ft between them and I wasn't sure how we'd get there when we were so tightly strapped together) other than it was swift and easy. Benny sat on the edge and I realised that I was no longer in the plane but just dangling from him just outside. It was a very weird feeling that I don't think I could begin to describe. We posed for the photo, Benny pulled the camera cord and then he pulled my head back and we fell out of the plane.By this point I wasn't scared or nervous anymore. My fate had been taken out of my hands. The whole thing just felt like it was happening to someone else and I was along for the ride! Benny tilted us slightly as we fell out of the plane so that I could see the belly of the plane as we fell. Seeing it get smaller above us was initially absurd (my brain simply couldn't process what was going on!) but was then fantastic as I began to enjoy the freefall. Benny tapped me on the shoulder to tell me I could stretch out my arms and for the next minute or so I tried to feel what it would be like to fly.The wind was immense and blasted past my face and through my ears. It didn't feel as though we were falling at all other than the wind and my ears repeatedly popping. I tried to whoop with excitement but instead got 10 tons of air in my lungs which at least probably helped us to float! So many things flew through my mind as I tried to take in all the sensations and I completely forgot that Ceri was there. After about 15 seconds I remembered I'd paid a fortune to have this woman point a camera at me, and Benny and I made faces at her and did thumbs up signs (there's a limit to what you can physically do!). I kept looking away to look below me as the view was spectacular. I'm terrified of heights but I wasn't scared at all because you don't have any perception of just how high you are. It was awesome. Before I knew it I felt Benny reach for the parachute and I held onto my harness in preparation for the jerk - quite a few people get caught out by it and I'd heard a lot about people passing out. After a short while I felt what seemed like being pulled upwards and I watched Ceri fall away waving goodbye below us. I was overcome with peacefulness and calm as we hung there in silence for a few seconds taking in the view. Didn't last long as I uttered my first swearword of the morning trying to describe to Benny how amazing that was! Most people like the freefall the most but those few seconds for me were just magical. Seeing the world below me as I drifted silently toward it was one of the most amazing experiences I think I'll ever have. It was spoilt slightly by suddenly feeling myself slip downward away from Benny as my harness loosened but, after a few foolish questions thrown at him, he assured me it was on purpose and I wouldn't fall! I think I'd have preferred it if he'd warned me! He moved my leg harness down my thighs slightly so that I could sit in it instead of hang, and we drifted along enjoying the moment.After a minute or so he asked me if I wanted to take in some of the view and I foolishly agreed not knowing what he meant. He suddenly jerked on one side of the chute and swung us wildly up 90 degrees from the ground so that we were facing it as we had been before. He then did the same thing to the other side and we swung around in figure 8s until the ground came closer and closer. I didn't actually like that so much as the weight shift was quite sore on my thighs where the harness dug in and even now a week later I still have bruises there. It was quite fun though despite the pain!All too soon we were almost back on the ground and Benny told me to lift my legs up as far as I could. The ground got closer a bit too quickly for my liking but the landing was smooth and fun as we slid along the damp grass. A cameraman was there filming my landing as he had done for the other people, who by that time I'd completely forgotten about. After swapping a sly smile with the petrified bloke from the plane (who was now akin to the Cheshire Cat), I went and stood with them and we all grinned from ear to ear as we filmed our closing segment for the DVD. We cheered and whooped and threw our hats into the air before jumping down on the ground and kissing it. Great fun!After all the euphoria and congratulating each other on being alive, we were led back to the changing rooms and then into a tiny cinema. We looked at each other's exit photos (some were even more amusing than my chipmunk one, with my only thought regarding mine being "if I'd died, that monstrosity of a photo would have been the last one ever taken of me!") and then sat down to watch the DVD taken of me and the other fella who'd also paid a fortune for it. It was brilliant to see what I'd looked like on the way down (not nearly as terrified as I'd have expected) and when Green Day's "Good Riddance (Time Of Your Life)" came on to accompany the landings, I felt myself get a bit emotional. It was weird because I hadn't felt like that at all beforehand but at that moment I just felt so proud of myself for overcoming my fears and doing something I'll hopefully remember and cherish for the rest of my life. Jesus, I'm so glad that I did.<i>So take the photographs and still frames in your mindHang it on a shelf in good health and good timeTattoos of memories and dead skin on trialFor what its worth it was worth all the whileIts something unpredictable, but in the end its right,I hope you had the time of your life.- Green DayTo be continued....
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145160000/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145160000/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1145160000/tpod.html Mon, 17 Apr 2006 01:59:07 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Wellington, New Zealand

Wow is week 3 over already? It's flown by! The first 2 weeks were action packed and felt like 2 months, but the past week has slipped past without me even noticing. I must be getting into the swing of things!I last left you in Queenstown where I was lying on my deathbed bravely overcoming some sort of deadly virus. Something like that anyway. Well I managed to drag my sorry arse out of bed and left Queenstown for Dunedin, the beer and chocolate capital of New Zealand. Our new driver was called Mangu and was the first Maori driver we've had on our trip. It was nice to get a different perspective of the country and on the Maori legends we get told as we travel around. Unfortunately he did have a seriously bad taste in music so most of our journeys were spent listening to our ipods and being generally antisocial.We got into Dunedin at lunch time and checked into our hostel above a nice pool bar that served guests $1 glasses of beer... Dunedin (translated: "Edinburgh of the South" as the Scottish had settled here to escape the English!) was fairly nice although we didn't really get to see much of it. Soon after we arrived we walked down to the Cadburys chocolate factory and joined the discounted (due to it being a Sunday) tour. Despite it only being $8 (about 2 pound 80) it was still quite a rip off as we didn't get to see much other than a short film about how the chocolate was manufactured and then we were given a couple of measly fun-sized crunchies. The one in Birmingham is far better, but then I suppose we did go on a day the factory wasn't in operation so perhaps it's better midweek. We did get to climb inside a huge silo and watch a tonne of chocolate form a waterfall so I guess it was worth it just for that. No oompa loompas though sadly.We left Dunedin the next day and headed for Lake Tekapo. First stop was Baldwin Street, officially the world's steepest street. There wasn't much chance of me making it to the top (although perhaps it could have helped burn off half the stock of Cadbury's outlet shop I bought yesterday...) so I kindly sent up Dan to take photos while I stood at the bottom. Glad I was that heartless because he came back panting and wheezing and mumbling something about it feeling like you were walking backwards! I'd surely have collapsed halfway up and there'd have been no chance of an ambulance getting anywhere near me. See, I was just making sure I wasn't wasting the emergency services' time! I'm good like that.An hour later we stopped at Moeraki Beach where we had a short stroll along the shore to look at the perfectly spherical boulders sticking out of the sand. Thankfully they look better in the photos than they did in real life, but perhaps we just don't appreciate round rocks as much as we should. We had a snack in the cafe (which for some reason seemed more popular than the boulders..!), took a look at some animals that looked like deer but were as big as horses and then we got back on the road.After buying another sheep (this time a pillow - see my souvenirs are practical as well as nice!) we finally arrived at our hostel, a backpackers lodge right on the lakefront. The surroundings were absolutely beautiful and couldn't really have been more wild. The lounge had a huge log fire with sofas set out all around it and looking out through the glass walls over the lakefront and mountains beyond. Not bad for 13 pounds each! We took a walk along the bright blue lake to the centre of Tekapo and to the Church of the Good Shepherd - a tiny church with absolutely stunning surroundings. We walked a little further to the statue of the collie dog which the women of Tekapo had raised money to have made before sending it over to Britain to get bronzed. I can't really remember why the dog was so appreciated. I vaguely recall it being something to do with the dogs exploring the dangerous land to help re-claim it but Dan remembers it being something to do with the dogs protecting the women while the men went off to build the villages. I really should look it up considering we have about 15 photos of it including the obligatory 'Sheppie At...' shot.The next day we had a full coach for the first time on our trip. The journey to Christchurch was uneventful with Dan's highlight being passing through the town of Fairlie which he renamed "Fairlie Dull" and then insisted on repeating the joke for the rest of the day. After a brief stop for brunch we found ourselves driving through a little suburb of Christchurch called (drum roll please) Templeton! The second Templeton of our trip but this time accidental. We didn't stop there though sadly so the only photo I have of it is the bakery we passed at 70mph. That's still enough for me to be chuffed about though. I might rename this trip the Templeton Tour.Christchurch turned out to be one of my and Dan's favourite places in New Zealand so far. We stayed in a hostel right in the centre of the city and on the Cathedral Square, a beautiful area surrounded by cafes and fish and chip stalls, a giant chess board and of course the beautiful cathedral. After a very brief wander, we went to the hostel bar (the Saints and Sinners) where we met a load of other Magic Bus travellers who had the same idea. We had a few pints of the super cold Export Gold taking advantage of the happy hour prices and watched a guy from Australia called - you guessed it - Bruce do some magic and juggling. He wasn't bad but did offer to down half a pint every time he dropped a ball which got him rather drunk! We then had a paper, scissors, stone competition for a Stray (a company similar to Magic) bus pass around the South Island. People took it quite seriously which made it good fun with one girl spitting "F*ck you!" to the guy who beat her and another doing warm up exercises as he waited for his heat. I managed to get myself disqualified by disputing the judge's decision but enjoyed the notoriety that comes with being thrown out of a paper, scissors, stone contest! Was good fun despite its simplicity and the guy who beat me ended up winning and had only just bought his bus pass earlier in the day. Isn't it ironic, don't you think?We left the bar just after 9 and headed to another nearby for a bit of dinner and a few more drinks. Was quite a nice and friendly bar until 2 middle aged American men started a conversation about how they didn't "get on with black people" and something about how slavery ended 200 years ago so get over it already..! They seemed ready to start discussing the English so it seemed a good time to leave.The next morning we didn't have to get up for the bus so treated ourselves to a spectacular lie-in until 9am. We asked directions to the supermarket and set off on a 15 minute walk to the Pac'n'Save. I really like Christchurch but it felt like we were walking through a rather seedy area with shops selling "party pills" and massage parlours appearing on every street. One Vietnamese buffet restaurant offered massages as well as food and I felt obliged to ask Dan whether he thought it was all-you-can-eat. New Zealand has brought the crudeness out in me, obviously.The supermarket was horrifically busy which put us both in a bad mood, although at least it was pretty cheap. We tried to buy some Freixenet (sparkling wine) which was only $8 (about 2 pounds 80, compared to it being about 8 pounds in England) but were rather amused to be asked for ID and then find they didn't accept any of the kind we were carrying. They do have a policy here of asking anyone who looks under 25 for ID which is fair enough but, unfortunately for him, not even Dan looks 24 let alone 17! I did find it fun to be refused alcohol by someone a good 5 years younger than me particularly as we then paid for our shopping using a Mastercard. Perhaps he was happy to let us use a stolen credit card so long as we don't under-age drink. Still, Dan's chuffed he looks like a teenager and I can only conclude that waterfall at Milford Sound that makes women look 10 years younger must have worked!Since we lacked cheap alcohol, Dan and I headed to the Saints and Sinners bar for a few happy hour specials. It was pretty empty so we decided to leave just as the entertainment was about to start in fear of being forced to be volunteers. Seemed a good move as shortly after I was passed by two girls leaving saying "There was no need for that, it wasn't even funny!". We found ourselves an Irish bar and had a pint of Kilkenny beer in honour of my mum who's from Kilkenny and a vague recollection that my grandfather had something to do with the brewery. Knowing Irish people though, it could just be that he single handedly kept them in business ;)The next day we headed out into Christchurch with a picnic after stopping in the newsagents for a small bottle of sparkly which Dan made me buy as he was crapping himself he'd get IDed again! We took some photos of the city and settled down by the river to have our food but quickly moved from the grass onto a nearby bench when thousands of ducks and seagulls decided to join us. We watched several people punting along the river and then saw a graduation ceremony parade from the University of Canterbury led by a man in a kilt playing the bagpipes. It was really nice to watch the proud students and even prouder parents march through the city and stop all the traffic.We spent most of the rest of the day watching films with other backpackers and trying to find a cinema showing Ice Age 2 after dark. We failed.For the first time since the first day we boarded the Magic Bus, the next morning we were waiting for the coach a good 15 minutes before it was due. We'd heard that the activities in our next destination got booked up quickly and the best way to ensure a place was to sit behind the driver and be the first to put your name on the activity booking sheet. Would have worked beautifully had the driver not handed the clipboard round the opposite direction to every other driver so that we ended up last instead of first! Thankfully it didn't matter and we secured our places on the whale watching trip.The journey to Kaikoura was pretty and we stopped at a fur seal colony where we took some more photos in case the other 70 we took previously weren't enough. We stopped for some breakfast which I promptly threw up for most of the rest of the journey. Need to start eating more operation-friendly food to stop this happening. I've never felt pain like it.We arrived in Kaikoura at about 11.30am and checked into our hostel. After a quick lie-down we walked 5 minutes along the beach to the whale watching centre. We got a coach to the docks and boarded the catamaran which took us out to sea. After about 15 minutes we came across our first beautiful sperm whale taking a breather on the water's surface. We rushed upstairs to the top viewing deck and took a million photos that will never do the magnificent sight justice. After about 10 minutes the whale arched its back, swung its tail up in the air and dove back down into the depths of the ocean. Unbelievable.We were so lucky (for once!) with the weather and had perfect conditions out on the water. We saw 2 more whales called Tono and Noodle (so called because he always spends exactly 2 minutes on the surface so is named after New Zealand's well-advertised 2 minute noodles) and we also saw another whale off in the distance. They were so amazing to watch even though you could only really see their backs. Noodle did show a bit of his face but I missed it trying to get a picture of his tail. We were really lucky to see so many whales as most people often only briefly see the one. We also saw a shark and loads of albatross before sailing into a HUGE pod of Dusky Dolphins. There must have been at least a 100 if not more. They jumped and flipped and showed off for at least 20 minutes before we finally had to sail on and leave them behind. It was wonderful seeing them so close and friendly. It's one thing to go to Sea World and see Flipper jump over a rope for his fishy reward but it's another to see so many competing in the open sea, showing off to the people watching and hoping one of the female dolphins might be impressed enough to do the dirty which they incidently do 8 times a day just for fun!We then sailed around the fur seal colony we stopped at earlier in the day and eventually returned back to shore. What a trip! Possibly the highlight of our journey (and maybe my life?) so far. Truly unforgettable.The next day we waved a very reluctant goodbye to the South Island and got on the Interislander Ferry back to Wellington in the North. We got some seats by a window in the hope we might see more dolphins but they never arrived. We got some tea in the cafe of "should I have ordered a short black instead?" fame. There wasn't much of a queue this time but that seemed to confuse them and they forgot to make our drinks. At least they're consistant. We then met a few people from the bus and the guy Sheriff who'd been our coach's chief at the Maori night a few weeks ago and also bumped into a couple who'd shared our cottage in Franz Josef. It's weird how you can run into the same people over and over.We got off the ferry and collected our bags but were too late to fit on the first free shuttle to our hostel. The driver assured me in an Arnie voice that he'd be back but after about 10 minutes a guy came over and asked Jamie, a girl we were with, whether she was Canadian. After a bit of a chat, it turned out he was a Stray bus driver and none of his passengers had turned up which I'd seen him looking for them earlier. He offered us all a lift to round the corner from where we were staying and we all gladly jumped on the coach. It was pretty cool as there were only 5 of us on the bus with the driver who gave us a little guided tour of Wellington before dropping us off. We only had a 5 minute walk to Wildlife House (the hostel we'd stayed in before that's painted like a zebra) rather than the 30 minute one we'd have had after the free shuttle.We headed out into the streets of the city and picked up a very cheap curry before going to the cinema to see Ice Age 2. Great film (not as good as the first one though) but the cinema was really loud - I must be getting old! We walked back to the hostel and passed a really awful singing busker who got the process slightly wrong and kept throwing his own money into his hat. We got back to our room to find we were on a floor with what seemed like an entire American school with kids ranging in age from about 10 to about 18. The floor had been turned into party central with the dorm opposite ours acting as the main hang out. We weren't too impressed with the noise continuing all the way through the night with the teachers just occasionally whispering "shhh!" down the hallway. That's the beauty of staying in hostels though I guess!So that about completes week 3 of New Zealand and already week 4 looks like it's going to be another good one. We're now heading back north toward the Coromandel Peninsula and the Bay of Islands, both of which are meant to be beautiful. Just under 2 weeks left here before we head over to Australia and a week or so later reach our halfway mark. It's crazy.Anyway, I hope my updates aren't too bloody boring and some of you manage to make it through each essay! I've loved hearing from you and all your comments, even if sometimes it takes me a little while to reply. Hope you're all well, take care and make sure you keep me up to date with the gossip!
]]> http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1144468140/tpod.html http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1144468140/tpod.html#comments Travel Blogs http://www.travelpod.com/travel-blog-entries/lynnetempleton/rtw2006/1144468140/tpod.html Sun, 09 Apr 2006 01:08:11 -0400 Round the world in 206 days!

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Queenstown, New Zealand

Kia Ora! Week 2 in New Zealand has gone already and I'm afraid that means it's time for another momentus update.I last updated from Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, where we spent a few days to have a break from the relentless pace of our coach tour around New Zealand. It was nice to relax and not have to rush around too much. Didn't last long though as we left our hostel far too late and ended up running to the YHA to catch our shuttle to the ferry. We made it though and even got to run past a few people still drinking champagne outside the pub they'd been in since the night before. You've got to love 24 hour drinking.We met up with a few people from our bus that we'd left behind in Taupo and made our way to the ferry. Before settling down in the "reclining chair" section we decided to get some coffee and joined the huge queue at the cafe. We were all served quickly and told to wait at the end of the counter for our drinks. 20 minutes later we, along with at least 30 other passengers, were still waiting while one poor girl tried to get through the orders as quickly as possible. We were stood next to an old guy who had ordered a "long black" and frequently asked around if he'd have got his drink sooner if he'd only wanted a short one. I found this vaguely amusing to begin with but by the time he'd repeated it 15 or so times Dan didn't find it quite so funny.The ferry took about 3 hours to get to Picton and we spent most of it listening the Ricky Gervais podcasts on our iPods and having a snooze. At one point about 15 dolphins swam and jumped alongside the ferry but unfortunately they managed to pick the one time Dan went to the toilet so he missed them. Shame I didn't get a photo, it was just brilliant fun to watch! The dolphins that is, not Dan going to the toilet.We got picked up at the other side by a guy named Carl who announced as soon as we met him that once he'd dropped us off in Nelson he was on holiday so the sooner he got us there the better. He wasn't joking either and he put his foot down before the coach doors had even closed! We arrived in Nelson a few hours later, were dumped on the side of the road and then Carl burned off round the corner. We weren't too impressed! Still we all vaguely agreed we'd probably have done the same.Nelson is called "The Sunshine Capital of New Zealand", which meant that it rained the entire time we were there. The town seemed nice though and we had a little walk around it before returning to our hostel with some incredibly cheap beer. Our room was inside a tiny little cottage in the hostel garden and had the smallest en suite I've ever seen. I found great amusement in having to stand on the toilet to have a shower. Despite this, it was actually one of the best showers we've had in a hostel, particularly because we hadn't even paid to have our own bathroom. We thought the hostel was nice but from what we hear from our friends it seems we were lucky. Apparently the dorms were full of bed bugs and the bathrooms were missing walls and no one got any sleep until 5am because of a load of noisy people in the sauna and spa. Thankfully we were oblivious to all of this and had a nice time.The next day we got up at Ridiculous O'Clock and left for Abel Tasman National Park just after 7am. Our bus driver Bruce was a character and the complete opposite to silent Carl, insisting on telling us everything about what we were passing, mainly about the orchards who were having the 4th bad year in a row and were having to shut down. We did pass some random things though such as a 30 foot statue of a kiwi - the bird, rather than New Zealander! - and an alien inside a phone box next to his broken down spaceship! Bruce also explained New Zealand's good relationship with Australia, so good in fact that Australia had sent a load of their convincts over to build the road we were driving on. Some of them had come back and left their mark by carving a brilliant little koala into the rocks in the sea.Despite the weather being ok when we left, by the time we arrived at the park it was pouring with rain. We got on a small boat which was supposedly a scenic cruise but instead became a refuge from the rain. We were dropped off at Torrent Bay and left to to walk back to Marahau where the coach would pick us up. We grouped together with a few friends and set off vaguely cheerfully for about 20 metres until we found the main pathway was covered by the high tide and would have to take a 4km / 2.5 mile detour. This meant the total walk back to Marahau where we were being picked up was 17km / 10.5 miles long! The track was windy and initially very steep so I wasn't particularly happy to find after 2 1/2 hours of walking that we were only a third of the way there. The rain had quickly turned into a torrential downpour and what should have been an enjoyable visit to one of the most beautiful places in the Pacific became an endurance march full of misery. The paths turned into rivers and we realised there wasn't much point avoiding the "puddles" as we were soaked through and couldn't get any wetter. We didn't see any of the view as the rain was so heavy and we didn't have time to stop off at the beautiful beaches along the way in case we didn't make it back in time for the last coach home. As it happened the last 10km were much flatter and we made it back to Marahau after 4 hours 50 minutes. Considering the weather, terrain and how ridiculously unfit I am (shamefully so) it wasn't a bad time. There wasn't much room for feeling a sense of achievement though as it was quickly taken over by the pain from where my wet trousers chaffed against my skin and had rubbed most of it away. I had to walk as though I'd had an accident in my trousers!This day out, by the way, was described by Magic as "a scenic cruise followed by an easy walk through the park". Had either of us known their idea of an easy walk was a 17km hike up and down cliffs we would have given it a miss and chosen something less... 'easy'. I'm sure it would have given some fabulous views in good weather but it still would have been a bloody long walk.After a cookie and some hot chocolate with marshmallows in the cafe in Marahau we got on the coach and had a cold and wet 1 1/2 hour journey back to Nelson. I have never been happier to stand on a toilet to have a hot shower and soon I was lying in bed in pyjamas revelling in the warmth. We'd bought a bottle of sparkling wine the day before and drank it in bed to help forget the pain. Didn't take much effort to fall asleep!We happily waved goodbye to Nelson and hopped on the bus to drive south along the coast road, considered in the Lonely Planet guide to be the 6th best coastal drive in the world. We stopped off at Paparoa National Park where we jumped/hobbled off to do a short walk down the Truman Track through dense rainforest to the rocky coast. The sea there was wild and raw, crashing against the cliffs and making an awesome roar. We drove on for another half an hour and visited a fur seal colony where there were a lot of newborn pups fast asleep on the rocks. I love zoos and places like Sea World but there's just nothing like being able to see animals in the wild. We stayed there for half an hour and pressed on stopping briefly at Punakaiki to see their "pancake rocks" and blowholes. Unfortunately no one was particularly impressed by them, many debating why they were actually called pancake rocks in the first place.We arrived at Greymouth just in time to get changed and jump on a minibus to take us to the local brewery (Monteiths) for a tour and tasting session. For some reason, this seemed a popular excursion with the Magic Bus patrons. We're all obviously very interested in how beer is made. We were given a very quick and dull tour by someone who didn't even work there and were hurried onto the tasting session after an obnoxious German lady pointed out their bottles here are smaller than in Germany because "small country, small bottles!" The tasting session was, of course, carried out very scientifically and we made sure we were thorough. We tried 6 different types of the beer they made ranging from a stout-like one called Monteiths Black to one with lime called Monteiths Radler. The tour guide, obviously bored by now, announced we could go behind the bar and help ourselves. We didn't need asking twice. Organised chaos ensued as we all queued up to have a go at pulling a pint. I didn't think I was too bad but one of our friends Koen (pronounced "coon" but has to say it as "co-en" whilst in English speaking countries...) seemed to think my technique was hilarious. I happen to like a glass of foam now and again.After half an hour of beer tasting, we got dropped off at a pub and given a free pint of whichever of the Monteiths beer we liked best. We had a free BBQ (if that's what you call a sausage, some onions and a slice of bread) and laid into the bar's supplies. After a few free shots of some weird tasting apple stuff (which later turned out to be melon) the night got rather surreal with a dwarf running around my legs playing hockey with a pool cue and the white ball. Drank loads of beer and a lot of sambucca and then walked back to our hostel. Dan went to bed and I stayed up quite late drinking tea with some Dutch people who kept asking me how I take my milk, to which I could only reply "with a bit of tea in it please".I woke up the next day feeling surprisingly perky but got on the bus to find quite a few quiet people with pale looking faces. After a short drive we stopped in Hokitika and most of us escaped from a jade factory tour in favour of some breakfast at a cafe holding New Zealand's largest teapot collection. Rhod (one of our friends who walked through Abel Tasman with us) was rather disappointed by them though as he'd misheard and thought he was going to see New Zealand's largest teapot, which probably would have served him about enough tea to sober him up.An hour or so later we arrived in Ross where we were given a gold panning demonstration and then left to hsng around in the rain. I did buy a sheep bag though (a bag in the shape of a sheep rather than a bag to carry one around in) so I was happy.We got to Franz Josef nice and early and checked into our hostel. Our room was in a little shack with only one other room to share the kitchen, bathroom and tv lounge. We were so pleased with it we decided to extend our 1 night stay to 2 so we could sleep off our hangover. We borrowed a video from reception and fell asleep on the sofa for a few hours until our shackmate arrived. We'd woken up feeling a little better so headed up to the nearby bar for some food and a pineapple juice. Weirdly, not many of the Magic Bus were out that night!The next day we got up fairly early considering we had no bus to catch. I'd booked a helicopter flight to take me on a scenic flight over the Franz Josef and Fox Glacier (yes ladies and gents - where the mints are named after!) before landing on the top to let us wander around and take some photos. I was really excited but was disappointed to find the weather was crap and the clouds so low that the helicopters weren't flying. I continuously re-booked myself on later flights in the hope that the weather would improve but alas it didn't. Instead I watched some bad tv and was happy to come across a few episodes of Neighbours. Dan had a much more successful day and went on a half day hike up the glacier and got some great photos for me to look at. I wish I could have gone with him but I still have no skin on my thighs and felt ill so would have made his trip miserable. I'm so jealous of him though, it sounded wonderful. Franz Josef is quite unique in the fact that it's in the middle of rainforest but still has a glacier running through it, which apparently doesn't happen very often. It's very beautiful, but no doubt even more stunning close up. I plan to come back one day to see it for myself.We left Franz Josef and set off for Queenstown. It should have been an early morning but after setting the alarm for 6PM by mistake we got a bit of a lie-in! That day was a lot of driving, starting at 7.30am and finishing at 5.30pm. We did have a lot of stops though which broke it up a little but when you know you've got a long trip ahead of you sometimes you just want to get there. First stop was at Lake Matheson where we took a walk to the lakeside and saw why it was often called the "Mirror Lake", reflecting the Southern Alps and Mount Cook from the skyline. We stopped nearby for lunch in a Wild West style saloon where I got a massive plateful of food from the buffet for a bargain $3.50 (about 1 pound 50). Not really sure why it was that price as it was advertised as over twice as much and if you piled your plate up high (which I did) they'd make you pay for the next size up. Instead they asked me if I wanted to pile on a bit more (wasn't sure if they were being sarcastic so said no) and when I didn't they reduced the price. Maybe I looked like I needed a good feed or something. Dan had one of their pies, which New Zealand seems to make a lot of, and passed up the opportunity to have their sandwich randomly titled "TWO JUICY FLAPS of ham AND A BIG KNOB of cheese". Not quite sure why it was called that, the rest of the food was rather boringly lacking in double entendres.After some photo stops of Lake Hawea and Lake Wanaka, we dropped off a few people who wanted to break up the long day of driving. While they organised themselves we went down the road to Puzzling World which had a maze and a load of rooms with different kinds of optical illusions and tricks to look at. We were too stingy to pay to look around but had fun trying to re-create some trick photography using the slanted buildings outside. We were both quite crap at it (as you'll see in the photos) but I must say Dan was particularly awful and his first attempt of photographing me is hilarious. In the end I had to line it all up for him and put dents in the ground to show him where he had to stand and we did eventually get a fairly good photo.We carried onto the Kawerau River to stop at the first commercial bungy site in the world where, after no one else volunteered, we watched our bus driver do a back flip off the ledge. It looked so much fun and was the only time in my life I could see why someone would actually jump off a cliff attached only to a rope. Got back on the coach (wasn't too sure I'd want someone with that much adrenaline pumping through them to be driving along some of these roads!) and eventually made it to Queenstown. Booked into yet another lovely hostel with a balcony outside our room overlooking the town and mountains. We had a shower, got ready and headed out with some other people from the bus. Didn't stay out for long as we had to get up early the next day but we had a few pints (cost $4.50 for 2 pints which is about 1 pound 80) and a free shot of the most disgusting drink I've ever had. Made me gag just smelling it and drinking it produced similar results. Left at about 11 and had an early night.Another early morning as we caught a bus at 7am to take us to Milford Sound. The drive there (200 miles each way) is beautiful. We drove alongside Lakes Wakatipu and Te Anau where we stopped to get a drink and lunch for later on. I was starting to seriously suffer from a bug or something that morning and spent most of the time being sick in the toilets. At least I hadn't drunk much the night before (did have one pint) so no one could accuse me of being hungover! We carried on driving toward and into the World Heritage park (an honour shared by other sites such as the Grand Canyon and the Great Barrier Reef) stopping occasionally to take photos and look at the breathtaking scenery. They'd had a lot of rain over the past few days and the cliff faces became home to hundreds of little waterfalls all along the roadside. We arrived in Milford Sound and took a cruise through the fjords where we saw glacier valleys, river valleys and hundreds more waterfalls, some of which we sailed right under. One, Maori legend decrees, has anti-aging properties for women and any that gets the water on her face will look 10 years younger. I figured it was worth a try. We passed some wild fur seals taking a nap (apparently a popular thing for them to do!) and sailed through waters so rocky that a lot of people thought the boat would roll over. The weather was typically awful and the rain poured down but I actually didn't mind that much. Without it, the waterfalls wouldn't have been so fierce or even there at all. The wind was really strong as well, so much so that one waterfall curled backwards where the wind picked up the spray and blew it back up onto the top of the cliff creating a circle of water. It was weird and wonderful. We got back on the bus a little wet, but I'd learnt my lesson from Abel Tasman and had brought a dry change of clothes. We had a 4 hour drive back to Queenstown and spent half of it watching Finding Nemo in black and white because the DVD player wasn't working properly.That brings us to today. We had a rest day today so we could check out a bit more of Queenstown and I could try to sleep off whatever flu or bug I've had for the past 5 days. We really love Queenstown and wish we could have a little longer here but after 3 days it's time to move on. Tomorrow we cross over to the east of the South Island to Dunedin where we'll be doing a tour of the Cadbury factory! We had the option of either that or another brewery tour but this time chocolate wins, particularly as apparently this factory has a chocolate waterfall and I'm hoping to catch sight of some oompa loompas.Hope you're all happy and getting by without me. Glad to see my last guilt trip regarding emailing me worked - thanks to those of you who took the hint! I love hearing from you so keep them coming. By the way I've now had the chance to upload the photos onto last week's entry so please go and take a look.If I don't get the chance to email before then, have a good Easter and enjoy your hard earned bank holidays. Hope you're having better weather than us!
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