Greeting from NZ
Trip Start
Jul 27, 2004
1
4
42
Trip End
Dec 21, 2004
Rotorua,
New Zealand
Friday, August 6, 2004
Anyway set off from LA on Sunday 1st Aug & arrived in Auckland NZ on Tuesday morning, I know, we still working it out. Flight v. long but Paul found it OK as he slept for about 10 hours of it, Kerry hated the whole thing because she couldn't sleep, she says due to Paul snoring, taking up too much room and slavering on her.
Arrived in Auckland at about 4.30am, couldn't pick up the hire car until 8am. God knows how we passed the time but pass it did and soon we were terrorsing the drivers of NZ. After about an hour of driving we found our way off the ring road surrounding the airport we made our way south to Waitomo (think that's how you spell it). A drive of about 180 miles through an amazing countryside of one volcanic mountains and exotic shrubbery. The reason for visiting Waitomo was the glow worm cave. As the name suggests this is a cave full of glow worms, thousands of the things. After a tour through your normal type cave we went on a boat ride into the bowels of the earth (well it was quite deep) to wonder at the luminescence of these maggots that attach themselves to a cave wall and light up there backsides to attract prey. This is only one of two places on earth (the other being Oz)where these things are found and it must be said the sight was amazing. Very hard to describe but I'll try. In the pitch black of the cave shone what looked like a night sky full of greeny/yellow stars or thousands of fairy lights twinkling.
Pea soup
Well the trip.After the glow worms we set off on a further 150 mile trip (it's turning into an endurance test)to Rotorua the thermal springs & geyser capital of NZ. Entering the area was a very eerie experience. The thermals springs are not confined to parks & tourist traps they occur all over, so at the side of the road will be this bubbling puddle emitting sulphurous steam, trees and shrubs look like they're on fire and the whole area has clouds of steam rising up and drifting along the landscape - as if someone is firing a dry ice machine.
Arrived in fine spirits & Kerry allowed us an evening doing nothing. Booked into a motel, nothing special but it was warm (it's flippin cold here). Motel called Regent's Motel, very central & handy for Rotorua centre and the huge lake that the city is built around. Before I go any further I must explain the downsides of visiting a place that has so many springs & geysers that emit sulphur from the bowels of the earth. Bowels is very apt because the whole place smells like eggy farts or to put it nicer, you know on school trips when there was always one plank who brought along egg sarnies & stank out the whole bus? Well it's like that but much more intense.
Main reason for visiting Rotorua is Wai-O-Tapu which is a thermal springs heaven. Got there early for the Lady Knox geyser eruption which occurs promptly at 10:15am each day helped along by one of the guides who sprinkles soap powder into the spout. Anyway, erupt it did, along with loads of smoke and foam.
Thermal under there
What an amazing sight (still not received those synonyms by the way)and then continued to do so for the next hour ish until the pressure subsided and it was bunged with rags until 10.15 the next day! The rest of the thermal wonderland is weird, lots of bubbling mud, green fluid filled volcano craters and multi-coloured rocks all with one thing in common - the smell.After visiting Wai-o-Tapu we decided to visit some more stinky water and went to a thermal Maori village up the road, more mud bubbling, more pools, and more geysers (this time naturally erupting) and again the smell was there. This village had lots of cultural stuff as well like a carving and weaving bit, a Mari concert (Paul was dying to get up and do the Haka with the men) and a Kiwi bird breeding tank thing. It was interesting to learn a bit about NZ but after all that geography and History Kerry was getting a bit bored so we went to a natural mineral spa for some r and r. It was so good we were sat in pools of v hot water on the edge of a lake !?! Our heads were freezing and the rest of us was boiling, v bizarre.
Anyway the rest of the time in the North Island was spent driving to the South Island or more specifically to Wellington to get the Ferry across to the South Island. Wellington is just like any quite trendy city but with no Jimmy Choo shop (Kerry is trying to find one in every place and grind Paul down so a purchase can be made). We will let you know whether we track one down in NZ and will write soon about our fun on the South Island. xx
ps Pat good luck with your interview. Also can anyone who knows Pat & Al tell them that if they don't read their e-mails/don't e-mail me then I can't correspond directly, thank you.
