Somewhere Over the Rainbow...

To get from the North island of New Zealand to the South, we took a ferry from Wellington across the Cook Straight, docking in Picton after the 3 hour cruise we were ready for our second leg of the country.

We popped into the supermarket for supplies before our drive to Nelson where we would be staying, maybe we should have topped up the petrol tank then too...As we reached Haverlock we were getting rather low on fuel: "It's OK we can get some here"...er..."No its not OK the petrol station has shut down". Yes, it was shut and it was a Shell Garage, not some locally run place. So we continued down the road thinking there would be a petrol station at the next town, only to discover on arrival that that town was even smaller and no there wasn't a petrol station.

I was biting my tongue, as I was thinking: "We should have got some in Picton" , we had been parked right opposite a petrol station there!!

Fitz made the decision to turn around and drive back to Haverlock, whilst all the way I was hoping we'd have enough fuel to get us back there as the needle on the fuel gage sat on the red line. We got back to Haverlock OK with the theory there must be another petrol station somewhere, you couldn't be this far away from anywhere and not have one. After driving around and enquiring in the Chippy, we were directed to see a man in the pub, who promptly lent us a petrol can without us even needing to finish our explanation of why we were there. All we had to do was leave a $20 deposit and go down to the harbour and use the self service pump down there to fill up. Some comfort was had in the fact that this had become quite a common event (so we felt slightly less stupid) since the Shell garage had shut down. The locals were pretty pissed off and where campaigning to get it open again.

We should have got a photo of Fitz using the self service pump but it wasn't amusing at the time. The use of the credit card on the pump also resulted in a phone call from the bank about strange usage of the card , even though they'd been told it would be used in New Zealand - bloody banks!!

We finally made it to Nelson and checked into a nice hostel near the beach aptly named 'The Beach Hostel'. I found Nelson to be a pleasant, relaxed town, with friendly locals and a good amount of sunshine.

Chilling out on Tahuanui beach with a beer was particularly enjoyable.



We wouldn't have believed that it would be flooded out in 3 days time, but unfortunately it was.

A trip to Milford Sound - the most visited place in New Zealand was a must see and definitely worth the 4 hour drive there and back from Te Anau.



Milford Sound is not actually a 'sound' it is a fjord. Sounds are formed by rivers and fjords are formed by glaciers and since Milford Sound was formed by a glacier, it should really be named 'Milford Fjord'. Don't say I never tell you anything useful!

I'm finding this whole round the world trip to be a Geography lesson! If they took kids on field trips around the world I'm sure they would find learning Geography a bit more interesting!!

We took a nature cruise around Milford Sound which was really interesting and informative. The whole place is absolutely gorgeous, it was lovely to go to a place of such natural beauty. The highlight for me was when they took the boat under a waterfall which had created a couple of rainbows and we ended up right underneath one of them.



I got pretty soaked - despite wearing 2 waterproofs - one borrowed waterproof plus my own.



But I absolutely loved it cos they were playing Issac 'Somebody's' (can't confirm his surname) version of 'Somewhere Over the Rainbow' which made it extra special, (though it may sound cheesy to some of you) and gave me goosepimples.

So that was our experience of New Zealand in a nutshell.

Now we're well and truly off to see the Wizard....

In New Zealand you get fat and throw yourself off stuff.

This is how Joe and Div described the country to me back in August. To be honest though there's been very little of that. Out of things, yes (planes, rafts); down things, yep (rivers and sand dunes); but the only 'off stuff' that I can think of has been underground ledges during caving, and even that was sitting in a big rubber ring. Plus we managed to avoid eating a fry-up every day.

In Wellington our plan was to spend the morning at their huge (and free) Te Papa museum before getting the ferry to the South Island in the afternoon. We checked out the hostel and walked back down the hill to where we'd left the car. Only the car was no longer there...and in its place were a selection of traffic cones. I was guessing it hadn't been nicked, otherwise those thieves would've had way too much time on their hands. Both of us were adamant that there were no signs up the night before indicating no parking, nor did any of the parking restrictions imply that we couldn't leave it there. We called the council, expecting to be told it was in a pound somewhere, but they just informed us that workers had arrived in the night planning on doing some digging, and any cars that were in the way had been towed to a different road ten minutes walk away. Now I've never heard of that happening before. But I won't complain though, it beats having to pay any kind of removal fee.

The weather was glorious for the two weeks we were in the North Island, and for the first couple of days on the South Island it looked like more of the same. But then the rains came. All our way down the West Coast. Mount Cook, the highest peak in all of Australasia is known as Aoraki to the Maoris, which means 'Cloud Piercer'. I couldn't tell you if this is a suitable name or not as we never got to see it. We never got to see much in fact, not unless it was less than 100 metres away. Dull grey mist for about four or five days was about the size of it. This was our view of the Fox Glacier. I certainly wasn't going to be climbing it.



The rains inconvenienced us in other ways as well. On our way to Wanaka and Queenstown we encountered the one and only queue of traffic that's probably ever existed in the whole of New Zealand. It was caused by a huge tree collapsing under the weight of all the water, blocking off the road. We waited around for ages just looking at it, as everyone else seemed to be doing too. Eventually turning up though were four blokes in orange jackets, three of them with machinery, two types of lorry, and a guy in a little digger that cleared the big tree.



We spent long enough in Wanaka to visit Puzzling World and that was about it.It houses the world's first 3D maze. It's estimated that you should complete it in 30 to 60 minutes. We took 31. I'd say that was a result.



As well as visiting the most northerly point on the North Island at Cape Reinga, we made it to the most southerly point of the South Island at Slope Point. While you can take a footpath to the Cape, to get to the Slope involves a 20 minute walk through farmers fields. And a whole lot of sheep.





Dunedin is Gaelic for Edinburgh, and they're fond of Robert Burns in Dunedin as much as they are in Dumfries. However, what really puts Dunedin on the map is the fact that it's home to the steepest street in the world, as confirmed by the Guinness Book of Records. So steep in fact that they've fitted a few benches at the top so you can catch your breath before going back down again. Sod having that road on your paper round.



The final stop on our tour of New Zealand was Christchurch, the least New Zealand-like place that we came across. Often referred to as "New Zealand's most English City", this basically just means that it has a large cathedral, you can (if you wish) go punting on the river, and the town centre's roads are called Manchester, Worcester, Gloucester and Hereford Street. Personally though, I'd say that if somewhere was described as the 'most English city', it should have a countless number of gastropubs, vastly overpriced tourist attractions, and identical houses stretching all the way out to the suburbs. Well, Christchurch has all these things too. That sounds a bit harsh, like having a go at the place. I'm not really, it's not that I didn't like Christchurch, it's just that there's not a really a lot there to get excited about. Or maybe my mind was just already on Melbourne and Australia.

Auckland to Christchurch via Pahaia, Omapere, Orewa, Hamilton, Rotorua, Taupo, Waitomo, Wellington, Picton, Nelson, Motueka, Hokitika, Haast, Queenstown, Te Anau, Milford Sound, Papatowai and Dunedin - 3104 miles

Going Extreme

What better way to relax after a sky dive than with a round of mini golf? Although, there was a hot tub at our hostel but we'd gone in that in the morning, prior to the knowledge that we would be leaping out of a plane that day ( am still gutted it wasn't the pink plane). Anyway, the deal with the mini golf (crazy golf to us Brits) is that if you get a hole in one on the 18th hole you get a a free round. Which fitz did.



And then I did too!What's the likely hood of that?! (Answers on a postcard please) So 2 rounds of mini golf for the price of 1 was definitely in the budget.


On the day that Fitz got up at 6am to do the Tongariro Crossing, I felt no guilt at having a bit of a lie in ( til 9 am) having recalled my experience of climbing Volcan Villa Rica in Chile. Instead, I had opted for a more leisurely activity ( much more up my street), a sailing trip aboard 'The Barbary' a 1920s racing yacht once owned by Errol Flynn who won it in a card game. We sailed across Lake Taupo, a pair of ducks flying aboard for biscuits and me taking the wheel.



The trip brought back memories of the sailing holiday in Greece 7 years ago with Dave, Ally and Johnny but there was considerably less sun than then! Also, we managed to catch a rainbow trout on Lake Taupo which is 1 more fish than was caught during a whole week in Greece!

We sailed to the Maori carvings which were completed 28 years ago and can only be reached on water.




The following day, from Taupo we drove 2 hours to Waitomo for our 'Black Abyss' adventure in the Waitomo Caves which was all rather exciting. The fact that it was raining and we may have been a bit wet did not help putting on damp wetsuits any more pleasant! Once we were kitted up and had practised abseiling above ground we were finally ready to go caving! Our trip underground began with a 30 meter abseil into Ruakuri cave which wasn't too scary as it's dark and narrow and you can't see anything part from the rock that surrounds you.

Inside the cave, we were shown stalactites and stalagmites, recalling some of our primary school education to remember which are which. This was shortly followed by a flying fox ( a zip line) in the pitch black. Most challenging however was the jump from a high ledge into the dark black water below with a tyre / giant rubber ring which makes a very loud SMACK as you hit the water with a big splash. Floating in these tyres whilst looking up at the thousands of glow-worms far more relaxing, like looking into a clear night sky sprinkled with stars ( and somewhere with no light pollution).

Caving felt like a real adventure, we swan, crawled and climbed up waterfalls (felt very pleased with myself after that!) and saw couple of eels, stopping for sugary treats along the way. The soup and bagels at the end once we were dry were very welcome! I really enjoyed this experience and would recommend it to anyone who goes to New Zealand. People of all ages can do it, we met an Aussie couple who were in our group who were celebrating their Silver Wedding Anniversary and they did it. Also they have kindly said we can stay with them in the Hunter Valley ( Aussie wine region ) so we will be taking them up on that offer! (They also bought the photos of the trip so we'll be nabbing a copy of them off them too.)


So, as you can tell, we had begun to embrace the extreme activities famously available in New Zealand. It's no surprise then that like all good travellers we choose to participate in a couple more when we arrived in Queenstown, the home of extreme activities ( and that's not included the Queenstown luge which is one of the few street luges in the world, which you can view us doing on iiitbTV). Though as I type I'm thinking if it wasn't for Fitz I may not have been so keen to participate....

Our afternoon of White Water Rafting began in quite a relaxed manner, paddling our way down the Kawarau river. Earlier we have been geared up bad given our safety talk which i found highly amusing, I was nearly crying with laughter at some points as the trip leader, Casey, a true Kiwi, was hilarious. There were 7 rafts on the trip that day 6 people plus a guide per raft. We ended up in Casey's raft which included a middle aged English brother and sister who weren't too keen on capsizing our raft for the sake of it like all the other rafts had been doing, hence the pleasantness of it all.

We hadn't been able to go on the more challenging trip due to the high water levels on the Shotover River caused by the bucket loads of rain which hammered down for days earlier in the week.

We cruised past the Pillars of The Kings as seen in the The Lord of the Rings, The Fellowship of the Ring:



This part of the river is is actually a fraction of the width that appears in the film. Just around the bend from here is the world's first commercial bungee jump which was great to see, especially as I wasn't attached to it!

We reached our final rapid 'Chinese Dogleg' which was the largest at a grade 4 and New Zealand's longest commercial rapid, with 800m of white water. We'd practised paddling as a team and ducking into the raft when things got hairy and so were prepared for what we needed to do. We were the first raft to go through and rose and fell as we went through the first part of the rapid, paddling our arms off. We continued onto the next group of waves, Casey, our guide, not seeing the 'hole' that had appeared from nowhere which meant we hadn't ducked into the raft when the hole caused our raft to to surf upwards resulting in us falling out.

I had no idea what has happened, one second I was paddling away and the next I was in out of the raft, in shock after swallowing a load of water. I was surprised to see Casey (our guide) in the water too and had no idea where Fitz was. I panicked as waves splashed against me and I was pushed along with the current. I was struggling to get my breath when a nice young man (blonde with short dreads) reminded me to put my feet up and float on my back (this prevents you from getting caught up in anything that maybe on the riverbed like a branch of tree). We clung onto one another and there was a lot of shouting going on "Swim left!!" "Swim right" I was really confused and panicked that I couldn't breathe properly. I did my best to swim to the raft but which was tough with the force of the water pushing me from all directions. I failed to grab onto the rope which was thrown out to us, it was just out of reach. However I did mange to clasp onto the paddle which was reached out to me -woo hoo! I was dragged back to the raft and then pulled back on board by my life jacket by the nice English bloke, who was in fact the only person who successfully stayed on board - my Hero! (This is not for the faint hearted -(Dave Goggin.))

Relieved to be out of the water, I tried to steady my gasps for air and worried about where the hell Fitz was cos he wasn't in the raft. He had in fact got back in another raft quite easily and gone into another woman's rescue!

Afterwards, everyone went over and over the whole experience. I was thankful to have survived and everyone was shocked that even Casey, one of the most experienced guides, had fallen out too. It was fun but I was bloody scared when I was in the water!!

So much so that the very next day I decided to abandon the raft completely and opt for a body board and a pair of flippers instead. Known as River Boarding, we signed up with a company called 'Mad Dog', and my God, it was completely mad! Probably one of the craziest things ?I've ever done. Sky diving is is a piece of cake, I'd do that on all the days of the week that end with a 'y'. River boarding on the other hand...hmm...I'm not so sure....

On the morning we went river boarding my apprehension grew and grew as I learnt more about what it exactly entails and the things you must remember to do / not do. However, some relief was had in the fact that we had loads of instructors with us that day, with just 6 of us suckers in our group with nearly a guide each when the usual ratio is about 2:16.

We had practise at kicking, turning and assuming a defensive position g for entering the rapids. We were warned against doing the 1st section of rapids as once again, due to the recent heavy downpours, the water flow had increased making the rapids bigger and stronger than usual. Needless to say, I happily opted out of this section.

So we got in further down the river. It was quite daunting going through the rapids on a body board but I clung on with all my strength, there was no way I was gonna lose my board! (You're strapped to them by your wrist but you still need to hold on tight!)

In the end I went down the river attached to one of the guides so I felt a bit better about the whole situation. We got a massive wave right in the face but onwards we went! It was pretty terrifying! I felt reassured that the worst was over as we went through our final rapid. My legs were tired from all the kicking and my arms ached from holding on so tightly. Despite all the negatives and my fear, I have to say it was a pretty amazing experience.

As we floated downstream after the rapids, it was time to relax a little after what we'd just done and enjoy the river. I struggled to do this as I was still worried I might float into the rocks as you as told to remain in the middle of the river at all times.

We got a ride on a giant body board dragged along behind a jet ski, clinging on for dear life with what little strength I had left in my arms and hands, being flung off at the end as the jet ski turned.

Fitz jumped off some high rocks with the others but I gave that a miss and we all whizzed down a slide and skimmed across the water on our boards.

River Boarding is absolutely exhausting and makes you aware of how unfit you are! If you're looking for a challenge, this is it. I won't be doing it again I don't think, but I'm pleased that I did and proud to tell the tale!

Nic

30 days hath September

April, June and November. No, not November. Not this year anyway. We flew out of Santiago on Sunday 2nd and arrived in Auckland on Tuesday 4th, having crossed the International Date Line. So apologies to Lulu, Dolph Lundgren, Ugo Ehiogu or anyone else whose birthday it was on November 3rd (but who wasn't near the top of the Google results list) because we missed it this year. Literally.

Auckland is home to the tallest structure in the Southern hemisphere, the Sky Tower (330m). Some people paid to walk around the outside of the roof, others to throw themselves off it. For us, just getting up there seemed expensive enough.



Our options for getting around NZ were by bus or by car. Seeing as we'd gone by bus around South America and were planning the same for Australia, we decided to hire a car for New Zealand. After picking up the almost superbly named Toyota 'Vitz' and heading out of Auckland we discovered a pair of prescription sunglasses left in the glove box, so had to drive back to the hire place to return them. This slight inconvenience turned out to be a blessing though, as we were rewarded with two bags of Pineapple Lumps which we would otherwise not known existed. Pineapple Lumps are amazing. They're basically big lumps of chocolatey pineappley goodness, and supposedly unique to in NZ. I have no idea why, they should be sold everywhere.



Our first destination was north to Paihia in the beautiful Bay of Islands. This is where they come to take long panning shots of sandy beaches and glistening seas as part of NZ tourism promo films.



It's also a spot where you're able to see (and swim with) dolphins. The swimming part is dependent on their mood (if they're relaxed it's fine, if they're stressed it's not) and whether or not there's calves feeding with the pod. Well, there were no feeding calves in the pod that we saw, but they were pretty stressed. Because they were being stalked that day by a pod (I assume it's also a pod) of Orcas. So while it was a shame that we didn't get to do any swimming that day, we did get the chance to see Killer Whales up close. Really close.



From the Bay of Islands we headed as far North as possible to Cape Reinga, where the Pacific Ocean meets the Tasman Sea, and then back down the west of the peninsula, huge strips of which are covered by huge sand dunes. And in New Zealand, if there's any section of land that isn't perfectly flat, then someone will have come and tried to climb it, or jump off it, or ride it, or surf it, or do anything else to it and then given that a name. Then they'll set up a business and try and get lots of other people to come along and have a go too. So on the sand dunes of Hokianga Harbour we tried sand boarding. If you put the effort in to walk up them, you're rewarded with the chance to slide on your chest all the way back down them. There's also a video over there -> somewhere.




The centre of the North Island has a rich Maori history, so near Rotorua we went to see a cultural show in the traditional house, called a Whare. I say near Rotorua, but the place we went to was actually called Te Whakarewarewatangaoteopetauaawahiao (and supposedly that's only the second longest word in Maori). I think 'near Rotorua' or 'Whaka' is easier. Whaka is essentially a huge thermal reserve, due to all the volcanic activity in the area (Lake Rotorua is actually the crater of an extinct volcano) so there's mud pools and hot springs all over the place. It's also home to Pohutu, a huge geyser which shoots up to about 20 or 30 metres. Good when it happens, but boring to wait for.




And then came Taupo and the sky dive. Taupo was probably my favourite town in New Zealand because it had loads going on, but with cheaper prices and fewer people than in Queenstown. For our jump we had the option of 12,000 or 15,000 feet - with 12,000 you get forty seconds of freefall and with 15,000 you get a minute. We went with the latter. The preparation all felt pretty rushed at to the airfield, but that was a good thing because it gave me no time to talk myself out of it. After throwing on the equipment, whizzing through the instructions and spouting out some nonsense for the video camera we were in the little plane (a very white one, not the very pink one) and high up over Lake Taupo and a host of volcanoes. At 12,000 feet the door rolled opened and several others in our plane slid out, before it rolled shut again. Five minutes and 3,000 feet later it was our turn. Me and my instructor Alex shuffled to the door then waited for what seemed like an eternity with our feet hanging over the edge...and then we were gone. At first we were spinning around a lot and my mind was scaring the hell out of me by worrying that something was going wrong. But it wasn't of course, and then you just start to really enjoy the feeling that you're plummeting to the ground at about 200km/h. Seriously. The freefall bit is over way too quickly though, no matter how many seconds you get. You'll all get to see the DVD at some point, with me looking stupid throughout.



The Tongariro Crossing is supposedly the best one day hike in New Zealand. It cuts between Mount Tongariro and Mount Ngauruhoe with the option of climbing to the top of either as well. Mt Ngauruhoe is also better known as Mount Doom from the recent Lord of the Rings trilogy, and it looks better than Mt Tongariro, so I chose to climb Tongariro (so I could look at Ngauruhoe, not because I didn't have faith in my abilities of climbing it. Oh no). All in all it wasn't too challenging a trek, and any pain I had at the end of the day was mainly down to mild sunburn, and it was well worth the effort for the 60 odd photos that I took.







More NZ stuff to come soon (from both of us).

Updates

The keen-eyed among you will notice that we're yet to write anything about New Zealand on here. Sorry about that. Internet use is pretty expensive in NZ, and typing it up, uploading the pictures etc etc takes quite a bit of time. We will remedy that shortly though, I promise. The hawk-eyed amongst you meanwhile will notice that down the right hand side of the screen there's a few new toys to keep you occupied in the meantime. Some different photos from South America, some sky diving ones (more about that later) and lots of us on a jet boat down a river (we didn't pay for the disc they try and sell you with the trip, but two nice folk called Adam and Karianne did, and they put them all online for us, and therefore you to see).

Happy viewing.

Love from Stuart, Nicole and Robin van Persie.