Kia ora!

Our stay in New Zealand was kicked off by a very long flight (almost 13 hours!) from LA...we left just before midnight on 17th Sept and landed at around 7am on 19th Sept. Skipping a day entirely is quite an odd feeling! First impressions were that Auckland was goind to be very helpful; the airport was full of free leaflets and guides telling us what was on offer. We took a bus into the city and found the hostel. Clearly it was far too early to check in so we dumped our bags in the storage room and headed out for coffee. It felt really weird to be arriving in a new country (having been up for what felt like days) and going off exploring straight away, with no hope of a shower in between! Auckland can be summed up in one word: dull. One third of the entire population of New Zealand live in that city and there is NOTHING going on. Definitely not the standard image of New Zealand. We went for a little wander around the shops and to an art gallery (which was actually really interesting - check out Rita Angus). My two favourite things about Auckland were that art gallery and the fact that Albert Park has a statue of Queen Victoria in it (I really hope there is a statue of Prince Albert in Victoria Park, we didn't get a chance to look!). Back in the hostel to check in, we met our one room mate (in a dorm of 10 beds - great, we thought). This time we actually got her name: Kerry. We had no option but to get her name because the girl talked non stop. About everything. We know everything about her and her relationships with her entire family. And for once I'm not even exaggerating!!! Thank god we only had to spend one night in that room! We escaped her for a few hours by checking out the Sky Tower, another one of those observation decks. We decided the best time to go was at night when the city at least had a hope of looking pretty with all the lights. It worked, but unfortunately our photos are not so good :-)

We met up with our Connections tour group and our awesome guides, Katie & Kev, the next day, for a 10 day adventure around the North and South islands. First up was a stay on a traditional Marae. Amazing experience. We were welcomed onto the Marae in traditional style, which involved singing 'heads, shoulders, knees and toes' in Maori (which is something like: mahunga pakahewee hoope tuti wiwi - but don't quote me!) and greeting the chief with the hongi (touching noses and foreheads; the idea is something to do with sharing breath). We had an amazing homecooked meal afterwards and learnt a lot about Maori culture from Sean and Jen who were showing us around. That night the whole group slept in sleeping bags in the meeting room, which turned out to be pretty warm despite the lack of heating and the cooold of outside. Don't think we're supposed to put photos up of the inside, but imagine a big room with carvings all over the walls and ceiling. They believe that the room has a spirit, so there are parts which represent the ribs, heart, head, arms etc.

We were up and out early the next day to visit a Maori village in Rotorua, named Whakarewarewa (the wh is pronounced as f - try saying that after a bew beers, or sober in fact!). The village was built on an area of high geothermal activity, which meant there were craters all over (for want of a better word) with pools of bubbling, boiling hot water and steam billowing out all over the place. They use the natural activity for everyday tasks like cooking and washing. After a walk around we watched some villagers perform the haka, some guys on the group got involved too - so funny! Lots of big eyes and tongues sticking out! In the afternoon Sooz and I went for a walk around the Hell's Gate thermal reserve, which was similar to the village in that it's an area of intense geothermal activity, but without the houses! The reserve took its name from George Bernard Shaw, who on visiting said that if hell existed that place would be the entrance to it. As well as pools of water there were some bubbling craters of mud. Sooz said it looked like the moon! I think the guide said we were pretty much as close as we'd ever get to the magma underneath the surface, which I guess explains why the ground was really hot to touch. After our educational walk we pampered ourselves in a mud bath and sulphur spa; very relaxing and entertaining to see everyone covered in mud. The only downside is that you can smell the sulphur on you for days afterwards. Even now the top I'm wearing has a faint tinge of sulphur about it, and it's been washed twice since! We were about to head back to the hotel when we saw that some of the group had done Maori carvings, and being the artistic (?) types that we are we wanted a turn! We each did two carvings of different symbols which all had different meanings. Luckily the Maori guy drew the patters for us, or I would have had no hope!

The next day was a long long drive down to Wellington (AKA Wellywood, if you're Kevin, the awesome driver on our tour). We stopped along the way for a few photo opportunities, first up being Huka Falls, where a huge amount of water gushes through a relatively small gap at immense speed - it apparently would only take something like 3 seconds to fill an entire olympic sized swimming pool! Incredible. Such beautiful colours, a truly amazing (if a little scary) sight. We were supposed to be able to see the mountain used as Mt. Doom in LOTR (as a non-fan I have no idea what this is, but would have been interested to see it anyway!). Unfortunately, due to cloud, this wasn't possible. We did however get to see Mt. Ruapehu and some others whose names I've forgotten. It was especially exciting for the aussies among us, some of whom had never seen snow before.

On arrival in Wellington we went for a walk around the city, which was, luckily, completely different to Auckland! That night we all went out for an Indian and to the local bowling alley afterwards. I was predictably awful, as usual (Wikus, you need to teach me!) but it was a fun night culminating in a trip round a few of Wellington's bars. The next morning Kev took us on a bus tour of the city and drove us up to Mt. Victoria for views of the entire city. It was really quite pretty, but so small for a capital! Only 400,000 people live there. We concluded our trip to Wellington (and the North Island) with a visit to Te Papa Museum (Our Place - one thing I love about NZ, they still really embrace the Maori culture and almost all of the signs seem to be written in English with a Maori translation alongside). This was a really interactive museum, the kind that would be great to take kids to, but it was entertaining and there was yet more art on one floor. Lots of references to the Royal Academy to be had, but also a lot of traditional Maori and New Zealand art.

Our North Island adventure was over with the crossing to the South on the Interislander ferry. A very long and uneventful journey, with the exception of seeing some dolphins swimming not too far away. The views leading to the South were pretty impressive even from the inside, so I'm sure from the outside they would have been stunning, but I was happier in the warm with my hot chocolate (which by the way we have had a LOT of in this country, so no doubt we'll be returning home fat!). Until the South... xx