Hi hi!

We have just arrived in Blenhiem after catching the ferry from Wellington to Picton. Here's a quick catch up of what we have been doing since we left Napier, Hawkes Bay.

The week before last, we left Napier and headed accross to Lake Taupo. In Taupo we went to Huka falls which were very impressive. The falls weren't particually high but the were flowing at a ridiculous rate through the narrow gorge and the walk to get to them was also very pretty. We also went to see a few thermal parks, one of which was called Craters of the Moon. This was a field of thermal activity from where you could feel the heat beneath your feet and see the steam rising from the cracks in the ground. The other thermal park was called Orakei Korako. This location was used to film Walking with Dinosours and it was easy to see why (see the photos!). Here we saw a few geysers, bubbling mud pools and facinating landscapes. It was awsome!!

From Taupo we went down to Tongariro National park and on Valentines day, we walked the Tongariro crossing through some of Newzealands most active volcanoes. We began the walk at 8am after we had been dropped off at the starting point. The track started by winding up the Mangatepopo valley from which we had a great view of Ruapehu (the most recent eruption being in 1996!). It went up past Soda spings and up to the saddle between Tongariro and Ngauruhoe (Mordor's Mount Doom, Lord of the Rings). From here it was a steep climb up to Red Crater (1886m) via south crater. The climb was quite difficult and we were knackered by the time we got to the top but the views were well worth it. From Red Crater it was a sttep walk (maybe that should be slide!) down to the vivid Emerald lakes. After passing Blue lake, the track descended into a zig zag to Ketetahi hut and from there it was a walk through dense forest. We were glad to get to the end as we truely were cream crackered!!But it was very enjoyable...!

From Tongariro, we drove back to Taupo and then back to Napier. The weekend we arrived back in Napier, the city was hosting the world famous Art Deco Festival. Heaps of people from all over Newzealand come to participate, bringing their fancy cars and dressing up in their outfits. It was a really nice atmosphere as there were lots of families sitting on the sea front with their gazebos and afternoon tea, even the kids were dressed up!

We had decided to do one more week of work in Napier just to top up funds1 So i went to the vineyard with Neil and Rach. The job on the vineyard was possibly the best job i had while we were in Napier. It was very easy and it was good to work with Neil and Rach for a change! On the Wednesday of that week we didn't work as we went to watch England play cricket against Newzealand. I was slightly worried that i would be bored but we all had a really good day. We had lots of food and alcohol and we sat on the grass embankment instead of in the stands which had a really good atmosphere. Being English, we were few and far between but i managed to meet a girl from West Monkseaton!!!and the Kiwis were friendly.

We worked for the rest of the week and then on Saturday night we had the usual BBQ. When Tony came to kick us out (or in!) at 10pm, we followed the crowd to Latinos, a bar in town. We all had a really good night. The Argentinians who were staying at the hostel all enjoyed the Latino music and they could really dance! We were due to leave the next day but nobody wanted to drive with a spinning head and so we waited until Monday.

On Monday (25th February) we got up early to say our goodbyes and then we set off towards Wellington which was a five hour drive.

On Tuesday morning we caught the bus into Wellington CBD. Wellington had more of a city feel compared to Auckland, it was a lot busier, however, in contrast to London it seemed nothing like a capital city! The first stop was the Botanical gardens which was accessed by cable car and was a bit disappointing! Parts of the garden looked really unkempt and it wasn't very colourful at all. Once we had walked through the gardens we headed to Thordon, a suburb where we went to an old Gothic church called Old Saint Paul's. This is about as old as Newzealands history gets! The church was intersting inside although non of us know anything about Gothic Religion!! After Thorndon we headed back towards the city center where we walked along the harbour and bought our ferry tickets to get us to the SOUTH ISLAND! In the afternoon we visited the Te Papa Museum which had some really dood displays that kept us entertained for most of the afternoon. We certainly weren't bored in this museum!

The next morning we headed to the ferry terminal. We arrived almost 2 hours early and so had a lot of sitting around to do before we could get on. When we eventually did get on (being one of the first there and the last on!) the ferry was a lot nicer than i thought it would be. It took about 3 1/2 hours for us to reach Picton on the South Island.