13/03/09

We had to be out of the campsite by 10 so we got up had another shower and refilled the water then emptied the waste, I have no idea where all the noodles have been coming from but every time we empty the waste a big ball of noodles interspersed with rice blobs out followed by a load of brown sludgy water before it runs clear, it stinks and looks rank. The weather wasn't the best, intermittent cold rain. We headed off to Hamilton, arrived there at about half 11 and went for a wander around town, I was looking for a new hoody because it's starting to get cold out here. I ended up getting a tacky one from CottonOn. Rich bought some new shorts then we went to the internet cafe for a bit then the guys got a Subway while I went back to the shops to try on another pair of shorts. The ones Rich had bought were so comfy I had to get some, he normally goes for brown so I chose a green looking pair, turns out when we got back to the van that we had the same pair.

The foodtown we had used 2 parking spaced in had a very strict policy on a 2 hour limit, when we were sitting there making sandwiches a van arrived and towed the car behind us away. No need for us to worry though, I don't think they'd be able to tow us, so we took our time and then set off for Waitomo. Helen was up front with me on the way and we had a good session of I Spy, using last letters and middle letters of the words we could spy. Then we spent ages playing 20 questions, Helen started off pretty s***, but got really good by the end of it. One of her things was a toilet and it took me 19 questions to get it, something you sit on, and put things in in the bathroom, and it definately wasn't a poofee.

We got to Waitomo fairly early and drove up Waitomo Cave Road stopping at all the activity places on the way to enquire about prices. Pat and Burns had a turd in the second place we stopped. Burns didn't lock the door properly and some guy burst in on him while he was sitting there, trousers round ankles. We then stopped off at the Rabbit Shearing place. There were huge rabbits, almost as big as me, they were so fluffy. A woman got one out so we could pet it. Her friend saw us and obviously doesn't get to talk to many people because she wouldn't shut the hell up, she waffled on for what seemed like an hour nearly boring me to tears and there just wasn't any kind of exit strategy without saying 'look woman, shut the hell up, i want to go now!' Eventually we'd all shuffled our way closer and closer to the door and we quickly said "thanks for showing us the rabbits" turned and walked away without looking back, got in the van and drove off.

We drove a few miles back up the road to go to a Kiwi and bird place, Pat decided he didn't want to see a Kiwi so stayed in the van. We paid $16 to get in, we thought we'd seen a Kiwi, but it seemed to be missing its beak, turned out it was a Quail, they were pretty cool though. We walked round the corner in to the dark room where the Kiwis were as they're nocturnal. There were only 2 Kiwi's on show, $16 to see 2 Kiwis in the dark and we weren't allowed to take photos, daylight robbery. The rest of the bird park seemed to be filled with NZ Kestrels and hundreds of different ducks, so I now have s*** loads of pictures of ducks. There was one cool Gecko that had his face pressed right against the perspex, then we saw a Tui which is supposed to mimic any song you sing, it couldn't even be arsed to make a single squark.

We drove off back towards Waitomo and parked up in another gravel place just out of view of a house. The girls cooked a beef and plumb sauce stir fry which was awesome, we were all nackered so went to bed early to be refreshed for an early start tomorrow.

14/03/09

Woke up at 7 as Coops alarm went off. The girls and I scoffed some cereal and attempted to make the camper safe enough to drive down the road to Waitomo. Leaving Pat and Rich in bed we headed off, I parked the thing in the most awful place so Burns could attempt the Austin Powers style manouver. We filled in a few forms, we had to weigh ourselves, Coops couldn't avoid it this time. We were in a group of six, us three, Odid, Helena and Michael. Barbra the tour guide drove us to the shed where we got changed in to wet suits, not the easiest thing to do with board shorts on underneath. We then had to put some trousers over the top of the wet suit, all of the trousers were shredded, Helen got one with a massive slit on the crotch, and Coops had one with a gash down the back. I found the only pair intact, but they were purple on one side. We were handed helmets that reaked of sweat before Babs drove us to the cave.

We got there and Helena was worried that her Welly had a hole in it before realising that it was to let the water drain out. The first thing we did was to abseil down to the cave floor, they call it abseiling, but its more of a straight drop down, you couldn't touch anything until the bottom. My harness cut right up into my crotch nearly severing a nut, so I had to lean back as far as possible to relieve the pressure the entire way down. I was glad when I reached the bottom. The water we landed in at the bottom of the cave was really cold, but not as cold as I had expected. Babs took us for a walk through the cave, on the way we saw a few eels, one of them was really friendly because it had been hand fed for a few years, Babs was able to pick it up and stroke it. After a few minutes walking we arrived at an open space in the cave where we turned our head lamps off and saw millions of glow-worms. Our eyes adjusted to the light and we could see more and more every minute, there were so many it looked amazing.

We turned our head-lamps off, sat in our tubes and floated back down the stream on the way back marveling at the glow worms on the way. We got back to the start and floated further down the cave gaining speed on the way through a few rapids. We then came to a place where we could do a pit of caving. Babs had us all crawling through tiny cracks in the rock and laughing at us when we got wedged in. We walked back to the start, everyones trousers were falling down as they were walking upstream, and it was really hard to walk against with boots full of water. We arrived back at the starting point and by this time I really needed a piss. The only part left was a rock climb back up to the top of the cave. I didn't think I could wait for the loo and now I had a harness, wet suit, trousers and board shorts on. I attempted to go slyly in the cave anyway but by the time I'd pulled the top of the wet suit down some guy popped out of nowhere and shone a torch on me whilst shouting 'Who are ya...Whatta ya doin?' So I quickly pulled the wet suit up and went back tot he rock climb. I don't think I've ever climbed a wall as quickly as that before. We walked back to the van, I had undone my harness on the way, dumped it the moment we got there and sprinted off to the bush.

We got back to the shed where we had free showers, we made full use of them and then drove back to Waitomo Road. We spent about and hour talking to Helena and Micael about the pros and cons of living out of a camper. The topic of using every public toilet possible to wash yourself in was quite popular. We told them about the big bunnys down the road, warning them not to get chatting to the woman, and they decided to go check it out. We laid on the grass and waited for the guys to get back from their trip because the weather was so good. The guys finally showed up and we drove back to where we stopped last night to eat some lunch as we were all starving. I ended up piggin out on s*** loads of chocolate. Then we drove to the nearest Woolworths and stocked up on food for the next 2 days and I made full use of the public facilities, which were actually rather nice, they had the right amount of pressure behind their taps for washing your hands without soacking your entire body when you stick your hand under it. We got back in the van and headed off down route 3 to get on the coastal road to New Plymouth. On the way we could all smell and awful s***ty smell but no one had any idea where it was coming from, we thought it could be coming from outside but it seemed to linger, we were then thinking someone had stepped in something nasty. I laid in the back of the van on the way because I was nackered from all the caving and the heat from the sun.

We arrived at Awakino where we searched for somewhere to park up for the night. It was about half six when we found somewhere so the lads and I ran on to the beach and played frisbee in some seriously black sand while the sun set. The girls went for a wander down the beach. I spent the entire time throwing the frisbee as hard as I possibly could because I always seemed to be down wind. It was a struggle running after it whenever Pat threw it as he is not very accurate and there were thousands of sharp shells dotted all over the beach. After about half an hour of play our feet were completely black with sand and we were nackered. Pat went back to the van and Rich and I continued. A little while later a tiny puppy started running towards me, I attempted to pet it and it kept biting my wrist which I didn't like so I tried to avoid it which only made it more eager to get at me. Rich ended up getting about a million photos of me being hassled by a tiny puppy. It just wouldn't leave me alone, it kept chasing me about for about another 20 minutes and I was actually exhausted from trying to escape from it, Rich was loving it, don't think he's ever laughed so hard in his life.

We retired to the van and it was our turn to cook for once, we cooked up some fajitas which actually turned out to be quite nice, then we ended up asleep by about 9 or 10.