Short here, just spent a night in Auckland trying to figure out what to do, stay here til my flight leaves, go over to the coromandel and see cathedral cove or push north, to the Bay of Island. The reason it is not crystal clear is because I've got a cold, which means blocked sinuses, which means no SCUBA. This is a bit of a problem since some of the worlds best diving is located just of the coast of the bay of islands, Poor Knights Island! I ended up with a gam...

Wow! Just... Wow... There is a special place in New Zealand. Some might call it claustrophobic, some might say pitch black. I name it "gorgeous". The place I'm talking about is the Waitomo caves, an enormous underground complex, dug out in limestone thanks to the undue amount of precipitation, inhabited by a feral tribe of creatures. The natives of the cave are, in the words of our guide: "cannibalistic, promiscuous worms with sun shining out of their arse". W...

I'm probably setting a record right now for doing nothing. Came here with the bus at 11 am, hoped for a tour down the legendary Waitomo Caves at 2 pm, but that one was full. So I got one for tomorrow at 9 am. That is how crappy the busses are, one coming in at 11, next one leaving 17, so in order to get down the caves for all the blackwater rafting I have to stay in Waitomo for 2 whole days. And the hostel I am staying at is located about 7 km outside of Waitomo...

Short post today after lots of stuff done: went to Hells Gate yesterday which is pretty bad ass. Just the name is cool. Anyways, it is a geo-thermal reserve named Hells Gate by George Bernard Shaw, and rightly so. It looks really like the entrance gate to hell itself. Smells like it too... All the sulphur makes the air smell like someone has constantly set their bowels to massive flatulence... But really cool with mud pools, water at 120 degrees, all that s***. ...

Culture time! Today I went out to a place called Tamaki Maori Village, which is basically a great way to learn a little bit about the maori people. They come pick you up, drive you out to the village whilst telling you a bit about the history of their people. When you do get there, they put on a cool show, which is supposed to be a traditional greeting ceremony. Keep in mind, this is new Zealand and not Hawaii. The maori where warriors, so a greeting ceremony was...