Well as you can see I’m now what is technically termed as mega behind on the blog. For that reason I have decided to give a summery of New Zealand in as few words as possible and bring myself right up to date.

I have mentioned New Zealand briefly enough to say that it was fantastic. So far my favourite country and apparently I haven’t even seen the best bits. It was the first country I was actually sad to leave behind and the first I have seriously considered making my home one day. It is such a beautiful country with amazingly diverse landscapes and no shortage of things to do, see and marvel at.

Our stay in New Zealand began in Auckland where we spent a few days chilling out staying with some family who have recently moved there and live on a beautiful peninsular just outside of the city.

Our visits into Auckland itself were more adrenaline filled with me taking the plunge off the 193 meter Sky Jump at Auckland Sky Tower (pictures to follow) on our fist visit into the city. It was something of a snap decision as it meant I got free entry to the viewing deck of the Sky Tower – which was incidentally lower than the height of my jump!!! The jump was amazing, a completely exhilarating experience. there is something about being scared of heights and stood on an incredibly windy platform staring DOWN at the roves of skyscrapers to make you realise you’re alive. Being absolutely petrified at the top I was surprised that as I was counted down from three I calmly, or was it blindly, stepped of the edge and began my 18 second decent to the floor landing gracefully on my feet. It was when I landed that the adrenaline really stared pumping, as I was released from the wires I was grinning inanely and shaking uncontrollably but ready to go back to the top and do it all over again!

One of the less exhilarating things we did in Auckland was the museum. It was badly laid out and much of the information wasn’t very clear so I opted to snuggle on some cushions in the library area and fall asleep whilst the other two walked around.

From Auckland we moved on to the very interesting smelling Rotorua. Rotorua is surrounded by geothermal areas and the sulphur produced means the whole place smells constantly of bad eggs – lovely – but after a while you do get used to it.

Rotorua was possibly my favourite place in New Zealand – despite the smell. There was so much interesting stuff to see and do plus loads of adrenaline activities to be found.

During our stay we visited two of the geothermal areas both of which were amazing sights to behold. The first, Hells Gate, was interesting simply because of what it is. It’s crazy to think the earth can be such a hostile place. All over the area boiling pools are dotted around some of them so acidic that if you fell in there would be no trace of you left. Yet beside them other pools are quite harmless and are safe to swim in.

The other geothermal area we visited was Wai-O-tapu, this place produces such a random mix of chemical is turns the water and earth a myriad of different colours. It was one of the most colourful natural phenomena I have ever seen. Well worth a visit just to marvel at the random yellow patches in the middle of a lake or the huge bright green lake that looks like it belongs to a nuclear disaster!

Another day was spent driving to and from the Waitomo glowworm caves. These spectacular carves are full of glowworms and a boat trip takes you into a cave system where you can stare at the wonder above you. Each worm gives out a small green light and sitting in the boat staring up it looks like you’re staring at a city of interconnecting roads of green streetlight. Stare for too long and it becomes like one of those 3D pictures where you go cross eyed to see the image, only there isn’t any clearly definable images that emerges just a mass of little lights playing tricks on your eyes as they morph in and out of different shapes. Sitting in the boat looking up no-one made a sound, all that could be heard was the gentle lapping of the water against the side of the boat as everyone took in the sights above them.

A less relaxing day in Rotorua was spent having a triple bypass – almost literally. Our day began with some fun on the swoop. A crazy swing type thing where you get strapped into sleeping bag harnesses and hoisted 94 meters into the air. Then one you of pulls a cord and you hurtle towards the ground before swinging back up the other side. Sooooo much fun. Emily and Kat were pretty scared and I have to say the thought of falling from the top was pretty scary but once we were off it was a lot of fun despite Emily screaming loudly into my ear the whole way through.

The second part of our triple bypass was the Agrojet. A high speed jet boat screaming around a small course full of tight corners. My idea of the perfect way to spend half an hour. Being three of us one had to go twice and I was extra happy to win the toss. I set off first with Kat who let out a piercing scram as we hurtled towards the end of the straight with the driver turning the wheel at the very last minute sending spray far into the distance. Three laps later Kat was still screaming and holding my had as hard as possible as I laughed loudly stamping my feet and loving every minute of it. And I still had three more laps to go with Emily, who screamed even louder and grabbed my hand even harder than Kat did!

We completed our bypass on the hydro Zorb. A Zorb is a big plastic ball that you get inside of and roll down a hill, the twist in ours was that the Zorb was full of water. I’ve always wanted to do this and it was a lots of fun although nothing like the adrenaline rush of the swoop or shear excitement of the Agrojet. You run along hamster like for about the first five meters than as soon as you hit the hill you fall and get chucked around inside the ball. It was impossible to stand up but I managed to find a sitting position where I could see down the hill – although I have to say I think being chucked around and sent crashing head over heals was the most fun!

From Rotorua we moved onto Taupo. There was a lot less to do here and having spent a fortune over the last few days we needed to sit back and chill out for a bit. We bumped into some guys in the hostel who we’d shared a taxi with to the airport in Vietnam – random I know – and our fist night we BBQ’d with them before heading into town for a few to many drinks. The second day was spent recovering before wondering down to some natural hot springs near our hostel and sitting in bath temperature water in the rain!! The river was nearby and you could swim from the hot spring about one meter out in the river where the water was icy cold. It was very good, so pretty and best of all free!

Our final stop heading South in New Zealand was Wellington. Here we stayed for eight days with Caroline, a girl we’d met in Korea, and had loads of fun getting pissed, driving around some of the beautiful countryside and discovering New Zealand’s wine tasting regions. Unfortunately the weather was rubbish for much of the time we were there and we really did have most of our fun in bars. But Wellington is definitely somewhere I’d love to go back to – maybe in the height of summer though!

We travelled back to Auckland from Wellington, spent one night and hired a car to drive to the Bay of Islands and far north. We got up early and set off in the morning stopping off first for a Scarecrow festival at a placed called Warkworth. The festival was really good with some very random looking scarecrows my favourites were BO Peep and the Gruffalo.

We continued driving to Whangarei where we stopped and stretched our legs walking around some waterfalls before heading to get some lunch. It proved harder than anticipated and after driving for a couple of hours along a windy road we eventually came to a small village with a bakery where we grabbed a sandwich and sat in the park eating it.

From the we carried onto through picturesque countryside past beautiful bays and deep blue sea to the Bay of Islands and Paihia. We stayed here for the night before heading out early the next morning on a mission for the far North. We stopped first at the Kerikeri Mission house where the oldest stone and wooden buildings in New Zealand stand – although they were only built in the 1800s. It coast money to get in and didn’t look desperately interesting so we had a look around the outside and took some picture before continuing on our journey.

Our next stop was the Ancient Kauri Kingdom where they make things out of 50,000 year old Kauri trees. The trees are huge. We attempted to find a Kauri forests earlier in the day but the road had became in passable and we’d had to give up. Inside the shop they had a tree that they’d made a spiral staircase inside – as I said huge!

We continued driving until we came to Te Paki and New Zealand’s massive sand dunes. They didn’t spread as far as the ones in Mui Ne (Vietnam) but were much taller. Kat elected to stay in the car as Emily and I walked up them in strong winds our legs being painfully whipped by grains of sand.

Our last stop of the day was the almost the most Northerly point in New Zealand, Cape Reinga. Apparently this is usually busy but we were there late in the day and there was no-one around. It was very pretty and incredibly peaceful, just what we needed to end our sight seeing around New Zealand.

From there we began the mammoth eight hour drive back to Auckland Airport to fly back to Australia early the next morning. Which is where I sit now writing this.

Hopefully later today or tomorrow I’ll get chance to update all my travels in Sydney and Cairns.

Loads more photos of our travells around New Zealand can be foud here. This includes photos of our boat trip across lake Taupo to see some Maori rock art and the fantastic traditional Maori performace we watched in Rotorua.

* Posted by j150vsc on 08/10/2007.