Junk in the trunk

Sometimes I regret starting this bloody thing. I appreciate that it serves a vital function – keeping all my loyal blog followers up to date with my latest adventures. However, I am clearly quite pish at keeping it up to date. Anyways, let’s back track a couple of months and update you on my action packed schedule since the last entry.

In November I took a wee weekend trip over to the Coromandel. More specifically I spent the weekend going round Hahei and surrounding areas. The highlights included Cathedral Cove, which is definitely worth the 45 minute walk through bush required to access it. It is basically a big beach whose main feature is a large cathedral (surprisingly enough) like arch which has been worn away by the sea. If you want to know what it looks like have a butchers at the latest Narnia film. The big white cave on the beach the munchkins walk through in the opening sequence is the cove. We also went to hot water beach. The whole concept of hot water beach is that you can dig a hole in the sand 1 hour either side of low tide and it will magically be filled with hot water created by the fault line that runs through the beach. My experience would indicate that it should be named tepid water beach, but I wasn’t doing a very good job with my shovel. We stayed in a lovely converted wooden church with a nice restaurant attached. As with most accommodation in NZ, great quality and very cheap. All in all, a great trip.

Next up was my birthday adventure to Waiheke Island. Waiheke is about 45 minutes off the coast of Auckland. Originally it was where people/hippies went to eek out a very cheap existence. However, the rich and famous of Auckland now use it as their holiday retreat, pushing up the prices somewhat. It is still a fairly cheap place for a break though. We were staying in a hostel which was accessed via a 10 minute bush trek. Nice big deck with a DJ playing every night, pool and hot tub. Waiheke’s main claim to fame is its wine. Needless to say we took a full day wine tour and indulged in lunch at the Mudbrick winery. However, our greatest indulgence was reserved for the day after when we booked dinner on the Flying Carpet. The Flying Carpet is a big catamaran that takes you on an evening cruise, complete with 5 course meal, all for a rather reasonable $120 (about £50). Turns out we were the only people who had booked it for that night, so we had a crew of 3 people looking after us as we sailed into the sunset on our own private vessel. Tough old life really. Again, a great weekend and a great way to celebrate my first birthday in NZ.

I was very fortunate to be invited down to New Plymouth for Christmas with the family Wansbrough. It was really great to enjoy a proper family Christmas and generally chill out over the festive season. We even managed to squeeze in a trip to the republic of Whangamomona (which I won’t go into here, but google it – it is a typically Kiwi story).

Now, I should point out that I’ve just returned from 2 weeks in a campervan with my dear friend Mr Alan Cameron. We covered 5000km over 2 weeks and I would be doing the trip a great injustice to try and summarise it here, but I’ll be nice and give you a quick list of the destinations and highlights:

28th Dec – Al arrives from the UK. We go to the pub. Al is asleep by 7pm.
29th and 30th Dec – We drive to Rotorua, geothermal capital of NZ. We see lots of geysers, steaming mud pools etc. I dip my foot in one and lose some skin.
31st Dec – We drive to Gisborne, the first place in the world to see the sun rise on the new year. We arrive, I realise I’ve left my wallet in a petrol station 3 hours away, I get distressed. We go to a very poorly organised music festival. Alan gets sore feet.
1st Jan – We drive back to the petrol station and retrieve wallet. We then drive on to Napier, Art Deco capital of the world (due to a rather nasty earthquake in the 1930s).
2nd Jan – We drive to Wellington, capital of NZ. We go to the pub and amazingly beat the chicks at pool. Alan’s feet are still sore.
3rd Jan – Ferry over to the South Island. We then drive on to Nelson. I would go back there in a shot, lovely sunny place.
4th Jan – We drive to Fox Glacier (biiiiiig drive). It is cold (something to do with the glacier apparently).
5th Jan – Alan goes on a helicopter to explore the glacier. I am cheap, so opt for a 4 hour guided hike up the monster. Amazing and spectacular are 2 words which come to mind. We then drive on to Queenstown.
6th Jan – Lots of fun in Queenstown, including the gondola, a steamboat, a luge (weeee) and a very scary jetboat!
7th Jan – Drive on to Te Anau, gateway to Milford Sound.
8th Jan – Visit to Milford Sound. Just look at the pictures, bloody hell!
9th Jan – Drive through to Christhchurch
10th Jan – After a bit of exploring round Christchurch it was time to drop off big gay al at the airport. A very sad time. I only got through the pain by getting my picture taken with a man in a penguin costume. I then drive on to Kaikoura.
11th Jan – Went whale watching in Kaikoura. Saw 4 sperm whales and about 200 dusky dolphins. An amazing experience.
12th Jan – Back in Picton. Had a pint of tennents at the flying haggis. Have discussion with barmaid about the logistics of importing tennents.
13th Jan – Ferry back to Wellington. Drive on to Taupo, the biggest lake in New Zealand. Had some r&r time in the hot mineral spa. Aaaaaah!
14th Jan – Back in Auckland after an amazing but bloody exhausting trip.

The trip was amazing, but it did put a significant dent in my finances. So, I’m planning to hang around Auckland for a while and see how things pan out. There are still lots of adventures to be had before my visa runs out in August, but there is plenty of time for all that.

Missing you all xx