A rough start in Welli

Hi all,

Time flies when you are starting afresh in a completely foreign city...!

Last time I wrote we were in National Park. We had a nice evening there, and a nice meal and some beers, and then left with the Stray bus early the next morning. We arrived in Wellington at about 2, and were left on the side of the road with all of our luggage. We drug everything to our hostel, which ended up being a dive.

We were a little down, so we took a walk around town. Te Papa museum is amazing, but everything is very, very expensive here. Worse than Brighton! Tomatoes are $8.99 per kilo, and chilis are $19.99 per kilo. It is just insane. We bought groceries and took them back to the hostel, but cooking is difficult when you are sharing a kitchen with about 50 people. To make matters worse, we were in a four share dorm with a rude German couple who liked to sleep between 3 am and 12 pm.

We were there for two nights. The day inbetween was spent viewing two flats and getting set up with a mobile phone. The first flat was inner-city and awful. The second one was pretty good...on THE summit of Mt. Victoria overlooking Wellington Harbour. Seriously, the house closest to the radio tower, and I can't even describe the view. Unfortunately, the guy showing the room smokes, and isn't the tidiest lad in the world. On the bright side, he has a pretty nice dog named Punch.

The next day (yesterday) we set up a bank account at ANZ and continued getting acclimated to the place. The city is pretty cool...it has a little of everything, but isn't very big, so that you can walk the whole thing in less than an hour. We moved to another hostel which is a little better, but I am getting very tired of dorm rooms and shared bathrooms. Last night I was woken up at least five times by drunk people.

So we've decided to take the place on Mt. Victoria on a short term basis starting tomorrow. It will be about half the price of staying in the hostel, and we'll only be sharing the house with one person (Sam). He is a uni student who just got back from living in Whistler for a year, and was hoping to rent to travellers. That means that starting tomorrow evening we'll have unlimited internet, so I'll be able to be in better contact with everyone.

I also got rejected from the first bunch of jobs I applied for. Hopefully things will look up once we get a good night's sleep.

Catch up again on Tuesday! Miss you all.

Taupo and Tongariro National Park

Hi again,

Just a brief entry about Taupo. We arrived there in the afternoon in time to drop off the skydivers…we couldn’t afford it, but more than half of our bus did it. They said it was fantastic, so maybe after we save a bit, we’ll go back. The town is a base for all kinds of activities that we can’t afford, such as rafting, sledging, jet-boating, etc. The only thing we did is have our usual walk around the town, which was nice enough.

The lake was beautiful, and large enough to fit Singapore inside of it’s area. About 12,000 years ago Taupo erupted in what still is the largest volcanic eruption in recorded history. The Chinese and Romans both noted a blackening of the sky. Therefore, the lake is actually an enormous crater, and just as in Rotorua, there is lots of geothermic activity.

This morning we caught the bus out to Tongariro, but the weather is too lousy to make the Crossing. Rory and I will come back in summer for another go, so in the meantime we are sitting by the fire on our laptops, looking for accommodation and jobs in Wellington. Could be worse!

Will write again when we get to Wellington.

Love, Amy

Cultural Stop and Sulfurous Rotorua

Hi everyone,

We’ve been busy bees the last few days. We stayed in Raglan until Saturday, and then caught the next Stray bus to the cultural night in Makatu. Rory was the only guy, and so had to do the haka by himself. For those of you unsure what that is, it is the intimidating dance the All Blacks do before a rugby match….it was hilarious. Rory was such a sport though, and the (13) girls in the group loved it.

Us ladies had to do the poi, which involves this little soft ball you throw around and catch. I didn’t really have the coordination to do it, but it was fun to dance and sing along with the Maori group. That night we stayed in the makeshift meeting house along with the entire group, and we consequently caught the cold that everyone else already had. Still good fun though.

We got off the bus in Rotorua and stayed in a nice hostel called the Funky Green Voyager. We spent about four hours at the Polynesian Spa, which was brilliant. There were pools of all different temperatures and pH levels, and our skin felt very smooth afterwards. The entire area is geo-thermally active, so there are steam vents and bubbling mud around every corner. We wanted to go to one of the volcanic parks, but we missed the bus the next morning, so we walked around the town and lakeside, which had black swans. It took me back to my days in Oz.

Anyways, I’ll do another entry about Taupo, so that you can see the difference in the photos.

Love you. XXX

From Auckland to Hahei, and then to Raglan

Hiya!

We've started our little tour around the North Island, and so far it has been lovely. We left Auckland on Tuesday morning and drove up to the Coromandel, arriving in Hahei beach at about three. Rory and I hiked down to Cathedral Cove (pictured), which took about two and a half hours round trip. After that the Stray group had a huge Kiwi barbecue (burgers, sausage, lamb, chicken kebabs, pork loins, chips) and we drank more Mac's beer with the rest of the group. There were about 25 of us, and only two Americans, so we had fun chatting with people from all over.

The pictures are from both Cathedral Cove and Hahei beach. The birdlife was amazing, we saw an owl on the trail, and then many quail and other New Zealand species. The sunset and sunrise were also noteworthy.

We got up the next morning, and then our bus broke down, so we became about two hours behind schedule the rest of the day. We arrived in Raglan about two thirty, and Rory and I decided to spend an extra two nights here, since it is a really laid back beach town. Parts of Endless Summer were filmed here and the surfing is world famous. It makes for a pretty groovy atmosphere. We stayed up at the lodge with the Strayers last night, just to hang out with everyone, but we came down into the main town for the next two nights. The hostel here is great...we used their free kayaks and bikes today, and tomorrow we are going boogey-boarding for just ten dollars. We might also golf, even though neither of us really can.

On Saturday we'll catch the Stray bus again and head to Waitomo and then to the overnight cultural stop. We'll spend the night in a Maori community house and have a traditional feast, which should be awesome. It is a bit expensive though.

I'm not sure when I'll blog again, or if Rory ever will! ;)

Love, Amy

A few more Mac's Great Whites, and it's off to Coromandel

Hi everyone,

Auckland has been a good, but soggy, beginning to our Kiwi adventure. Two days ago it rained so much that there was urban flash flooding (just not here on Mt. Eden, thank goodness).

We've been trying to plan out the next several weeks, as well as get acclimated to life here. I'm still a little bit jet-lagged, but not too bad. As far as job leads go, I was asked for a follow-up application for the job at NZAID (New Zealand Agency for International Development), but they might ask everyone, so I don't want to get too excited. Rory is still working on his CV...until we arrive in Wellington and get settled in, it is hard to be taken seriously. I have to leave my phone and address as 'TBA' on my applications, and I'm sure that seems pretty sketchy.

We leave on the Stray bus tour this morning. Our first stop is Coromandel and Hot Water Beach, then Rotorua, then Waitomo, then a National Park near Mt. Doom (Tongariro), then Taupo....I think I missed a spot. We'll be staying in Rotorua a few extra days, so we'll be traveling for eight or nine days. Because the weather has been so bad, we had to invest in raincoats and hiking boots...an expensive mishap in our packing.

We discovered the supermarket and are feeling better about prices. We also discovered a Kiwi microbrew called Mac's. They make about ten varieties of beer, but so far we have been hooked on Great White, which is a Belgian white beer sort of like Hoegaarden. It is delicious, and a fraction of the price that we paid at the bar. To top it off, we got some yesterday for just $1 a bottle...apparently the six pack had had issues and there were three perfect bottles just waiting for us.

I'll write again in Hahei beach tonight or tomorrow.

Love, Amy

Auckland, NZ

Hello from the other side of the world!

We arrived yesterday after traveling for nearly an entire day. Our plane landed a bit after 6 am...we were tired, but we managed some sleep on the flight despite severe turbulence. Both flights were easy and we didn't experience any problems.

We got our visa stamps and got straight onto a Supershuttle which took us to our hostel. We are staying in Mt.Eden, a suburb, and the Bamber House is lovely. We napped a little and then headed into downtown, where we went to an Asian food court and took a long walk around town.

We went to the Auckland Museum, in the middle of the Auckland Domain. It was a great museum, with lots of natural history and Maori culture. We walked back to the center at dusk, and that is when I took this photo of the SkyTower.

We will be here until Monday morning, and then we leave on our bus tour of the North Island. We are taking the Stray Bus to Hot Water Beach, Rotorua, Waitomo....and then on to Wellington after a week or two. We'll just hop on and off the bus as we please. Should be fun! I'm excited for Rory to see all of the things I was able to experience six years ago.

The only worrying thing at the moment are the prices. New Zealand is really quite expensive, which I didn't notice on my last trip since the exchange rate was so much better. Yesterday morning we shared a breakfast, but it was still nearly 19 NZ dollars. A bottle of soda is between three or four. Looks like we'll be on a tight budget until we get jobs.

Love you all,
and write again soon,
Amy