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Hello all!
We apologise for a very long delay in our blog but life has been a tad busy and the effort to type all the activities we have done, well it gets in the way of our beach time hehe!So now we have given up sunning ourselves to finally get an update to you, so here it goes...we left you in Queenstown on the South Island of New Zealand!
Day 5
So while Claire and Gillian had a lovely lie-in.....Kyle and Nelette decided to jump out of a perfectly good plane for fun! (You thought we were the crazy ones :P) They loved every second of it and would do it again in a heartbeat!!!!Kyle did worry that when Nelette jumped out of the plane first that it was the last time he was going to see her....bit harsh Kyle, if she wasn't scared enough!!!
While Claire continued her relaxing day in bed Gillian met up with the adrenaline junkies, Kyle and Nelette and decided to go canyon swinging! The canyon swing is really unique, it is meant to be much safer than a bungy jump....or so we tell the parents to stop them worrying....they still fell off a very big bridge!The people that work there try and mess with your head and try to freak you out before you jump! Kyle was summoned to tackle the canyon. He decided to go head first.Nelette followed deciding to do the cutaway. All you could hear was her screaming all the way down! Then Gillian decided to go backwards.The guys that worked there seemed to like Gillian and would not stop talking to her, they were trying to wind her up but she was having none of it, she got to the point where she just asked if should could jump off....so she did! Gillian and Kyle loved it...as for Nelette, I don't thinks she will be doing it again in a hurry. We headed back to our hotel to meet up with Claire and to get ready for a big pub crawl...apparently what Queenstown is good for as well as the adrenaline sports.We went to 6 different bars and danced the night away.Nelette the sensible one decided to go back to the hotel quite early while Claire, Kyle and Gillian still went strong and headed back to the hotel around 3am.
Day 6
A nice early 7:30am start for all of us as we packed up and left for the next location.Kyle and Claire were suffering big style from the previous nights pub crawl, slept most of the journey up to Franz Josef.Today was the day of the glacial hike but it was a miserable day, pouring of rain outside. It was the most rain they have seen in a long time...they measured the rainfall in meters!!We stopped off at Fox Glacier to hike the Glacier but due to the weather it was cancelled. The whole bus was really disappointed but slightly relieved as pretty much everyone was suffering from the night before, lol! We headed to our hostel where we got told we got free entry to the hot pools across the road so we unpacked our swimmers and all the hungover people (i.e. the whole Contiki bus) headed over to the hot pools for some much needed pampering! They were so good, a very enjoyable way to spend the afternoon, soaking in 38 degree baths...one of the best hangover cures ever (apart from skydiving, Kyle and Nelette agree). Feeling recharged and ready to roll we got ready had a lovely 3 course dinner served at the hostel and spent the evening playing pool and chilling out.As Nelette and Gillian did the sensible thing and retired to bed early, Claire and Kyle stayed in the hostel bar chatting away to the rest of the Contiki crew.Claire who learnt her lesson (haha) from the previous night stuck to water whilst the rest of the bus drank jug upon jug of beer.The amount of people needing help to find their room that night was funny!It's quite good seeing drunk people when you're sober...you can tell them what an idiot they were being in the morning...good blackmail too :P hehe!
Day 7
We got a little bit of a lie-in this morning. It was bliss the bus didn't leave till 8:45am. We drove through a beautiful mountain town called Arthur's pass which had some brilliant waterfalls.Today we drove back to Christchurch as the tour of the South Island had ended.We got checked into our rooms at the holiday inn and we headed straight for the pool. It was our task for the afternoon...to dunk Kyle under the water. It took a lot of planning, strategy, time and patience to finally get him under. It took all three of us....but we succeeded, he was under!!! After the fun and messing around at the pool we headed to our rooms and got ready for the goodbye meal at Bealey's. Half of the Contiki people were leaving as they had only signed on for the South Island and the rest of us left the next day for the North Island.It was a ready good night...ending up in the hotel lobby drinking until the early hours of the morning.They were the best bunch to do a tour with...Claire, Kyle and Nelette both agreed, it beat Europe for sure!AND...the tour had not finished yet!
Day 8
It was another early start for us as we left Christchurch and headed towards the North Island.We picked up some new passengers for the North Island...all from California (enough said)!We caught a ferry from Picton to Wellington.It was quite a quick 3 and half hours to cross from island to island.When we arrived in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, Trent our bus driver showed us around the capital pointing out various Lord of the Ring sites before heading to the highest point in Wellington. We got off the bus to take some lovely photo's then headed back to the bus to take on the most dangerous part of the tour....getting the contiki bus down a really small windy road to the bottom of the hill. We even had mission impossible music on the way down! We were all in stitches as our tour manager was petrified!!!She couldn't even look where we were going. We pay many repesects to Trent as that was one dangerous road to take a bus on haha! We also have to mention that Wellington has a lot earthquakes as it is located on a vault line.Most of the buildings have material to buffer the shocks built into them so not many people will feel an earthquake when it occurs....like us!!Apparently at 4am in the morning of our stay in Wellington, we experienced an earthquake....but no one felt anything!Anyway, back to our day...we got to our hotel room in one piece and got ourselves settled before heading out to a restaurant called Blend for a group dinner.It was a fantastic meal and a cracking night out!We are proud to say...out of the whole tour group, the Scottish (and Nelette, our token South African) were the last ones standing!Oh and Trent, our bus driver....we had to walk him home hehe!It was a reasonably early night...1am isn't too bad!
Day 9
We spent the day in Wellington today. Claire and Gillian got the day to chill, relax and shop like girls for secret Santa presents and material for out flamboyant toga party we were to have the following night on our dinner cruise!Whilst we did what we do best i.e. shop, Kyle and Nelette went quad biking through the countryside. They came back with no injuries like we joked about.That night we managed to get our contiki group together and went out for a Malaysian dinner...nothing to special or exciting.We even had a quiet night back at the hotel watching movies.Marley and Me came on which caused quite a few tears for the girls in the room!Claire again walked out before the end of the movie!Gillian, Claire and Kyle would like to give our dogs a big virtual hug at this point in time!!!
Day 10
It was goodbye to Wellington and hello Lake Taupo! We stopped off at Taihappe and a place called bulls for some much needed food and a stretch of legs and a picture stop at the highest mountains of the North Island...one so happens to be a volcano waiting to erupt! We got to our hotel with only an hour to get ready for our flamboyant toga dinner cruise party on the lake.The girls looked awesome where as the boys looked...well, erm strange in their plastic table cloth togas!Well the word flamboyant definitely comes to mind, so they did well!It was an awesome party filled with conga lines, writing on people with permanent waterproof marker, boys jumping of the boat, food and booze...the pictures are hilarious! It was one of the best nights, ending up in one of Lake Taupo's nightclubs and a long walk home!
Day 11
We spent Christmas Eve in a place called Rotorua.We stopped off and walked through a place called Craters of the Moon where steam just rises out of the ground and various mud puddles bubbled away.Rotorua has the most geothermal activity in the world. It is a beautiful place but due to the geothermal activities it smells like rotten eggs! Claire, Nelette and Gillian were not impressed!We then got dropped off in the centre of town had some lunch before getting picked up to go white water rafting.It was a Maori run company and before they enter the river they pray to the gods to keep us safe from harm.Once we got through a little practice section we then headed out and took on the grade 5 rapids! We handled them very well and just when we thought we had made it......the 7 meter waterfall approached! The most exciting part of the whole experience!It is the highest commercially rafted waterfall in the world...of course we had to do it!We were told to get down into our positions and we plummeted down underneath the water.We thought the raft was going to capsize but luckily our guides know their stuff.Once the raft had been corrected Claire, Kyle and Nelette looked around to see Gillian was not in her seat!! In true Kemp tradition.....of course she fell out lol! (Check out the pictures they're Awesome!) After the adrenaline filled afternoon we headed back to the hotel and got ready for a Maori feast and show! A traditional form of cooking called a Hangi...a feast cooked in the earth. The food was tasty and the performance was even better! They showed us traditional dances such as the Kapakapa, the Haka and the Poi. Gillian and Nelette went on stage and performed the Poi a traditional woman's dance and some of the contiki guys got on stage and preformed the Haka! Claire, the photographer for the night was standing back in stitches watching the boys performing the Haka! It was a brilliant night....no alcohol involved (almost)!!!
Day 12
Merry Christmas, ho ho ho and all that jazz!We woke up on Christmas day feeling very un-Christmas like...but after putting on some tinsel, Santa hats and reindeer antlers and running around like some drunken idiots shouting Merry Christmas....I guess we got into the mood!We headed off to the most amazing ride in the world....ZORBING!!Big huge inflatable balls with water inside at the top of a big hill...lots of fun!Claire and Nelette were the first to (ungracefully) jump inside one of the balls and roll down the hill.Then it was Gillian and Kyle's turn. We jumped in like pros! It was like being in a washing machine spin cycle...if you have ever been inside a washing machine spin cycle before lol!It was so much fun we got to do it again! Claire, Kyle and Nelette even had the opportunity to get run over by one of the balls rolling down the hill!After all that fun and excitement we then headed on to our next stop.We watched a sheep shearing show, you're not mistaken we actually watched a sheep shearing show! A very different way to spend Christmas indeed! The highlight of this stop was finding 6 little Harleys in a pen!Yes I tried to sneak one out but they caught me!We headed off and stopped by a river to have our Christmas picnic. There was a lot of food, wine and of course the most important thing of ALL.........our Secret Santa Presents! Claire and Nelette carried on the Christmas fun by face painting ourselves with all types of artistic Christmas pictures!I think we looked more like clowns than Rudolph.After our very festive lunch we headed back on the bus towards Watamio...the smallest little town with absolutely nothing in it but a cave and our lodges for the night! We settled into our 2 story lodge and there headed straight to the Watamio Caves. The limestone rock formations were amazing and the highlight was cruising in a boat through the tunnels and seeing the glow-worms! It was mesmerising! Unfortunately we were not able to take pictures as the flashes kill the glow-worms.We headed back to our lodge and got ready for Christmas dinner. The food was lovely, the company even better! We got to speak to our families and wish them a Merry Christmas. Movies in the t.v room finished the night off for Claire and Kyle.A very different but wonderful Christmas!
Day 13
We packed our bags and got on the Contiki bus for the last time. We drove to Auckland where we were to disembark off the party bus for the final time!We waved the bus and all our friends on and we headed to our hotel.Don't feel too sorry for us we were staying in a 4 bed penthouse apartment on the 23rd floor! Well we decided that we needed some luxury as we were going to be stay in a hostel for the next month! We explored the city of Auckland and headed back to the apartment and had a lovely Chinese and watched movies, trying to finally finish the booze we bought at duty free when we first arrived in Christchurch. Ha we kept that secret right till the last day...go us!Today was officially the end of our New Zealand adventure, one of if not the best trip we have taken!We had the best night sleep we all had in ages! The beds were so comfy we didn't want to leave! We caught our shuttle to the airport the next day and flew to Sydney to continue our next part of our adventure!
Much Love
Claire and Gillian
xxx xxx
- comments
Bigger Kemp That all sounds amaaaazing guys! True Kemp fashion Gil, true kemp fashion! xxxxx
Mum I watched the video. You are one crazy chick.