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Wellington
Our coach trip started quite weirdly as our driver known as 'Nancy Boy' put on 'Its Raining Men' and did a very strange dance to it whilst driving the coach!!!
Wellington is known as the Windy City and boy did it live up to its reputation. Didn't get to see much sunshine here accept for on the ferry over but we still really enjoyed Wellington. Our plan of being anti-sociable backfired as we ended up going to the hostel bar the first 2 nights we were in Wellington and both nights ended up a little worse for wear!
The first night the bar was doing a quiz with free chip butty's so we headed down there and then found they were doing happy hour on snakeyb's (snakebite for those who are unfamiliar with the term snakeyb's). We also had 2-4-1 drink vouchers. We came 3rd in the quiz, we teamed up with 2 Essex birds and an Essex lad. Oh and the chip butty's were awesome. Hickey had 3 of them, Lorry had 2, even though we both had dinner a couple of hours before the quiz! We did plan on leaving after the chip butty's until they started playing some banging tunes, so we had a good boogie and ended up going back to our room at a reasonable 1am.
Next day we went to the Museum - Te Papa, it had 6 floors but we weren't that impressed and it was no way near as good as the Museum in Melbourne. It was Valentines night that night and the hostel bar was doing speed dating so we decided to check it out, we took part in some bar games and then we realised we had 2-4-1 Jaeger vouchers - bad idea as we were doing Jaeger bombs with snakeyb chasers! So much for taking it easy. We had a great night though and were one of the last people to leave the bar. A very romantic Valentines Day for us then!
On our last day we moved hostels as we found a cheaper hostel and we had our own room. It turned out to be a very cheap hostel as when we arrived the owner was really hungover and forgot to charge us so we ended up staying there for free! We agreed it was Karma as Hickey found a wallet in the other hostel before we left which had about 300 dollars in, most backpackers would have taken the money but we decided to hand it in to reception.
We slept off our hangovers and headed to Mt Victoria lookout which is about a 40 minute trek and gives great views over looking Wellington - the fact that it was really cloudy meant we didn't get the views we wanted but it was still a nice walk and decent views. We had an early start the next morning so had an early night and we both agreed we were going to stay off the booze for as long as we could!
Taupo
As we headed into Taupo our driver informed us that the weather forecast was going to be bad for the next week and if we wanted to do a skydive then we should do it on our way into Taupo so we took her advice and we did it! Its the best thing we have both done and we want to do another. We did the cheapest option which was 12,000 ft with no photos or videos. We wish we could have done the 15,000ft with the extras but just couldn't justify spending that much money. Anyhoo back to the skydive itself, we got strapped up and got into the smallest plane we have ever seen and it was pink!! The 20 minute journey up was probably the worst part, very squashed and a lot of nervous people around. Lorry was the first person out of the plane, Hickey watched as she got sucked out of the plane! Next up Hickey was off! The initial feeling you get when you jump out of the plane is what the hell is going on! You are flipping all over the place and plummeting to the ground, then you get your bearings and its awesome, then the parachute goes up and you are just floating, such an amazing feeling. We both agreed it was the best thing we have ever done, the views were awesome and the actual 45 second free fall was insane! We were both buzzing afterwards. Lorry nearly cried when she landed as it was an emotional experience!
When we got back to the hostel we took a walk to the thermal spa which is a natural hot spring and its amazing, so hot, feels like a hot bath that you forgot to put the cold water into! We just chilled out sitting on rocks inside the water, a relaxing way to end a crazy day. The reason why these hot springs appear is something to do with it sitting on the Pacific ring of fire, thats about all the geography you will get from us!
Next day we mooched around the centre of Taupo. It's a lovely place and a lot bigger than we first thought. The sun was out for a change so we led on the grass by the sea and sunbathed, well, until a massive storm approached 2 hours later - it was one hell of a storm and the common room/ kitchen area of the hostel started leaking....badly!! We decided to head to the TV room and we watched a couple of DVD's before heading to bed as we had another early start in the morning.
Rotorua and Waitomo
We arrived in Rotorua about 10am, our plan was to spend a night here then a night in Waitomo before heading back for another night Rotorua...so thats what we did! The sun was shining so we got some sun beds from our hostel and basked in the sun for a bit, then we headed down to the thermal parks where we saw lots of mud pools that were bubbling from below the ground and lots of steam coming out from them, plus they absolutely reeked of sulphur, or rotten eggs if you don't know what sulphur smells like! Rotorua is the center for geothermal activity and it was quite a surreal sight, seeing all these boiling hot mud pools that sometimes explode and cause a lot of damage. We pretty much chilled for the night and carried on our no alcohol pact!
Another early start as we headed to Waitomo which is famous for its caves and lots of caving activities and where you can see the glow worms. We are trying not to spend money so we opted out of the activities but we wanted to check the place out anyway as we read that you can do a free walk which takes you to some caves. When we got there we checked into our hostel and they couldn't find our booking so they gave us a free upgrade to a private double room...sweet as! We then decided to do the walk which would take us about 3 hours. The walk itself was really cool, taking us up through the forest looking over Waitomo then through endless fields full of cows before taking us up through some caves which was the best part. The caves were really cool and we tried to take some photos although it was pretty dark, we wanted to stay there until it got dark so we could see the glow worms but realised we forgot our torches and didn't fancy the trek back in pitch black darkness!
Next day we headed back to Rotorua to stay the night, had our 6th day of booze and enjoyed a boiling hot spa! Next stop Auckland which we have heard nothing but bad things about!
Auckland
We arrived in Auckland and straight away headed to the bar! Our hostel was gave us 2-4-1 vouchers so our no alcohol thing ended right there! We had a couple and then headed to a really cool pub called Cassette 7 where we had a free drink and free pizza!! Being a backpacker is just great for the freebies!! The pub was buzzing and playing some funky tunes but after our free drink and pizza we left as we knew if we had another we would be there all night and we had to be up at 7 to go the Bay of Islands. When we left we accidently ended up in Burger King, bearing in mind that we had dinner when we got to Auckland, then had free pizza and now were munching down on some burgers. Tuesday 22nd February will go down as epic eating day!
We actually thought Auckland was ok, I think the fact that the rest of NZ is so amazing makes it look pretty ordinary, nice fact to end on Auckland has more people living in it than the whole of the South Island. See we do listen when we are on the coach!
Pahia (Bay of Islands)
We arrived into Pahia at midday and the weather wasn't great, We wanted to chill before we left NZ so we spent 4 nights here. It's a lovely place with a nice beach and is just really chilled, it bloody rained for the first couple of days which was typical as we started to think the bad weather was following us on purpose. On the plus side our hostel was really cool and had a swimming pool and the weather got better and better.
Our first night we stayed at the hostel and met a few girls who taught us how to play a new card game called' a******'. It was a civilized evening, however the following evening it got messy! Again we played card games but this time alcohol was involved. We bought some cans and a bottle of wine but had to return to the liquor store about an hour later. Lorry made the mistake of sending Hickey down to the liquor store with the instruction of buying another bottle of wine, he came back with a 3 litre box of vodka cranberry! This stuff was deadly as it was like drinking squash and the drinks flew down. At 11pm security kicked everyone out of the hostel communal area so we headed to the bar next door, by this point Hickey was a mess so 1 drink later it was back to the hostel to bed!!!
Next day was hangover from hell day, Lorry was sick all day whilst Hickey tried everything to beat the hangover, coffee, food, a swim, sunbathing, nothing would work so it was back to bed for the day. Incidentally this was the first day the sun came out so we missed this due to our damn hangover! We made up for it the next day though by spending the whole day chilling out on the beach. In fact that is pretty much what we did for the last couple of days. We headed back to Auckland for the night just to stay as we had to be up at 4am to catch our flight to Singapore!
Overall we loved NZ, best country we have ever been too. We were told to spend most of our time in the South Island, but we spent 2 weeks in each and enjoyed both. They are completely different with the south offering better scenery, however the North has the cool natural hot pools, caves and the Maori culture. As the South Island has Queenstown it just edges it for us as that place is just firkin awesome!
Off to Asia now so preparing for the culture shock! Can't wait for the cheapness though!
- comments
Andy gill Hey look at me imdoing this on my own! Sounds top fun (street talk) new Zealand bars will now be in rcesx trouble (can't spell the recess word ) miss you so much up the robins dad and mum and stu xxx
Mum At last some sunshine, you only got 3 months left to get a good tan. lol xxx
Mr and Mrs Bunting Hello Olly. What a smashing time you are both having. Not sure if our messages are getting thru. Been to Cornwall. All our love N and G
Marie, Ryan & Pepper Ah you guys sound like your having the best time. My dad lives over there and raves about the places you two have been, sounds amazing! Makes me wanna go even more. Well on another note we've arranged the date for our wedding now it's the 23rd August. We'd really love you guys to be there, we have your invite but nowhere to send it!... Anyhoo enjoy the rest of your travels and loving the blogs by the way xx Big Love xx