We decided to move out of our box room into a more colourful affair across the street to save a little money. Hearing that Billy Connolly was due to perform at a big arena in the city centre we went on a hunt for tickets and found out they were stupidly cheap compared to the UK tours so nabbed a couple of them for the final night. The show was pretty good but was mostly directed at New Zealanders (obviously..) and as we hadn´t seen anywhere outside of our box room and Auckland city we were a little lost at times. With not a lot to do around the city we spent our few days there wandering around taking in the sights and getting incredibly lost in an architects joke of a shopping centre.
We decided to book ourselves onto a ´hop-on\hop-off´ bus with a company called Magic which would take us on a tour of both the North and South islands. The first day on the bus we realised that it was a little more for beginners (travellers) than we´d first thought as they gave us a running commentary of the towns we passed through, handed out ´activity sign up´ forms and accomodation booking sheets to complete (from which you would be dropped off and picked up at the appropriate times), stopped for 5 minute photo ´opportunities´ along the way and counted us as we got on a and off the bus; it was only a short step ´til they were telling us to hold onto the belt of the person in front... One of the drivers even asked us why we were on the bus after all the independant travel we had done so far, we weren´t so sure either.
Below is a map of our journey, starting and finishing in Auckland (the coloured dots show places we stayed overnight).
On the way to Rotorua we stopped at a placed called Waitomo which had glow worm caves:
"visit the famous Glow-worm Caves which are over 30 million years old. Here you can take a walk and slow boat through the caves to view the amazing caverns and glow worms."
Well... why not. Here´s why: Possibly THE most patronising time of our lives, like being back in pre-school but the sight of 30,000 glow worms above our head was pretty impressive. Back on the bus we began to notice a distinctive wiff of rotten eggs, while looking around for the culprit we arrived in Rotorua which is situated in an area of high geothermal activity - hence the smell. Taking a deep breath we stepped off the bus into a relaxed hostel with slouchy sofas and chilled music. We went for a wander into the citys park with boiling mud pools and steaming, multi-coloured lakes as well as warming foot baths and childrens play areas; not for adults as Mark found out when he went flying off a merry-go-round, much to his ankle´s despair.
Back on the bus a couple of days later we stopped at a geyser (very adamently pronounced GI-ZER not GEE-ZER!) which was a much more relaxed affair than we had first imagined. After a couple of minutes talk by the park warden he walked up to the steaming stack and threw in a couple of bars of soap whose chemicals reacted with the pool below the ground and stepped back as the geyser started to froth and overflow. After a couple of minutes the frothing got stronger until the geyser was pushing great steaming jets of water about 16ft into the air and still we were more reminded of the bubbling of a jacuzzi say, than the jet of water we´d been expecting. Further south and we were heading into Wellington, the little known capital city of New Zealand. After a cloudy few days the sun broke through as we walked along the attractive marina area, watching kids jump into the green-blue waters and visited the national museum, Te Papa to learn a bit more about NZ´s history. After a couple of days we crossed over to the south island by ferry; a 3 hour journey passing through the amazing scenery of the Marlborough Sounds with dolphins jumping in our wake. After a night of indulging in free chocolate pudding and ice cream at our hostel in Picton we were back on the bus and travelling down the rugged west coast to Queenstown.
The scenery along the way was beyond stunning; as we stopped at the Franz Josef glacier and a perfect mirror lake with a backdrop of snow capped mountains it was easy to see why Lord of the Rings was filmed here. Mark´s ankle by this point was fluctuating between two to three times it´s normal size, especially after insisting it didn´t hurt at all and was ok to walk up a big hill to the geographical centre of New Zealand then presently falling over on a flat surface as soon as he was done.
Queenstown was the mecca for backpackers with its massive lake plus beach, mountain backdrop and massive burgers courtesy of Ferg Burger.
Back up the east coast of the south island we stopped at Dunedin for a much needed call into the Cadbury factory and a bag full of free samples. Everyone on the bus chipped in for a big BBQ at Lake Tekapo (on reflection we saw a lot of lakes in NZ...) cooked up by our driver who mysteriously had steak while we had ´meat patties´ and lots of salads and awesome potato bake.
We were now on a bit of a tight schedule to get back to Auckland in time for our flight so we were rushing back up to the north island. The ferry journey was a lot rougher going north on which we were assured by the cabin crew that we would be sick. We were on the 7th floor of the boat watching the waves crash over our windows and the floors above but with Nikki doped up on sea sickness tablets and Mark´s stomach of steel we did not yeild to the call of the sick bag and made it safely ashore with wobbly legs back into Wellington. Due to the bus schedule we had a few more days in Wellington which was not a bad thing as we´d both fallen in love with the city and it´s laid back atmosphere.
Another few days on the bus passing through Napier and Mt. Maunganui back to Auckland where Burger Fuel managed to top Ferg Burger for the ´best burger EVER´ award (we also had a lot of burgers...) All of a sudden we were back at Auckland airport after a one month whistle stop tour of New Zealand, wishing we had longer to spend in this amazing country and dying one day to return (with a hell of a lot more money).
Santiago here we come...
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