A brief summary

We've made it to Wellington, where we're staying with R's family. It's been a busy couple of weeks - we've camped on the Coromandel Peninsula and walked up tracks with steps as high as my waist (well, nearly); visited the hot springs in Rotorua and relished in the smell of sulphur; adopted a kiwi at Rainbow Springs (by kiwi I mean the comical flightless bird, not a stray New Zealander); seen the crazy colours of geo-thermal pools and caves at Wai-O-Tapu ("Sacred Springs"); seen what looked like Mordor while on the Tongariro Crossing, apparently the best one-day walk in New Zealand if not the world, and more that I can't think of at the moment.

Tomorrow we take the ferry across to Picton, and our South Island adventure will begin. We've got a hostel booked in the Marlborough Sounds where we'll spend a week about a three hour drive from - well - anything, and then we'll be camping our way down to Christchurch via whatever looks interesting on the way. Oh the life of a carefree traveller!

Aotearoa photos!

Rob put some up here.

We just found out that his sister is in Grant Park at the celebration. I'm so jealous! But there's celebratory salad and big glasses of wine. We know how to live.

(We're also going to be staying in Auckland for a few more days than planned. Daisy needs new brake pads, and given how twisty the roads are here - think rally tracks on gravel roads - we might appreciate her having them.)

Obama did it!

And I dance around awestruck at the amount of people in Grant Park, wishing that I could be there too. Chicago will be having one hell of a party tonight.

This is history. Let's hope it lives up to expectation.

Back in Auckland

As the title says, we're back in Auckland for a few days being fattened up by Stephanie and Yid-Ee, getting a new road user charge (since diesel here doesn't have tax added at the pump, there's a separate charge) and generally working out what to do and where to go next.

Still having massive bank trouble - Natwest blocked my debit card the other day, which was exciting. They did leave four messages for me on my UK number, which was nice, but that also meant that I've just spent lots of money calling voicemail. Oh well. Got to keep Richard Branson happy somehow. After talking to a rather tired-sounding Scottish man, my debit card should now work again. Huzzah, access to money! I hope. The other thing is that the BNZ won't take a Sterling cheque, so my new plan is to take out $600 at a time and pay it into my NZ account in cash. If I'm lucky, I won't get mugged between the cash machine and the bank counter... I'll just have to act nonchalant.

We went up to Waitangi the other day, which is where the treaty between Maori and Pakeha (generally "European", but more specifically the English in this case) was signed. The treaty was the official establishment of New Zealand as a realm of Her Majesty, drawn up with the usual colonial arrogance of the time and then debated and changed by the Maori to better suit them. Good for them, really. There's still an awful lot of debate about it too, especially as it's almost election time here.

It's a very interesting place, especially as there's not a comparable place in the UK. There's a meeting house (marae) which is unusual in that it's for all the people of the country and you don't have to be invited in, unlike a tribal marae. We saw another cultural performance, which was much more powerful than the one in Auckland Museum - the performers seemed to take much more pride in welcoming visitors to the "birthplace of the nation". R and I were the only two there for the first part, so we had the full force of the traditional welcome. R was designated the chief; this meant that he was greeted by a young Maori man doing the threatening posturing thing, tongue out, eyes bulging, lots of yelling and gesticulating with a stick. I'll tell you now, the Pakeha explorers were very brave. If I'd come across this country and been greeted by angry Maori, I'd have said they could keep it. This guy was being welcoming and was still terrifying! Eventually he gave R a fern leaf as a symbol of peace and welcome, and then all was ok. They sang us a song thanking God and the ancestors, theirs and ours, and formally welcoming us into their whare (house); then it was time for hand shaking and the hongi, which is gently pressing noses together. By doing this you share breath with the other person, showing that you've been accepted by them as a brother or sister.

There were a few more songs, talking about Kupe (the first Maori to set foot on New Zealand) and another legend which I can't remember at this point, and then it was audience participation time. Uh-oh. Poi looks simple, but is really not. Luckily another couple had come in, so it wasn't me by myself (poi is a women's game). I think I may need practice; fortunately there are no photos. I'll just have to make a set.

After being shown how to do it properly by the Maori women, it was the men's turn. Haka is also not simple, although good to watch. R and the other man didn't look as fierce as the Maori though - it's hard to stick your tongue out and get the good staring eyes when you're concentrating too hard on what you're supposed to be doing.

Aaaanyway, there's baking happening and that sounds exciting. I'll try to get some photos up soon, and perhaps a more ordered post of what we've been up to. I need to get back in the habit of keeping the blog up to date - it's been a while since Russia.

Our car is now called Daisy. She's fantastic.

Spent the past few days out on the Karikari peninsula at a fantastic backpacker's called The Rusty Anchor. Staying there felt more like crashing at a friend's house than staying in a hostel, which was great. One night Shane (one of the owners) took us out on a glow-worm tour on his private land, which was really cool. There's something magical about sitting listening to a stream and the calls of the morepork (NZ owl) while watching the glow-worms come out and light up the rock overhangs like earthbound constellations. Gorgeous.

Anywy, today might be caving shortly. Yay, underground exploration! or it might just be sitting drinking coffee and chasing the hostel's dog around. Who knows.

At some point I need to get to a bank, too. Then I can pay myself a cheque and finally have access to my own money! Take THAT, Natwest! (Still very annoyed about that.)

Oh, and I snorkelled for the first time the other day too. That was a lot of fun, although I kept having to remind myself that yes, I can breathe underwater. I kept holding my breath, which really doesn't work. Anyway, saw loads of little tiny fish, masses of sea urchins and a big crab. Not sure who was more scared, it or me. I quickly left it alone and went back to looking at the less pinchy things.

What else? I can't really think of things of interest. Lots of the past few days has been spent just enjoying the spring weather and relaxing in pretty scenery. Oh, and driving. Almost ran over some wild turkeys, which was exciting. Why do they run along the road? You can't outrun Daisy!

Currently we're staying at the Little Earth Lodge, which is rather cool. There are ponies, which took a liking to R and decided to try and eat him, a rather fantastic shaggy dog who we spent a while chasing round and round, and lots of farmland. It's so peaceful - I can hear a tui and a pheasant at the moment and nothing else. Lurvely.

We are officially surf bums, but withoout the surfing. We shall learn though, and then the Tasman Sea had better watch out!

Lots of other things to write about too, will do that when I'm not supposed to be cooking...

We bought a car!

Or, more accurately, R bought a car. I was present though, so that counts for something.

It's a 1998 Ford Escort estate, with a 1.8 diesel engine. It's a workhorse! And I imagine is really heavy to drive. I have to keep up my climbing strength somehow. And it's green! Which is an important factor, obviously. Green is good. Apparently it's R's third green car, which is good?

We went to Waiheke Island recently (last Tuesday or so) and hired scooters for the day, which was a lot of fun. Did mean that we couldn't do the vineyard tour, but that's probably just as well. Carrying lots of bottles of wine, while tasty, would be hard work. We both survived pretty well, although R did try driving off the road a couple of times. I claim no responsibility for that. Just because I meeped my horn at him to tell him to drive on the left is no reason to drive on the left-hand verge, in my opinion.

The scooters were a little scary on the roads though. Suddenly there was an 80kph road, and our little speedos only went up to 60... but we survived, I was nearly overtaken by a bus, and all is well. We were very glad when we dropped them off though, and had a local bottle of wine to celebrate. With a delicious meal, I should add, not on the street with it wrapped in brown paper.

Waiheke itself is absolutely beautiful - golden beaches, turquoise sea, green hills... all the stuff you see on the brochures and think they've Photoshopped is actually how it looks. Unless someone Photoshopped my eyes, which would be weird.

Journey time again

Ok, been in NZ for over a week now. Starting to feel a bit like a local - I can use words like "kumara" (sweet potato) and I can even pronounce Aotearoa! For reference,it's "Ow-teer-owa". Go me.

... oh yes, and we met the Prime Minister Helen Clarke at a flea market in the south of the city:


Let's start at the beginning. 32 hours is a long plan journey! First part (to Frankfurt) was easy, as was getting through Frankfurt airport to wherever I needed to be. I did enjoy the "smoker's boxes" - glass boxes in the corridors in which the smokers stood looking a little like vertical goldfish, and where people walking past could feel very smug about not smoking. Good stuff.

The next flight was to Hong Kong, which was long. Luckily my medication knocked me out, much to the chagrin of the man sitting next to me who wanted to talk. Sorry.There were also noodles for breakfast, which was odd but appreciated. Yum, noodles.

Then I was in Hong Kong! I decided to venture into the city itself on a sleek fast train. It sounds silly, but I didn't realise HK was so mountainous! Very pretty, with all the sea and mountains and big tall buildings.I wandered for a while, went to the pier and saw boats (surprisingly enough), took photos, got lunch (which was a strange experience in itself, but successfully negotiated without too many faux pas, I think), discovered I'd lost my train ticket, bought another and headed back to the airport.

Then there was another 10 hour flight down to New Zealand. Slept some more, which was good, ate more noodles for breakfast (what is it with noodles for breakfast on long flights?) and watched as we flew into the dawn with the long beaches of North Island below us. Such a beautiful introduction to the country. Seems I was lucky, as R had landed a few hours earlier in the dark and rain. Heh.

I was met by R and S (his cousin), who took us back to her house for an early lunch. After that we headed out to the Waitakere mountains for a bit of a wander and some pictures (which are on facebook, but nowhere else at the moment). There was a giant picture frame framing the view, and a totem (for which I don't know the Maori word) featuring various ancestors with huge penises.Such is the way of things.

So far our time here has been eating, sleeping and doing touristy things in almost equal measure. Since we're so close to the sea wherever we are, green mussels are incredibly cheap (NZ$2.25/kg!) which means we're eating them fairly often. Yay seafood!

The Auckland Museum was fairly fun. We went to see a "cultural performance" which was a Maori troupe performing songs and dances with poi and sticks, culminating in (of course) the war haka. Quite a sight, even when done purely for tourist purposes. One of the dancers reckoned himself to be a bit of an NZ Idol star, which was quite amusing. Hard to be fierce when you're trying to pose.

We've also been over to Devonport, which is a village just north of Auckland reached by ferry. All very picturesque and "English", down to the prevalence of fish and chips (or "fush and chups") and little tea houses. Really is a bit like stepping back in time.

Other than that, we've been organising ourselves (ha!) - getting bank accounts sorted, SIM cards for phones, car hunting etc. Turns out that I can't transfer money from my UK account to my NZ one without calling them, which is a pain, but I'll need to do that at some point soon. What's the point of internet banking when you can't use it to do the things you want to? Grr.

But, all in all, we're fairly settled in. S has been taking us to various places (mostly foody places), we've found good places for beer, like here:



Oh yeah, and we met the Prime Minister Helen Clarke at a market:




So we're doing quite well.

Hopefully we'll set off for the Northland next week at some point, when we have a car.

Will write more when there's more to tell, and internet to tell it from.I do have a phone number down here now; email me if you want it.

Safely in Auckland

And R did a decent blog about the first couple of days here. I'm too lazy to duplicate it, so if you're interested, head over there. There'll be more updates here when I/we feel like it (and have internets).

Yay travelling!

EDIT: Also, the Earth has now been destroyed (see the indicative badge on the left). This is unfortunate. Details here.

Pastures new

Tomorrow I set off for New Zealand. I can't quite believe it's happening; I've been planning for so long that it felt that's all I'd ever do.

Too tired to write more. Still trying to persuade either OS I use to recognise my iPod. Pfft, computers. Overrated.

I'll update as often as I can. Love to you all (that's right, all three of you who actually read this).