Nearly Home

As I arrived in Auckland I decided I wanted to return home to see everyone I'd gone so long without seeing. My New Zealand plan has never been fixed. After about 20 emails back and forth between myself and STA I managed to get my flight changed to the 4th of March. This meant I now had a month left to enjoy New Zealand.

I vowed to spend every day left in New Zealand swimming and place to begin was Waiheke island. The main attraction for me was a hostel with a volleyball court. As soon as I arrived I met a couple of Germans celebrating Bob Marley's birthday by listening to Bob Marley songs and smoking weed. I spent a few days enjoying the delightful beaches the island has to offer. On my travels I encountered a free orchid and a box of cucumbers and courgettes being given away. While being a short ferry trip from Auckland it feels like a world away.
Then it was time for the final part of my kiwi experience trip up to Paihia. With so much time to spare I decided to break it up with some side trips. First was a four night camping trip around Cape Reinga which was so intense it will get it's own blog entry. This was followed by a break in endless summer lodge in Ahipara. The garden has some bananas, herbs and aloe vera growing in it. The highlight for me was the grapevines which had far fewer grapes on them when I left. There was body boarding to be had in the bay and sand boarding in the dunes.
Now after sand boarding on the Cape Reinga trip I felt I had it mastered. After a long climb up to the dune I took some time to appreciate the landscape at the top. There were nice sandstone rock formations and a silence in the air. I sat in the sledge provided by the hostel and went flying down. Instead of stopping at the bottom I hit a rough area of sand and basically crashed. While clearing the sand out of my face a wedding photography expedition appearing to start taking photos with the sand dunes as a stunning backdrop.
My final side trip was to be the last use of the tent on Urapukapuka island. This again provided bountiful swimming opportunities in the many sheltered bays. I also swam to a nearby island because why limit yourself to just one island.
While gallivanting off on all these trips I have been using my Paihia hostel to store my luggage. This allowed me to take only the essentials camping and amaze everyone in Ahipara by turning up with just a small rucksack.
Today I went on a walk along the coast and was invited to join a couple of Kiwis drinking beer on the beach. Then an Aussie turned up who was running because she was worried the homeless guy who lives in a tent might try and eat her. We are all meeting up in a bar tomorrow. With only a few days to go my New Zealand holiday remains interesting.

North again

Carrying on from where I left off. Palmerston North turned out to be a pointless diversion as the whole sheep farming thing didn't come about. Anyway I returned to A plus lodge in Turangi only to be kicked out for getting food poisoning. Yes that actually happened. Ian's ex wife/girlfriend/whatever who for some reason is in charge said I couldn't stay because I might
infect everyone else in the hostel and I hadn't done any work which was true as I was a bit too dehydrated to do anything. While appalled by this woman's small minded stupidity I was glad to finally be leaving. The next day I was back on the bus on the way to Auckland.

Auckland was fully booked until Monday due to an event on some sort at the weekend. So I decided to spend some time back in Rotorua. I was staying in the hobbit hole wing of funky green voyager.

Having already seen most of the attractions I haven't actually done that much. But then most isn't the same as all. I wanted to go to the lakes to the south of Rotorua as the weather was perfect for swimming. There isn't really a public transport option for these lakes and the shuttle buses only take you to paid attractions. So I decided as they were only 11km away I'd run down. Now this run turned out to mostly be walking but it worked out well.

I arrived at the Blue lake to find it had jet skis on it which kind of ruined the whole get back to nature thing I had in mind. So I went further to lake Tarawera which was much more isolated. It had a four hour walking track to hot water beach which I couldn't resist doing even if it meant getting back very late. Almost immediately I came to the conclusion this was a splendid idea regardless of the
consequences. The Tarawera trail has stunning views and takes you through the fern filled rainforest which gives New Zealand its appeal. The water was perfect for swimming in and it was delightfully isolated.
I'd had visions of spending the night bathing in warm water at hot water beach. It didn't exactly work out like that because the water at hot water beach actually is hot. The hot water flows into the lake creating a scalding hot layer of water on the surface while underneath the is water normal lake temperature. There is fun to be had with this and it is spectacular but not one for bathing in all night.
I then raced back to the car park at the start of the track and got there just in time as it was getting dark. Surprisingly there were still cars on the road and I was able to get a lift back from Ike who was returning from an engagement party.