North Island, New Zealand :: 21 Nov 2003 - 27 Nov 2003

Here are the logs for my trip to New Zealand. It's babbly and sometimes there are fragmented sentences and thoughts. Basically copied directly from my travel journal, so excuse the switch in tenses. I'll try to link to any interesting sites/locations and YHAs. Enjoy!

November 21 - 22, 2003

These two days were spent in-flight. I left Albany, NY (ALB) at 11:15am and landed in Auckland (AKL) at 6:05am on Nov. 23. There were two stops - one in Chicago, IL (ORD) and another in Los Angeles, CA (LAX). The flight was pretty much long and painful. Don't remember exactly, but I think it was something like 23 hours travel time. Qantas rocks. They have the best service and the best in-flight food. On the back of every seat is your own screen and their in-flight entertainment includes games! I was very much amused. Nevermind the fact that one day completely disappeared.

November 23, 2003
Where: Auckland, North Island
Accommodations: Auckland International YHA

Customs and Immigration were ridiculously long. It probably took me an hour to go through both lines and get my baggage. I was pretty surprised they let me through with some goods I thought I would get busted for - cookies. Meh. Once I went through customs and immigration, I walked out to the airport waiting area. Immediately, I spotted Stacey & Dianna sitting in chairs waiting for me. Yay! They had checked into the hostel the day before when the arrived, so off we went. The plan was that after I got checked in, we'd go do something to keep me awake and help with the jet lag. My first impression of the YHA was that it looked very much like a dorm building with lounge rooms and stuff. The showers were totally clean and not groady like the ones I remember in Ireland. Once I dumped my stuff in the room, we had a wee gift exchange. Dee gave me an Evenstar pendant! I love it. Gave her & Stace some tiny trinkets and Stace got a mini-Legolas figure - one of the promotional Armies of Middle Earth ones.

For lack of anything better to do, we went to the Auckland Zoo. Of course, it wasn't quite open when we got there, so we sat in the car and watched the free roaming chickens wander around. We did wander around the zoo for a good 2 hours once it was open. There were a helluva lot of birds there. Hit the Victoria Place Market on the way back. Was kinda meh. Saw a gazillion bone carvings, but I didn't buy any there. They were kinda shoddy and there weren't any designs I liked anyway. I was amused that the vendors had signs on their tables that said "no haggling," because that is totally what I would do.

Coming back to the YHA, I discovered some Jappy girl had stolen my bed. Not like I had my stuff there or anything. Cripes. Went back out and bought some groceries. Came back. Played Jenga (w00t!) and then 3 hours of Monopoly. I hate that game. Except I won this time. Dude. Like never. Ha! Cooked dinner. Ate. Went to bed. How exciting.

November 24, 2003
Where: Matamata & Waitomo, North Island
Accommodating: Kiwi Paka YHA Waitomo

Woke up at the crack of dawn. Had a shower. Rearranged my luggage. While Dianna & Stacey were still sleeping, I went and called my mom. Thought about taking pictures outside, but my view is crap. Maybe I'll buy some postcards or something. Today we're off to Matamata and Waitomo! Whee! Hobbiton! Drove to Waikato/Hamilton and stopped by Stace's house to pick up a few things and visit the kitties. Cats generally don't like me. We were pretty much late and hit Matamata at around 12:30 - Dianna pretty much sped to get us there on time. And at that, just barely.

The Matamata Hobbiton Set tour was fantastic! Minus the abundant piles of sheep poo. But yes, the tour was most excellent. We learned all sorts of things like why they were allowed to keep the sets (yay for crappy weather!) and how they how to be able to restore the facades once Return of the King has been out for a while. We basically wandered the Alexander farm under moderate guidance. Our guide was cool. Saw Bilbo's Party Tree and the party field! And Sam's house! And Bilbo's house! And stuff! Took many pictures. It was t3h cool. I reiterate the mad sheep poo.

After a quick lunch in Matamata, we drove to Waitomo and checked in to the YHA for the night. Dunno what to do now. Oh, music!

November 25, 2003
Where: Rotorua, North Island
Accommodating: Kiwi Paka YHA Rotorua

Left the YHA and headed for the Glowworm Caves. Very cool. Bought some postcards. Okay, lots of postcards. The tour was cool and it was like Howe Caverns, but with glowing, mucus-dripping bugs. The guide was funny 'cause he wasn't laughing at his own jokes. Do like that. The river ride through was cool, too - glow bugs!

After that we drove to Rotorua. Whee? The entire place smells like rotten egg gas. Which, you know, is because of all the sulfur springs. The YHA was nice and clean - we had our own en suite room, so that was nice. Stace was a little unwell, so after we checked into the YHA, Dee and I took a drive around to see if there was anything fun to do. We stopped at the museum, but it cost money.. and we are cheap. I mean, saving money. So we walked around and saw some sulfur things. Went to some shops to look and bone/jade carvings and buy more postcards before we headed to the info center to see what else was around. While looking at some fliers, we spotted one for the Rotorua 3D Maze and got stupidly excited. We thought it would be crappy and it looked kind of rundown, but it was really difficult. Uh... yeah. It was hard and we were cracked. "OMG! We're LOST!" So. Funny. There were a million stairs and and such. Oy. Haha. Then this Portuguese family came in and the little boy was following us. Eh? WTF? It was weird, like we had our own little fanboy. Dee & I kept trying to hide and duck & run. After about two hours in the maze, subjecting ourselves to sun burns, and only finding three of the four house things, we gave up and left. Our only consolation being that we stranded the fanboy and his family! Mwahahaha!

After the maze we hit a fish & chip place for burgers. Mmm... MEAT! We were so crazed in the maze, thinking about food and getting dead cow on a bun. So, yeah.. burgers. The craving was so insane. We got the order in the car and were basically distracted all the way back. Meat!! Inhaled the thing, basically. Mmm... red meat! That's probably it for the day. Beginning the Tomination process. Tomorrow we're heading to the thermal springs.

November 26, 2003
Where: Rotorua, North Island
Accommodating: Kiwi Paka YHA Rotorua

Second day in Rotorua. We went to Hell's Gate Thermal Springs after sitting in bed until noon because it was raining and crappy. Hell's Gate was cool - it's all sulfur-y with thermal mud pools and stuff. Took loads of pictures - it looks like the moon or an alien landscape. Came back, washed the dishes and called mom. Um, actually, after Hell's Gate we stopped in town for gourmet burgers. Meh. After dishes and call to mom, Dee wanted to go find something to do, so we went to the Warehouse for snacks, ghetto!Jenga, and Tumblin' Monkeys. Came back and played ghetto!Jenga for hours.

So much rain. Ugh.

November 27, 2003
Where: Taupo & Turangi, North Island
Accommodating: Backpacker's Habitat Turangi

Left Rotorua and stopped in Taupo to see Huka Falls. Very pretty and very blue; like a blue-green, actually. We got some food in town and made our way to Turangi YHA, which is a damn hole. Liek omg. Scary motel cabin in the woods with bathrooms in a separate building. There were some old people who hadn't checked out and were still in the room so we went food shopping. Came back and put our stuff in the room.

We headed to the Whakapapa Ski Fields and Mt. Ruapehu! Which is where they shot a lot of the Mordor scenes in "Lord of the Rings." Very cool and alien. Mars-like. Had lunch at one of the carpark/lookout stops. Took many pictures. We stopped on the way down and Dee made a phone post to her LJ. Mt. Ruapehu was cloudy while we were there, so of course it cleared up as we left. We stopped again to take some pictures from the sunny side. While at the top, we were trying to get a camera to do the timer thingy and snap a picture of us, but it wasn't working, so I handed a tourist my camera and asked him to take a picture of us. He made an unfunny joke about doing it for $10. Har. Har. Blah. And now we are back in our dirty little camping cabin. Eh. So now... we sit around. Tomorrow: Wellington!

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