Scenic stop offs , Napier, Masterton and. arriving at South Island

From Rotorua we headed south, there was nothing else specific we wanted to visit on the way, so were just winging it really to see what came up.  We were basically making our way to catch the ferry to the South Island. 

On the way there are a lot of different view points, scenic areas, and areas of interest signposted. We stopped off at two amazing waterfalls which were so different , one was not high but very wide and fast while the other tumbled down a mountainside. 

We spent one night at Napier which is known as the Art Deco town. There was an earthquake in 1931 in the  Hawkes Bay area, in which Napier is in, which decimated a lot of the area and is classed as New Zealand's worst natural disaster.  The houses which were rebuilt at this time were made in the style popular then, Art Deco. This has resulted in the town being full of many beautiful buildings so it is lovely to wander around. 

There are modern sculptures in the town centre, keeping with the Art Deco style. 

In our motel there were these emergency procedures, we have never seen advice on earthquakes before. David looked at the doorway to our room and wasn't convinced, I think he would have hidden  under the bed. 

At these lodgings we had a huge room, 3 sets of bunk beds, one with a double underneath which we slept in, stopped us fighting about who would sleep on top. It was very cold here though and the internet was rubbish. We are still taking bad to having to pay for wifi when we got it free in most other places we have been. The worse thing is, when you pay for it and it doesn't work. We did complain and got our money back.

The next day we drove down to Masterton, this place was very quaint and again was nice to walk around. At our motel the receptionist was struggling to hear, and proceeded to tell us all about her problems with ear wax and how she liked to get it treated, which was lovely! We asked her for a wifi code, which after several minutes on the computer and a lot of sighing and muttering going on from her, we got. When we tried it at our room though no joy. David went off to enquire but gave up and we set off to explore the town, hoping someone new would be on the desk when we got back. 

When we did get back there was still no wifi, so David went to ask again but the poor lady was totally confused, looked it up on her computer and said " It says it's not connected, but it's lying , it is." It wasn't. David noticed the router at the back wasn't switched on and mentioned it to her but she was having nothing to do with that. At that, we thought well we are going to get nowhere and just accepted it, then we saw another man go over with his computer and I decided to join him, he actually went behind the desk, switched the router on, noticed she had two others and another gadget not plugged in but even with that it still didn't work. 

While we were wandering around this town we went to the local park, they have this very old toilet for men. 

In the park there was a geocache which was disguised as a toadstool. 

A church in the town 

One of the cars parked in the road. 

While in this town we had our first fish and chips in months it was really good, the fish was Moki and  tasted really nice. There are lots of different types of fish on offer, none of which we had eaten before, some of them I couldn't pronounce. 

In Masterton we did manage to get wifi by skulking around outside the library which has free wifi, trying to act casual. To be honest there was a whole bunch of us skulking around, I am sure we could have just gone in. 

The next day we travelled the last leg of the journey to Wellington, once again we pulled into an area on the side of the road. There was this little memorial to a soldier who had died during a disturbance at a P.O.W camp, we were surprised by this we didn't think there had been a P.O.W camp in New Zealand. 

This is the ferry we sailed on, the journey lasts about three hours but passed quite quickly. Surprise, surprise there was a school trip on it! Wherever I go there are school trips. It was the first time we had driven onto a ferry so big but it was quite straight forward. 

There are Scottish links everywhere, one of the lorries that travelled with us. 

When we arrived in Picton we headed for a nearby camp site where we were planning to stay at a cabin. The camp itself was in a beautiful spot and the cabin though small was really nice. We really liked it there and hope to stay there the night before we sail back to the North Island. 

Rotorua - thermal springs and the luge

After the tour we headed back to Rotorua where we were staying for two nights. On the way, just on the outskirts of Rotorua is a place where you can go on a luge.  Now, I wouldn't call it a luge I would call it a go-kart but anyway Margaret had told us all about it and it sounded good fun. 

You get on a gondola which takes you to the top of a very high hill and up there are several activities you can do, such as zip lining, mountain biking, wine tasting etc but we just went for the luge. There are three tracks you can go on, training, which every one has to do on the first run, intermediate and skilled. 

 You get a quick lesson on how to use the luge, once you pass you get a stamp on your hand and off you go. The training route was good, very long, scenic and you do get up to decent speeds. While on this I could see people doing the skilled track and at points they were in the air as they shot down the route. 

At the bottom  you put your luge on a conveyor belt and you get a chairlift back up to do it all again. On the second go, we decided to do skilled as typically for us the intermediate route was closed. Luckily you can control your speed so I went down this track slower than David shall we say, and at no point was I airborne but David was. He was in his element, loving it, while I was thinking, "How old am I, what are you doing?" I tell you the things he, and on this occasion Margaret get me into! 

It was fun though, although you shudder, shake and vibrate all the way down, at one point I thought my glasses were going to come off, but I couldn't take my hands off the handle bars to push them back on

After we had done all our turns, we had 5 each , we headed to the Jelly Belly shop, which was also at the top of the hill. David loves Jelly Belly beans, in this shop they had lots of different types, but also pictures and models made out of jelly beans. 

In the evening we went for a walk around the park beside our lodgings. Now, this park was right beside where we were staying and we had driven past it several times but at no time did we notice steam coming out of the ground.  As we walked towards it, all you could see was columns of steam rising up. There were loads of areas  fenced off  due to the thermal areas,  which you could walk right up to and see the water bubbling and boiling away. At some points it was also very smelly! 

Some bits were like ponds, others puddles and streams. Some were muddy holes with sludge gurgling away in the bottom. 

In the picture below the ground has dried with the heat and is peeling, you could actually peel layers off. It was fascinating to see. 

Some of the thermal areas are very close to houses which I don't know if I would be happy living there,  as there are warnings all over about the unstable ground. We have heard that a young girl fell into one of the pools and died a short while ago. 

After our walk in which David found three geocaches we headed back to the room after what had been a very busy day. 

Hobbiton

When we decided to visit NewZealand on our tour , we looked at different places you could visit,  and Hobbiton was high up there on our list. Hobbiton is the film set for the Hobbit village in Lord of the Rings and was great fun to visit. You get a guided tour, which was excellent, we learnt so much about the filming and what went on behind the scenes. Although we really enjoyed the film we aren't what you would call Lord of the Rings groupies but there were some people there who were, they added to the fun though, they were so excited and kept quoting lines from the film. Strangely one of them looked like a hobbit, a tall hobbit, but still hobbitish! 

There is so much detail put into everything on the set, from the plants right up to the houses with some even having washing drying on the line. A lot of the houses had a theme, for example one had little beehives and honey for sale outside it. Another had a wood fire going with fish being smoke over it. The houses were built to different scales so that the actors looked the right size beside them. Gandalf stood beside houses which were built 60% to size so he looked taller. To make Gandalf look taller than the Hobbits he would be filmed nearer to the camera while they were stood further back. 

The film set is on a working sheep farm, this farm was chosen because it had a lone tree, set aside from other trees , which was used for the party tree. The farm also is set in the middle of nowhere and  where the film set is, right in the middle of a very big field,  there are no signs of the 20th century, such as electric pylons. A no fly zone was set up over the film set but apparently two pilots did fly over it, resulting in them losing their  flying licenses. 

These two houses are built to different scales, if David was stood up in the lower picture, he would look a lot taller than he does in the photo above, when compared to the house size.

There are a few houses whose doors open but there is nothing inside they are just used as storage cupboards. In Bilbo Baggins house there is some stuff put just inside the door, on one side, so that it could be filmed with the door ajar. 

So much effort was put into the set, particularly with the trees. Some even had their leaves stripped off and artificial ones put on so they would look the right type of trees, now you might think why didn't they just use the right tree, well they would grow to the wrong size. 

At the end of the tour you visit The Green Dragon Pub, where you can get one free drink. I had the cider which was delicious, David had water as he was driving and the only other non alcoholic option was ginger beer.  Strangely, the barman used to live where we do and knows one of our children!

David is well known for hogging the fire at home and he just went towards it naturally over there. It was a scorching day! 

Flaunting my cider at David.

During the tour we visited every part of the film set, so I  took lots of photos and have had to be very selective in what I have chosen to show here. 

Some of the sheep sheltering under a tree from the sun. The farm also has Angus cattle. 

It was great fun and we are so glad we made the effort to go, as it is out  in the sticks as they say, as it needs to be.  The film set was actually nearly dismantled but a storm halted the process and while it was on, the farmer who owns the land decided he would like to keep it and use it for tours. In a way this was good as it was used again for the Hobbit films but also it gives people a chance to see it. 

Cathedral Cove and Hot Water beach

The reason we went to Whitianga was because of the famous Hot Water Beach which is just down the road from it. On arriving the day before we were told that we had basically missed it tide wise, so we waited until the day after. We were told the best time would be after one o'clock, so that meant we had the morning to do more exploring. We set off for Cathedral Cove which is another coastal walk with beautiful rock formations and bays. 

We found it quite easily but the very small car park was chockablock with camper vans, so a bit of manoeuvring was needed to get a space. We are driving around in a little blue car, which is really nice,  very fuel efficient and easy to park.  We have mainly stayed at motels so far, but have camping gear in the boot of the car incase we need it. We have actually been carrying around our tents since July and only used them on the Inca  trail for three days, so I want to get more use out of them, so fingers crossed we get good enough weather for camping. We bought a cheap tent out of a shop called The Warehouse, so we are all prepared, I even bought pillows. Well,  I like my comfort when I'm roughing it! 

Anyway, back to the walk, even early in the morning a lot of tourists were already there making their way along the trail. The path went past a couple of small bays, we went down to one called Stingray Bay, only two other couples had gone down this side route , with most people just heading for Cathedral Cove. It was well worth the effort to go down there as, as the name says, there were stingrays swimming in the bay which were easily seen in the beautiful clear water. It was amazing to see so many gracefully gliding alongside each other.

Stingray Bay, it looks really dark and cold but it wasn't, we just had our t-shirts on.

Now, going down to the bay was easy lots of steps but that of course means a lot of steps back up, hard work. I kept telling myself that I had managed to do the Inca trail, and this was nothing compared to that but I struggled. I actually think I have put weight on since arriving in New Zealand, I don't know if it is because it is western style food or what, more snacks  across here too. There is also more food that I recognise, sometimes in Asia, I would wonder what something was and avoid. 

This is Cathedral Cove, there is a lovely little beach which you can get to through this amazing arch, as you can see the cliffs are quite white in this area and there is a lovely golden beach. On the way we walked through woodland which had a lot of finches darting about, we have loved seeing the goldfinches which we get in our garden at home. We have also seen a lot of yellowhammers and siskins. There is a lovely little gull here, which we think is called a Redbill, beautiful red beak and feet. 

Just like the temples in Siem Reap I am drawn to the trees, I just love seeing them. 

Our next stop was Hot Water Beach, there is an area on this beach which is on top of hot springs, so when the tide goes out you can dig a hole in the sand and hot water settles in the bottom, which you can then sit in. Well, there are loads of tourists all at the one spot, clutching shovels all trying to dig a hole, big enough to sit in. Added to this clamour is the waves which now and again come back far enough to undo all the work you have done and the heat of the water in the sand which I found too hot. My toes are still red nearly a week later from being scalded, I had a few crazy dance moves going on, trying to escape it. 

All the tourists in one area, the test of the beach was empty.

After trying for ages to dig a hole which kept being washed away by the waves, we landed lucky as another couple abandoned their spot and asked if we wanted it. We were straight in there but to be honest, the water  was too hot for me to sit in it comfortably I basically sat on a ledge of sand, David did that too but did put his feet in. After a short while, we sort of looked at each other, and you could tell we were both thinking, right we have had the experience, let's go. 

Whitianga - New Zealand

Have had lots of problems with wifi since leaving Margaret's so blog is way behind. 

After three wonderful nights at Margaret's  we realised we had to move on, or we never would and there is so much to visit while we are here. We came across  to New Zealand with  ideas of where we wanted to visit but talking with Margaret and Harry gave us a lot of  new places  to think about.

First of all we headed to Whitianga, which is pronounced Fitianga, as apparently wh  is sounded like a f. It was a beautiful drive up there, although to be honest if you ignore the palm trees, certain places closely resembled Scotland.  The roads were mainly quiet so we were able to relax and enjoy the trip, taking our time and stopping if something took our interest. After booking into our motel we set out to explore.

Our motel was very close to the waterfront so we headed to the beach and walked along to the ferry point. There is a little ferry that carries people a short distance across the harbour to another part of the headland which has beautiful walks. 

The walk we took made its way along beaches, woodland and on top of the cliffs. The weather was lovely and the scenery was incredible. 

The walk led to a bay where Captain Cook beached his ship, "The  Endeavour"  to careen or clean it. 

The harbour at Whitianga is seen above, the ferry basically takes you across that piece of water. After tea we headed out for another walk, we headed through the town and headed back at the harbour, as we were walking along we were surprised to see a stingray basically at our feet. If we bent down we could have touched it. 

Walking along the beach we came to this sign , this tells beachcombers what they are allowed to collect from the beach.  In chip shops across here they do Paua fritters and mussel fritters. 

I am keeping this blog short as, as I have already said major probs with wifi, which is surprising us as we thought this would be one of the better countries for it, we have also had to pay for it more here. We have had better free wifi in most other places we have visited. So many times recently I have done a blog and lost it all because wifi goes, very, very frustrating ! 

Arriving in New Zealand.

After Vietnam we headed for New Zealand this involved taking two flights. The first one was to Hong Kong with Cathay Pacific and it was lovely, comfy seats, good food and a great choice of movies, TV programmes and games to play on the monitor at your seat. 

On landing at Hong Kong we didn't leave the airport but looking out the windows  it seemed very smoggy. After a couple of hours wait we got our next flight to New Zealand, unfortunately this was with another airline. The seats were uncomfortable, the food was alright and the in flight entertainment was very dated, David's monitor kept breaking up and my sound kept going. To cap it all we had an air hostess on our aisle who was very grumpy,  she was alright with us but she  was very snippy with the people behind and to the side of us.  This was the longer of the two flights and seemed to go on for days if not months but eventually it was done. Hooray.

After landing we had to go through Customs, now I have watched Border Control at home and was feeling quite nervous about it, even though the only thing we were unsure whether it was dodgy or not was David's conical hat and we were going to declare that. On the plane we had to fill in a form with other items that might need clearance this included diving equipment and our camping gear.  We were directed to the biohazard section of customs but thankfully we passed through no problem, with the staff being both friendly and helpful. 

We soon picked up our rental car and were on our way. The first place we headed for was Margaret and Harry's house, Margaret is a friend of mine who I worked with a few years ago, she recently retired and moved to New Zealand with her husband Harry. Luckily we found their house quite easy and was warmly welcomed by Harry, as Margaret was out bowling. Both of them are already very involved with the local community, being members of a bowling club and volunteering at a local nature reserve.  

We were only going to stay a night or two there and then head off but we ended up staying three nights. It was lovely meeting Margaret and Harry again and sharing all our news. They also took us to the bowling club, where we were made very welcome by all their friends, so much so that we went to a party at one of their houses before we left. 

On our first full day with the help of Maragaret and Harry we headed to Auckland using the local buses. It was very strange seeing cars on the road following normal road rules and being able to walk on the pavement without avoiding motorbikes, pit holes or cows. The shops are starting to get very Christmassy,  but it seems strange with it being so sunny. I even saw mince pies and the biggest Santa  ever.

On the second day we headed to a nature reserve at Long Bay which is very close to Margaret's house  and is the place where they volunteer.  At the start of the walk we saw a big red shed, this amused me,  as they say, it does what it says on the tin. 

The walk along the coast was gorgeous with stunning views. We also saw lots of birds which was lovely, there was the normal sparrows, finches and gulls you would expect to see on coastal walks but also parrots were flying around. 

The walk finished at a river.