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Auckland, Thursday September 7th
Got in early yesterday after missing a nights sleep. There's a 4 hour time difference between Perth and New Zealand (so back to a 10 hour difference with most of Europe!)
Got a great reception last night by Averill & James. They're friends of Michelle, a girl I met in Lao a couple of months ago. They showed me around the city after which we went for the best dinner I
must have had in the last couple of weeks. Weather is fine - not as cold as I expected it to be so that's good! In 2 days I'll be off to explore the country. Et c'est tout pour now. Cheers, Floris
Wellington, Zaterdag 16 september
Did anyone know that Wellington was the Capital of NZ? Well I tell you - I didn't!! Evenso, this is where I ended up today after a great trip down from Auckland. Just to get some "formal" facts out of the
way: "NZ consists of 2 islands, the North and South Island. Around 4 million people populate these Island. Auckland is the largest city on the North Island (1 mln) and Christchurch is the largest Southern Island
city (350.000). We can find Wellington at the most southern tip of the North island (around 350.000 inhabitants)". Ok, wasn't that interesting. Now that we've got that out of the way, let's start writing about
the real important stuf!
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Diving the Poor Night Islands
Coincidence, it seems to happen all the time! Walking on the streets of Auckland, I ran into Lauren, the Californian (or should I say Romanian?) McDonalds loving guy I met in Tasmania. We rented a car and
took the scenic route up north of the country. Picked up some hitchhicker (yes, she was blond) and went of to dive the Poor Nights Islands, rated one of the 10 best dive sites in the world. It was
absolutely amazing - swimming under archways and through caves (wearing a 7mm thick wetsuit with hood it was actually quit warm!).
Black Water Rafting
Lauren flew back to LA while I hopped onto a bus heading south. Met up with John (Scotland, wauw, that's cool!) and kicked the day of doing some "Black Water Rafting". You get into your intertube,
floating through these caves (Waitomo). While going through them the only thing you see is the hundreds of glow worms that live in the caves. It's like watching the Milky Way and the stars at night. Just beautifull.
We spent three days in Roturua, a large Thermal area in NZ - Geisers, hot water pools etc, (
the (un)usual stuff). We spent quit some time in the "scenic" Lava bar with Reout & Inbal, two Israelian girls in our room. Had a good time before BBQ'ing last night with a bunch of people in Turangi (where the "MtFuiji"
of NZ can be admired) and arriving in beautifull Wellington tonight. It's a saturday so we all know what that means (ok - only the one beer!)
Gotto catch the ferry tomorrow evening over to the south island. A three our trip so shouldn't be that hard. Finally got around to buying "Lord of the Rings" so that should give me some
time to kill. See ya there. Sweet as!! Floris
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Queenstown, sunday afternoon September 24th
Queenstown is the snowboard & ski capital of New Zealand. We got in last night after having spent the last four days on the Magic bus coming down the West coast of
NZ's southern island. It has been a really great trip; it's not untill you get to the south island that the beauty of New Zealand truly starts showing.
Franz Josef Glaciers
The highlight of the coastal trip definately was the Franz Josef Glacier - the blue ice packed river comes down in between the mountains, reflecting in the sunlight. With a bunch of people from the bus
we got a helicopter ride up to the top of the glacier where we tied our crampons tight under our boots. The crampons provide you with the utmost grip necessary to walk the slippery ice of the glacier. We then all got an ice axe and started hicking. Wonderfull - the
blue ice all around you while you step over deep crevasses and go through beautifull lit archways. We called back for the helicopter which brought us back down to the foot of the glacier.
Snowboarding & the highest Bungy
The rest of the days have been quit partylike. We got a great group of people together whom with we spent the days travelling and the nights.. well, let's just say enjoying the drinks. It now is time to go snowboarding for a day and to do the highest bungy in NZ (and possibly the world?). 134 metres (440ft)
which is over 3 times the hight of you normal bungy. After that I'll have to start making my way up north again. We're first going to enjoy the rest of our sunday, down, down under in mountain fringed Queenstown. Floris
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