November 10 Tuesday China side: Well things were exciting for much of the rest of the day and mostly in ways I did not want it to be exciting. First, they could not find me in the airline system and sent me to a special customer service desk. The lady there was very helpful and was able to find that when I rescheduled the flight (which I had to do through Airtreks, I could not do it directly myself), the flight had been changed to November 6. Airtreks had sent me a confirmation email saying November 10. That was not a good feeling. Fortunately, she also said that when I had not shown up on the 6th the ticket was put in an open holding position and there were open seats on the flight that day so I could go after all. It took almost 40 minutes to get it straightened out and I let her know how much I appreciated her fixing it for me, especially since it took so long and that made some other customers behind me agitated (and rude). I got my main bag checked in right at the weight limit and things were looking better again. When I got to the screening area, they told me my carry on was too heavy (of course it was, I had it filled so the main bag was okay) and that I had the choice of throwing things out or returning to the check in desk and working with them on a solution. Well, my main bag was already at the limit so that was not much of an option, but I returned to the check in desk anyway. We went back and forth taking out items and weighing the bag to see what I could get away with. In the end (and this just shows the absurdity of our flight “safety” systems around the world) I had a bag that was acceptable to the screeners and I had an armload of books and every pocket in my jacket was stuffed with items. I went down to my gate and put all the things back into the bag, so the whole process was largely pointless. I did donate two items to a charity bin, but that was negligible as far as weight was concerned. The flight was fine, long enough to play some Bedazzle and watch three movies (Get Smart, Plastic City (a Japanese/Brazilian movie), and Wallander (a
Danish movie). Once in Hong Kong it went smoothly to get my bags and I found an ATM to get some cash. I got $HK2000 to get me started. That is about $258 US. The cheap way into the city is by bus, but since I was arriving late it would be quicker to take a train, which cost $HK100. I thought if this is how everything is, my money is not going to last long here. The airport train is the only expensive one though because they know people have to take it. Other routes are much cheaper, I happily discovered. The train (MTR) was fast and clean and everything is labeled in Chinese and English, so that was easy to deal with. I got to the Central Station and based on my directions from my Couchsurfing host, I found the #4 Pier with ferrys to Lamma Island, but just missed the 10:30 ferry, so I had to wait an hour for the next one. The ferry workers were helpful in showing me how the system works and it was easy after that (although the token machines were always reading the coins incorrectly and I had to overpay several times, but still it was literally pennies and not worth arguing over). After a half hour ferry ride we arrived on Lamma Island. There were a lot of people on the ferry given the time of night. The town of Yung Shue Wan has one main street and most of the people headed down that way. I was looking for a particular ice cream shop, but missed it and went much further down
the village before I stopped to ask for directions. Then it did not take long to find the stairs mentioned in my directions. My host had said there were 100 stairs and I thought it was probably just a number he threw out there, but there were just over one hundred stairs to the top. Just before the top was a split in the path and I followed the left branch which shortly came to a sign reading “End” and with two houses. This matched the directions I had, but one
house looked deserted and the other, after waking up some dogs, and their owner, was clearly not my destination. I left my bags at the deserted house and walked over to the right branch of the path. It led to a couple apartment buildings and the path continued on from there. This did not match the description I had in mind and I went back to where my bag was. My phone was almost dead battery wise and when I tried to send a text, it failed, so I was not sure if it was my phone not working in a new country or if the number was wrong, or what. I got out my netbook and could get a free wifi signal from somewhere in the neighborhood. I sent a message to my host, but it was nearly 1 am at this point and I expected him to have gone to bed. At the seemingly empty house there was a wicker couch thing in the side yard and I tried to get comfortable on that, but the mosquitoes were incessant and if I covered up it was so hot I was
quickly sticky with sweat. Neither option was pleasant and the time change being greater than I had realized meant I was getting very tired and miserable. I almost forgot one of the other things: with all the running around I was happy that there are public toilets open at all hours of the night and on Lamma the public toilets are squat toilets, so I had my first experience with one of those. Super exciting!!!! I'll continue the story tomorrow.
November 11 Wednesday I only slept a few hours, then because of the time differential combined with the uncomfortable sleeping surface in the garden, I stayed up. I read for a couple hours and watched the sunrise. Since I had not made contact with Adrian, my phone was low on battery, and he would be out all day working, I decided to take the ferry back to Hong Kong Central and look for hostels. I still had the address written down for YesInn, one of the better
rated hostels and took the subway to the nearest station to it. I found the place after a few minutes searching, but they were booked up for the night and tomorrow night. Bummer. The reception man did not know of any other hostels nearby, but he said I could use their wireless to find out where some others in Causeway Bay (not too far from YesInn) were. While looking, I got two emails, one from Adrian and another from Daniel, the guy staying with Adrian at the moment. I could go back to the island and meet Daniel who would let me into the flat. I still made a booking at YesInn and put a 5 dollar deposit down for 5 nights. Then lugging all my belongings, I retraced my route back to the subway, then to the ferry, then through Yung Shue Wan on Lamma Island. I texted Daniel that I was on the island again, but my phone is having issues and it told me the text failed. Here we go again, I started thinking. I hiked up the stairs to the place I had been last night and looked around. Nobody. I walked over to the other side where the path had forked. Nobody there either that I could see. I got out the netbook and it showed Adrian's wifi network giving off a signal from one of the buildings, so I knew I was at the right place at least. I left my backpack in a relatively safe spot and walked back down to Emily's Ice Cream Parlor to wait a bit and see if Daniel had gotten my text anyway. I read while I waited, but after twenty minutes, I headed back up the hill. This time there was someone on the deck and I
asked if he was Daniel. He was and he quickly let me in. Daniel is from the UK and his girlfriend Florine is from France. They are just finishing up a five month stint in China and head to India tomorrow. We talked quite a bit about our respective trips. They have been traveling for 8 months, came overland through Russia from Estonia, before entering China. They visited Taiwan and said it was easy to go there. That is something I'll have to look into because I would really like to visit Derek if I can.
Adrian's flat is actually quite nice. It has two bedrooms (Daniel and Florine have the second bedroom til they leave tomorrow, so I get the couch in the living room. The kitchen is VERY small, but the bathroom is really nice and there are two walkin closets, so there is a decent amount of space. Later Adrian told me he pays around $1500 US dollars a month for it and that is about a third of what it would cost in Hong Kong proper. He used to stay in a 9th floor flat
there that cost US$4000 per month (more than HK$30,000) and was smaller. The flat here has a nice view of one of the hills/mountains on the island and also of the harbor and ferry terminal. You do not see the city lights of Honk Kong at all, so you really do not feel like you are in a city, which is great.
Now that I was in the right place and had a chance to sit down for a bit, my first priority was to take a shower. Then I slept for a few hours until Adrian arrived home. Daniel and I went down to the village to buy some pasta sauce and a few other items for a dinner of spaghetti with pesto that we all ate together, then I went to bed shortly thereafter.
November 12 Thursday Adrian left for work quite early, I made some of my remaining oatmeal for breakfast, with an apple I purchased last night. Daniel and Florine got up and were finishing up their packing to go to India. They gave me a banana, some bread, a little peanut butter, some raisins and sunflower seeds since they did not want to take those things with them on the plane. That helps me out for sure. They left close to 11 and I worked on the computer for a bit. Later I walked around the village some, went to the two small temples and a couple other 'landmarks'. I did a bit of grocery shopping, got some soy milk and cereal, more peanut butter, some tomato sauce, corn and eggs.
November 13 Friday I wandered some more on Lamma, but stayed close to the village. With the good internet connection, I have been uploading my photographs and videos to Scott's server. It will still take a few days to get it all backed up, but then I'll have the added safety of knowing the pictures are secure.
In my version of a blog filibuster here is a list of the books I have read on the trip so far: (NonFiction) Last Chance to See by Douglas Adams, Abolition of Man by CS Lewis, Istanbul: Memories of a City by Orhan Pahuk, Are You Somebody? By Nuala O'Faolain, Dave Gorman's GoogleWhack Adventure!, A Walk In The Woods by Bill Bryson, Born on a Blue Day by Daniel Tammet, Marching Powder by Rusty Young, (Fiction) Seeker by Jack McDevitt, Past Watch: The Redemption of Christopher Columbus by Orson Scott Card, The Confessions of Max Tivoli by Andrew Sean Greer, The World According to Garp by John Irving, The Last Juror/The Chamber/The Runaway Jury/The Appeal by John Grisham, Tess of D'Urbervilles by Thomas Hardy, Their Eyes Were Watching God by Zora Neale Hurston, 1984 by George Orwell, Brave New World by Aldous Huxley, Skinny Legs & All by Tom Robbins, The Great Pursuit by Tom Sharpe, Voices From The Street by Philip K Dick, Toad Triumphant by William Horwood, Dolphin Island by Arthur C Clarke, A Short History of Tractors in Ukrainian by Marina Lewycka, The Dark Room by Rachel Seiffert, The Dharma Bums by Jack Kerouac, Prey by Michael Crichton, Perfume by Peter Susskind, In The Woods by Tana French, The Distance Between Us by Maggie Ofarrell, The Anatomist by Federico Andahazi, Breakheart Hill by Thomas H Cook, The Catcher In The Rye by JD Salinger, plus three compilations of short
stories: Ep;phany, McSweeney's Massive Treasury of Thrilling Tales, and It's All Good: How Do You Like It Here Now?
The book by Nuala O'Faolain was interesting enough that when I saw another book by her in a New Zealand hostel I was at, I grabbed it. That is what I am reading currently: My Dream Of You. I also have three others: Consider the Lobster by David Foster Wallace, Metro by Alasdair Duncan, and I Have Fun Everywhere I Go by Mike Edison. The last one I picked up just for the title alone. I have no idea what it is about.
This afternoon another couchsurfer arrived at Adrian's place. He is from Spain, but going to school in the Philippines studying anthropology. He was interested in hearing about PNG and we talked quite a bit about that and many other things. He is partly in Hong Kong to buy a computer, something Adrian told him was rather foolish. Hong Kong is not the place to get good deals on electronics. There are too many knockoffs and the only discounts you will get are due
to the lack of warranties on the products.
November 14 Sabbath I got up early and had breakfast. Mario and I left on the ferry together. He was headed for Mong Kok, where one of the bigger electronics markets is. I was going to the address I had for the Kowloon SDA church, near the Prince Edward MTR station. I arrived just before 9:30 and they had not started yet, but the greeter said they only have services in Cantonese. He gave me a map for another church that had bilingual services. I walked down following the directions and found it quite quickly. My path had taken me by Austin Road, so I had made a small stop there for some pictures. Sabbath school was just starting when I made it to the church. The english class was made up mostly of Filipinos, with a couple other nationalities also represented. We went over the lesson and then there was a discussion for a while about work and Sabbath, which is apparently a big issue here. Many of the Filipinos come through work agencies and while they request placement into jobs where they can have sabbath off, when they arrive that is often not the case. So they were talking about what they can do to be true to their beliefs in circumstances like this. It is definitely a challenge and one I have not had to deal with fortunately. For church everything was translated through headphones. After, there was a good potluck and an energetic Indian lady named Katy invited me to the Clearwater Bay church for next Sabbath. That is where the Hong Kong Adventist College is. I got my picture taken with some of the people at potluck including Maris from Indonesia, Babu from India, and Nori from the Philippines. Nori and Maris took me to the Kowloon Park, just a couple blocks away, to walk after eating. We went through the aviary and by some interesting fountains. At 3pm was a prayer meeting, so I went back to the church with Maris for that. I was supposed to contact Adrian about a dinner he had with some of his friends and that he had invited me to. The prayer meeting was scheduled to go until 6 I realized after it had begun. At five during a break between speakers I left to get in touch with Adrian. It turns out I could have stayed because the dinner is actually next weekend, but by the time I had worked that out I did not go back to the prayer meeting.
I walked down to the Kowloon harbor side where the Space Museum, Hong Kong Cultural Center, and the HK Museum of Art are located. The Cultural Center is apparently controversial because it is a large building with no windows facing the harbor (one of the better views in the city). I had read something about a nightly light show, but in my mind I had transformed that into a fireworks show and I did not remember the time it was supposed to occur. I wandered along the piers and through the Avenue of Stars (like the Hollywood one), then wandered back into the city interior. I never did see a show. Many of the buildings are rigged with lights and do their own displays, but they are random and this was supposed to be a coordinated show. After a while I headed back to Hong Kong central and caught a ferry back to Lamma.
November 15 Sunday Mario and I set out together with the plan of going to the Peak and then the Giant Buddha on Lantau Island. He was going to catch a plane back to the Philippines in the evening, having successfully purchased a computer yesterday. But things went awry right from the beginning. The weather was not great to start with, but as soon as we were halfway to Hong Kong Central, Mario could not find his cell phone. He was quite sure he had left it at Adrian's
and so we went back. I continued on to the Peak on my own. Turns out he must have had the phone with him anyway, so he wasted some money on ferry rides, because Adrian said he never came back to the flat. Hopefully, everything worked out for him. There are directions on my city map for how to get to the Peak tram, but they are silent on how to walk up. I know there are several roads leading up and so I just went in the general direction of the Peak. My path went through the Botanical Gardens, where I did not spend much time. They also have an aviary with many of the same birds as on the Kowloon side. I passed the tram station and began following Old Peak Road, which I figured had to go in the right direction. It does and after a good workout I emerged from just below the tram station at the Peak. The bad thing was the weather, which had not been nice anyway, had decided to get very windy and descend on the Peak in the form of a dense fog/cloud. I could not see anything. I still took a few pictures of Lions Pavilion and so on, but I will really have to come back on a better weather day. Going down the same way I went up I passed a house that I should have gotten a picture of (I did later, but it was not the same). In the driveway in front of the triple car garage were a Porsche, a BMW SUV, and a Ferrari. That may sound incredible, but I have actually seen quite a few Ferrari's and Lambourghini's on the roads here, alongside many many Mercedes, BMW, and other luxury cars. Nice cars seem to be the standard here if you are going to own a car at all. Once I was back down from the Peak I walked east to Causeway Bay, partly looking for a specific music shop (which happened to be closed when I found it even though it was still during the time it should have been open). I had a vegetable and egg fried noodle dinner in a small restaurant. I should have gotten pictures of another restaurant I passed that had 'Vegetarian soup with goose neck' and 'Vegetarian noodles with pork dumplings' on the menu.
Tuesday, November 24, 2009
Monday, November 9, 2009
November 6 Friday I spent the morning taking care of laundry and surprisingly the dryers here did their job. Most places the dryers do not work properly and I have air dried my laundry almost exclusively on this trip. I got a positive response from one Hong Kong couchsurfer so my first few nights are in place and I will book a hostel for a few more. I might still get another response from one of the other couchsurfers I contacted. I returned to the post office and mailed off just under a kilo of papers and seashells by the slowest method possible, so it should arrive in a couple weeks. I had culled a couple shirts and a pair of shorts and those went to a donation bin in the hostel. Similarly, I dropped two books off at the mini library at the hostel. They did not have anything that I wanted to take in exchange, but I still have four books to work through in China, then I'll have to start hunting for more reading material. I checked my records and I have read over 13,000 pages so far on the trip. That sounds like a lot, but it is only 38 books. I started the trip with 6 books and have been fortunate to keep finding places to trade/exchange them as I finish.
November 7 Sabbath Mathew was true to his word and I got a text that a ride would be by to pick me up at 8:40. A church member with two of his teenaged children brought me to the church. Mathew had said he might not be there, so I was not expecting to see him. I went to the young adult sabbath school class and a small group of us went over the story of the rich young ruler. I enjoyed the class. One of the people in the class was a Thai woman named Mary. I spoke with her after the class and she gave me the name, email and phone number of a church leader in Bangkok to contact when we arrive there. She said the church would happily give us some housing if we needed it and could help them in some way. We shall see, but it was great to get another contact like that. The church service was kind of like a second service at PUC and the place was full. The sermon was excellent and it ended with a story about the Christian musician Steven Curtis Chapman and how one of his older sons had accidentally run over and killed his five year old sister. That hit me emotionally as I thought of my friends that have killed themselves and my father's death a year ago. A girl who is a teacher talked to me for a while after church was over and then Mathew also came. We went to the potluck, where haystacks were being served. They were good and I got seconds, plus desert. When we left, we took a drive out to the coast on the eastern side of Auckland and took a walk and talked. It was very pleasant. Before dropping me off this time he said his wife was returning that evening from a conference in Manila and they would like to invite me to dinner Sunday evening. I had a small late dinner because I had eaten so much at potluck. I seem to have just the right amount of food and will use everything I wanted to finish before I head to China.
November 8 Sunday I finished off my Nutella and peanut butter this morning.I went to the library and really should have done this sooner because the speed and connection is great. They have a 100 mb download limit, but no upload limit, so I could have been backing up my pictures to Scott's server. My guidebook for what is going on in Auckland in November had info on a short film festival. They are doing the screenings right next to the library so I went and got tickets to two of the sessions for Monday. At 6 pm Mathew and his wife, Helen, picked me up and we drove along the harbor for a while before making our way to a Thai food place called Grasshopper. The food was excellent and the company very nice.
November 9 Monday I spent more time at the library today getting the blog up to date and in the afternoon went to the shorts film festival showings of 12 shorts, six on the theme 'Calamitous Love' and six on “Curious Children'. The children set were better on the whole, but I enjoyed both sets. I got my bags pretty much set how I want them and will be able to finish packing quickly. I only was left with some cous cous that I wanted to take with me anyway and a Cadbury chocolate with macadamia nuts bar.
November 10 Tuesday Breakfast this morning was 2 minute noodles and a banana and with that I have used up my food. I'm heading to the post office to send out a couple postcards, then a quick stop at the library to post this, since it may be the last you hear from me on this forum for 6 plus weeks. I hope that is not the case, but it could be. My flight leaves at 1:30 and should take more than 10 hours, which means I'll be arriving rather late in Hong Kong, but my couchsurfing host gave me very good directions to get to his place. Mathew is picking me up and taking me to the airport in a few hours. He has been a godsend here in Auckland. Because of he and his wife I enjoyed my time much more than I would have otherwise. The next few weeks should go something like this: I have ten days of accommodation in Hong Kong, I may add a few more before leaving. Most likely I will take a two day train up to Beijing, if I can stop on the way for a couple days I might do that. Gabe is targeted at arriving in Beijing on December 1 or 2, not sure with the time change and then we will have to see from there. I hope you enjoy the pictures I posted yesterday and I post more as soon as I can.
November 7 Sabbath Mathew was true to his word and I got a text that a ride would be by to pick me up at 8:40. A church member with two of his teenaged children brought me to the church. Mathew had said he might not be there, so I was not expecting to see him. I went to the young adult sabbath school class and a small group of us went over the story of the rich young ruler. I enjoyed the class. One of the people in the class was a Thai woman named Mary. I spoke with her after the class and she gave me the name, email and phone number of a church leader in Bangkok to contact when we arrive there. She said the church would happily give us some housing if we needed it and could help them in some way. We shall see, but it was great to get another contact like that. The church service was kind of like a second service at PUC and the place was full. The sermon was excellent and it ended with a story about the Christian musician Steven Curtis Chapman and how one of his older sons had accidentally run over and killed his five year old sister. That hit me emotionally as I thought of my friends that have killed themselves and my father's death a year ago. A girl who is a teacher talked to me for a while after church was over and then Mathew also came. We went to the potluck, where haystacks were being served. They were good and I got seconds, plus desert. When we left, we took a drive out to the coast on the eastern side of Auckland and took a walk and talked. It was very pleasant. Before dropping me off this time he said his wife was returning that evening from a conference in Manila and they would like to invite me to dinner Sunday evening. I had a small late dinner because I had eaten so much at potluck. I seem to have just the right amount of food and will use everything I wanted to finish before I head to China.
November 8 Sunday I finished off my Nutella and peanut butter this morning.I went to the library and really should have done this sooner because the speed and connection is great. They have a 100 mb download limit, but no upload limit, so I could have been backing up my pictures to Scott's server. My guidebook for what is going on in Auckland in November had info on a short film festival. They are doing the screenings right next to the library so I went and got tickets to two of the sessions for Monday. At 6 pm Mathew and his wife, Helen, picked me up and we drove along the harbor for a while before making our way to a Thai food place called Grasshopper. The food was excellent and the company very nice.
November 9 Monday I spent more time at the library today getting the blog up to date and in the afternoon went to the shorts film festival showings of 12 shorts, six on the theme 'Calamitous Love' and six on “Curious Children'. The children set were better on the whole, but I enjoyed both sets. I got my bags pretty much set how I want them and will be able to finish packing quickly. I only was left with some cous cous that I wanted to take with me anyway and a Cadbury chocolate with macadamia nuts bar.
November 10 Tuesday Breakfast this morning was 2 minute noodles and a banana and with that I have used up my food. I'm heading to the post office to send out a couple postcards, then a quick stop at the library to post this, since it may be the last you hear from me on this forum for 6 plus weeks. I hope that is not the case, but it could be. My flight leaves at 1:30 and should take more than 10 hours, which means I'll be arriving rather late in Hong Kong, but my couchsurfing host gave me very good directions to get to his place. Mathew is picking me up and taking me to the airport in a few hours. He has been a godsend here in Auckland. Because of he and his wife I enjoyed my time much more than I would have otherwise. The next few weeks should go something like this: I have ten days of accommodation in Hong Kong, I may add a few more before leaving. Most likely I will take a two day train up to Beijing, if I can stop on the way for a couple days I might do that. Gabe is targeted at arriving in Beijing on December 1 or 2, not sure with the time change and then we will have to see from there. I hope you enjoy the pictures I posted yesterday and I post more as soon as I can.
November 1 Sunday After the beautiful sunset I had seen last night at the thermal vents in the park in Rotorua, I wanted to go back in the morning and see them in the light of day. I made it back into town about 13 kms, stopping briefly at the Zorb facility, but they were not open that early so I could not exchange dvd's. The thermal vents were interesting in the morning light, but not nearly as magical as they had been. I did not spend very much time because the Coromandel Peninsula was calling and there was much I wanted to do in my time in the region. My first major stop was at the town of Mt Maunganui, where I climbed the mountain for which the town is named. Tremendous views again. There was a second finger of land that I walked out to the end of and watched some young guys jumping off the rocks into the ocean. There were also jellyfish visible in the water off shore. Next was the Karangahake Gorge area, which had been the home of several gold mining operations. I visited a waterfall, an old mining town remnant, and a few short walking trails. Whangamata is another old mining town, only this one still has a huge open pit mine operating. You can walk up to the edge of the open pit and look into the mammoth hole they are creating and the seemingly antlike machinery working down in it. Next was Wentworth Falls, a very nice two stage water fall of some 50+ meters. I watched the sunset from the top of Mt Paku and then drove a little further north in the dark before camping behind a hedge along the road.
November 2 Monday I had kind of been able to tell last night where I was camping and it was confirmed in the morning: the edge of a large kiwi farm. I got up early just in case the farmers showed up and did not want trespassers. I was only a few kms from Hot Water Beach and planned to have breakfast and reconfigure the car there. Well I got to the first beach access at close to 7 am and walked down to the beach. It was hard to tell if the tide was coming in or going out, but it was clearly not low tide. This was an unexpected surprise based on what the tides had been doing on other beaches throughout the day yesterday. I found a few of the 'hot tubs' people had made presumably yesterday. The beach is otherwise rather ordinary. I went back to the car and was eating breakfast when a maintenance lady came by to check the trash bins. I asked her about the tides and she said it would be low tide at 1:15 pm; too long to wait. I was also getting low on fuel and would have to watch that. So I left Hot Water Beach and drove a little further to
Cathedral Cove. It is a series of four coves and beaches that start from a high bluff and culminates at Cathedral Cove itself after about a half hour walk. I stopped at the other beaches on my way so it took longer, but I thought it was worth it. There are a number of arches, columns, and caves carved into the cliffs or free standing in the surf. There was also a natural shower under a small waterfalls right on the beach. A few people used it after venturing into the
surf. There were not many other people there yet and that was nice. The area seems that much better without crowds of people. When I got back to the car park, a couple buses had just arrived, so my timing was good here, if not at Hot Water Beach. I do not think my pictures really do it justice though. I continued from Cathedral Cove and went slightly north to a secluded beach that is listed as one of the top 20 in the world: New Chums Beach. It took half an hour to walk to it and there were two other people at the far end. Otherwise it was deserted. It did not look like anything special to me, but the cloudy weather at that point certainly aided that opinion. The sun came out for a few minutes and it improved the impression quite a bit. Next was Coromandel Town and it looked like most seaside towns. The remaining drive down the eastern side of the peninsula was seen at lowtide, so lots of mud flats were visible and while it was a nice windy road for driving (and that was truly fun) the coastline was less and less remarkable as I got closer to 'civilization'. In the late afternoon I came through Thames and just south of there entered the Pinnacles Park. I did a short walk to Hoffman's Pool and another to Edwards Lookout. The other walks in the area, while several sounded interesting were too far for me to be doing before dark. There are six or seven campgrounds spread throughout this park and I decided I'll park in one that looks nice and not have to worry about being woken up early as a trespasser. It was the first time I've set up camp in day light in a while and I used the time to clean the van somewhat, clean up all the dishes I would no longer need, cook dinner and then read some.
November 3 Tuesday Well, my final bit of time with the good spaceship ADAMA has arrived. I got up at 7 am from my campsite in the Kaurengi Forest, had my breakfast, cleaned all the dishes, separated all my things from those that stayed with the vehicle, brushed out the interior one more time, and left for Auckland at 8 am. The drive was rather boring. Not much to see on the highway. I had chosen not to follow the coast, because I had spent the last couple days mostly on the coast and the last day, specifically, where I could see across from the Coromandel peninsula to the coastline I would have been driving along. It still might have been preferable to the complete flatness of the plains leading most of the way to Auckland. I topped off the fuel in a suburb called Bombay and easily found the Spaceship depot in the southern suburb of Penrose. I had put a little over 9,000 kilometers on the Spaceship an almost 50/50 split between north and south island. It took me a while to finally pack everything away and head out as a pedestrian
once more. My belongings seem to continually expand and I seriously need to reduce in the next few days before heading to China. Good that one bag is mostly food stuffs. The Spaceship guide says the depot is walking distance from the Auckland CBD, but while that is technically correct it is about 10 km and I doubt anyone seriously does walk it. The lady at the counter said I could walk about a kilometer to the train station and it would only cost me $3.80, or they could call a cab that would be a flat rate $20. I took the train. The two conductor ladies were fascinated with all my baggage and my explanation of what it all was. Neither of them thought they could handle being on their own for 6+ months, like I have, but I had to tell them I have hardly been alone in that time, with all the people I have met, traveled with, couchsurfed with, etc. I got out at the Britomart Station (the central Auckland station) and walked up Queenstreet to one of the two YHA hostels in the city. I had to wait half an hour to be able to check in, got a room for one night (hoping I can contact someone and couchsurf part of the time), and met the two other guys already in the room, Carsten (from Germany) and Bruce (from Taiwan). I spent the afternoon charging my camera batteries and working on these notes. I got an hours worth of internet time at a cafe around the corner from the hostel. By the time I went to bed all eight beds in the dorm room were occupied.
November 4 Wednesday I booked another day at the YHA, then set out exploring. I walked to the top of Mt Eden, a volcanic crater and the highest point in the city. It offers surround views and you can really see how spread out Auckland is. I continued walking away from the city center in search of a hostel, but the directions I had written down from the internet were bad and I went much further than I needed to. A resident with a roadmap in his car helped me out and I eventually found the place. It was the same rate as I was already paying and they did not need any work done in exchange for free nights, so that will not work out. The people I contacted about couchsurfing also were not panning out. I had emailed Mathew (who I met at Taupo) and he had written back that there was a get together at the church for the teens and he would pick me up if I was interested in going. I told him I was, so in the evening he got me and we went out to the suburb of Papatoetoe where the PAPSDA church is. The building is beautiful and includes a church and school. One of the people there said they have 300 students in the primary school and another 300 in the SDA high school at nearby location. What they do on Wednesday evenings is open up the building for ping pong, foosball, basketball and other games for the teens, then they get together for some group activities and break up into smaller Bible study groups for those that are interested. We had vegeburgers and fries to eat before most of the teens started showing up. I played ping pong with Mathew for a while. When we all got together for the group part it was to play a game where you had to get others in the group to help you complete a list of tasks. After a while they had to come up with life principles that had been demostrated through the game – like cooperation with others, things are not always as easy as they look or sound, sharing, etc. Afterwards, Mathew drove me across the Auckland bridge to the community of Devanport which has a very nice view at the night lights from the city. Before dropping me off he loaned me a cell phone and told me he would make sure I had a ride to church on Sabbath. All of this was incredibly generous and I really appreciated it.
November 5 Thursday I walked to the SkyTower, then down to the Viaduct, where the central marina is, along the marina, to a grocery store, through the Auckland Domain, by the Museum, and eventually, back to the hostel. I sorted all the paper I am carrying into piles I could throw out or recycle/mail back home/keep with me. I went to a post office to check out my options on sending some of the stuff back to the states. Depending on the weight it could be expensive,
but I do not think I have more than 2 kg of papers and shells. I met a Swiss guy in the hostel and he and a French guy invited me to go eat dinner with them, so we ended up in a Korean place about a block from the hostel. There are many asian places in the area so our method of picking a place was to look in the windows and the first place with a lot of asians eating there would be the one, since they ought to know if the food is cooked correctlly and well. That seems like a logical approach and I know my dinner was good. I also met a funny Indian man named Vernon from Goa, who knew Goa Gil and is a professional guitar player. He was funny though because he was in our room for several nights and each afternoon he would come in and someone would have taken over his bed because he left nothing behind and no one would have known he was still using the bed. The rest of us have learned to leave a jacket or a couple books or SOMETHING to identify the bed as occupied. He said to look him up if I end up in Goa
November 2 Monday I had kind of been able to tell last night where I was camping and it was confirmed in the morning: the edge of a large kiwi farm. I got up early just in case the farmers showed up and did not want trespassers. I was only a few kms from Hot Water Beach and planned to have breakfast and reconfigure the car there. Well I got to the first beach access at close to 7 am and walked down to the beach. It was hard to tell if the tide was coming in or going out, but it was clearly not low tide. This was an unexpected surprise based on what the tides had been doing on other beaches throughout the day yesterday. I found a few of the 'hot tubs' people had made presumably yesterday. The beach is otherwise rather ordinary. I went back to the car and was eating breakfast when a maintenance lady came by to check the trash bins. I asked her about the tides and she said it would be low tide at 1:15 pm; too long to wait. I was also getting low on fuel and would have to watch that. So I left Hot Water Beach and drove a little further to
Cathedral Cove. It is a series of four coves and beaches that start from a high bluff and culminates at Cathedral Cove itself after about a half hour walk. I stopped at the other beaches on my way so it took longer, but I thought it was worth it. There are a number of arches, columns, and caves carved into the cliffs or free standing in the surf. There was also a natural shower under a small waterfalls right on the beach. A few people used it after venturing into the
surf. There were not many other people there yet and that was nice. The area seems that much better without crowds of people. When I got back to the car park, a couple buses had just arrived, so my timing was good here, if not at Hot Water Beach. I do not think my pictures really do it justice though. I continued from Cathedral Cove and went slightly north to a secluded beach that is listed as one of the top 20 in the world: New Chums Beach. It took half an hour to walk to it and there were two other people at the far end. Otherwise it was deserted. It did not look like anything special to me, but the cloudy weather at that point certainly aided that opinion. The sun came out for a few minutes and it improved the impression quite a bit. Next was Coromandel Town and it looked like most seaside towns. The remaining drive down the eastern side of the peninsula was seen at lowtide, so lots of mud flats were visible and while it was a nice windy road for driving (and that was truly fun) the coastline was less and less remarkable as I got closer to 'civilization'. In the late afternoon I came through Thames and just south of there entered the Pinnacles Park. I did a short walk to Hoffman's Pool and another to Edwards Lookout. The other walks in the area, while several sounded interesting were too far for me to be doing before dark. There are six or seven campgrounds spread throughout this park and I decided I'll park in one that looks nice and not have to worry about being woken up early as a trespasser. It was the first time I've set up camp in day light in a while and I used the time to clean the van somewhat, clean up all the dishes I would no longer need, cook dinner and then read some.
November 3 Tuesday Well, my final bit of time with the good spaceship ADAMA has arrived. I got up at 7 am from my campsite in the Kaurengi Forest, had my breakfast, cleaned all the dishes, separated all my things from those that stayed with the vehicle, brushed out the interior one more time, and left for Auckland at 8 am. The drive was rather boring. Not much to see on the highway. I had chosen not to follow the coast, because I had spent the last couple days mostly on the coast and the last day, specifically, where I could see across from the Coromandel peninsula to the coastline I would have been driving along. It still might have been preferable to the complete flatness of the plains leading most of the way to Auckland. I topped off the fuel in a suburb called Bombay and easily found the Spaceship depot in the southern suburb of Penrose. I had put a little over 9,000 kilometers on the Spaceship an almost 50/50 split between north and south island. It took me a while to finally pack everything away and head out as a pedestrian
once more. My belongings seem to continually expand and I seriously need to reduce in the next few days before heading to China. Good that one bag is mostly food stuffs. The Spaceship guide says the depot is walking distance from the Auckland CBD, but while that is technically correct it is about 10 km and I doubt anyone seriously does walk it. The lady at the counter said I could walk about a kilometer to the train station and it would only cost me $3.80, or they could call a cab that would be a flat rate $20. I took the train. The two conductor ladies were fascinated with all my baggage and my explanation of what it all was. Neither of them thought they could handle being on their own for 6+ months, like I have, but I had to tell them I have hardly been alone in that time, with all the people I have met, traveled with, couchsurfed with, etc. I got out at the Britomart Station (the central Auckland station) and walked up Queenstreet to one of the two YHA hostels in the city. I had to wait half an hour to be able to check in, got a room for one night (hoping I can contact someone and couchsurf part of the time), and met the two other guys already in the room, Carsten (from Germany) and Bruce (from Taiwan). I spent the afternoon charging my camera batteries and working on these notes. I got an hours worth of internet time at a cafe around the corner from the hostel. By the time I went to bed all eight beds in the dorm room were occupied.
November 4 Wednesday I booked another day at the YHA, then set out exploring. I walked to the top of Mt Eden, a volcanic crater and the highest point in the city. It offers surround views and you can really see how spread out Auckland is. I continued walking away from the city center in search of a hostel, but the directions I had written down from the internet were bad and I went much further than I needed to. A resident with a roadmap in his car helped me out and I eventually found the place. It was the same rate as I was already paying and they did not need any work done in exchange for free nights, so that will not work out. The people I contacted about couchsurfing also were not panning out. I had emailed Mathew (who I met at Taupo) and he had written back that there was a get together at the church for the teens and he would pick me up if I was interested in going. I told him I was, so in the evening he got me and we went out to the suburb of Papatoetoe where the PAPSDA church is. The building is beautiful and includes a church and school. One of the people there said they have 300 students in the primary school and another 300 in the SDA high school at nearby location. What they do on Wednesday evenings is open up the building for ping pong, foosball, basketball and other games for the teens, then they get together for some group activities and break up into smaller Bible study groups for those that are interested. We had vegeburgers and fries to eat before most of the teens started showing up. I played ping pong with Mathew for a while. When we all got together for the group part it was to play a game where you had to get others in the group to help you complete a list of tasks. After a while they had to come up with life principles that had been demostrated through the game – like cooperation with others, things are not always as easy as they look or sound, sharing, etc. Afterwards, Mathew drove me across the Auckland bridge to the community of Devanport which has a very nice view at the night lights from the city. Before dropping me off he loaned me a cell phone and told me he would make sure I had a ride to church on Sabbath. All of this was incredibly generous and I really appreciated it.
November 5 Thursday I walked to the SkyTower, then down to the Viaduct, where the central marina is, along the marina, to a grocery store, through the Auckland Domain, by the Museum, and eventually, back to the hostel. I sorted all the paper I am carrying into piles I could throw out or recycle/mail back home/keep with me. I went to a post office to check out my options on sending some of the stuff back to the states. Depending on the weight it could be expensive,
but I do not think I have more than 2 kg of papers and shells. I met a Swiss guy in the hostel and he and a French guy invited me to go eat dinner with them, so we ended up in a Korean place about a block from the hostel. There are many asian places in the area so our method of picking a place was to look in the windows and the first place with a lot of asians eating there would be the one, since they ought to know if the food is cooked correctlly and well. That seems like a logical approach and I know my dinner was good. I also met a funny Indian man named Vernon from Goa, who knew Goa Gil and is a professional guitar player. He was funny though because he was in our room for several nights and each afternoon he would come in and someone would have taken over his bed because he left nothing behind and no one would have known he was still using the bed. The rest of us have learned to leave a jacket or a couple books or SOMETHING to identify the bed as occupied. He said to look him up if I end up in Goa
Sunday, November 8, 2009
October 26 Monday (Labor Day holiday in New Zealand) I had been looking forward to Rotorua, because it is the home of Zorbing and because of some recommendations passed on through my mom about a Hot Sand Beach on a lake in the area. I drove the last 28 kms into town from my camping area and stopped at the visitor center. The one snag involved with getting to Hot Sand Beach was confirmed for me: it is only accessible by boat. I was told I could head out there and there would be people operating like water taxis, but it would cost me. That was disappointing and I ended up not going there at all. I did go out to the Zorbing facility only a few kilometers outside of town with the intention of having a go at it. This also happened to be a dvd exchange site so I replaced the dvd I had watched last night. I spent nearly an hour watching people come down the hillside. There were three coarses and two variations on how you could ride in a Zorb. Two of the courses were straight runs (for racing against frends if you chose, and one was a windy zigzag course that looked like it was much more fun. You could ride in a dry Zorb strapped in so that you literally stuck to the side and went round and round with the sphere or you could do a wet Zorb by yourself or with a friend, and that was more like a self-contained water slide. Ultimately, after watching a number of people, I decided not to do it. Between the cost, the fact that it only lasted about a minute, and having already sky dived/scuba dived/bungy jumped, it ended up not looking nearly as exciting as I had imagined. I drove most of the way west from Rotorua towards the Waitomo region where there are many caves.
Another thing I forgot to mention. Rotorua is in the midst of a highly active thermal vent area. You can see puffs of smoke/steam rising from places all around as you drive or walk even in town. That also carries with it a relatively strong sulfur smell and you notice THAT long before you arrive in town. I'm not sure how the people that live there deal with it, they probably do not even notice after a while, but it is strong. Before I realized what it was I kept thinking there was something wrong with the Spaceship – then the lightbulb went on in my head.
October 27 Tuesday I was quite close to the Waitomo Caves, but after arriving at the visitor center and getting prices for the cave tours (all the main caves, and there are many, are on private property) I decided I was not going to do any of the packages. All were more than I could justify. I told myself that having seen parts of Mammoth Caves in Kentucky, I have already had this experience. I had a map with many free things and sights and I somewhat reluctantly went to explore as many of those as I could. I also made a quick stop to exchange dvds since this was one of the locations where that is possible. There was supposed to be a “Natural Tunnel” nearby, where gloworms could be seen, but either I missed the sign or there was none. I did find the second location on my map, the Natural Bridge, which was amazing. It is a narrow canyon of limestone that has eroded to leave two bridges stacked on top of each other. I next found the Puripuri Cave, a cave set on park land and therefore free. When I got to the cave entrance a crew was working on repairing and expanding the viewing platforms inside the cave, so I could not go in very far, but they also had massive lights to aid their work and it made the viewing I could do much better than it would have been otherwise. I enjoyed the rest of the afternoon slowly driving along the coast in a southerly direction. Apparently, there was a rally race going on and many cars with racing numbers passed me. I had actually seen them the day before going in a different direction than I was and had not paid any attention, but now they were all around me. This was on a scenic section of road and again it was mostly gravel. At the town of Mokau I changed course from where the race continued. I wanted to end up near Egmont National Park, which encompasses Mt. Taranaki, a dormant volcano and one of the main ski areas on the north island, but as I got closer and closer to the park, I could not find a place to pull off and camp. I had met an elderly couple out fishing for Whitebait at a beach earlier in the day and they had recommended which sides of the mountain to see, as the roads into the park come from many directions, but are not connected. So I actually ended up in the National Park before I had found a place to stay. It was also getting foggy as I drove up the mountain side. I passed a ranger station and figured if they saw me passing in the fog they would come and ask me to leave. I did eventually find a turn off with a level gravel area and made my camp. About an hour after I arrived a truck did drive past, but in the fog they did not see my location and I was undisturbed the rest of the night.
October 28 Wednesday A beautiful morning greeted me at 6:12 when my alarm went off. The sun was almost visible and the sky over Mt. Taranaki was completely clear. Fog all gone. I watched the sunrise on the mountain, read a little and had breakfast. Because I was not supposed to be camping inside the National Park where I was, I waited until a couple vehicles drove on up the road before I drove up to the top parking lot. I was almost there anyway, but if I had gone there last night I would have been found. Between the fog and the location I actually used, no one would have found me. But it was a perfect place for my whole morning. The viewing platform from the car park gave almost the same view as I had had. There were several long walks you could take from this top parking lot. I chose a trail called the Enchanted Track and headed off. It was supposed to go by a hut and I could see one in the distance and assumed that was the goal. But the trail started heading downhill and seemed to not have received any maintenance at all during the winter. There were trees and branches and washouts and lots of mud all along the trail and I really should have turned back early on, but I kept on because I did not want to go back UP the trail I had just come through. I figured that I had been wrong in thinking the hut I had seen was where I was heading and that instead I was going down the mountain to a ranger station I had passed the night before (and had alerted them to try and find me). After a while I came to a split in the trail where one branch continued to the ranger station and another that joined the Around The Mountain trail. From here on the trail was well maintained and you could see where they had been working even recently. I noticed that several of there traps had been tripped and contained dead rats mostly. Good for the birds. At the ranger station I had the choice of going back to the car park by following the road or taking a different trail. I certainly was not going back the way I came down and the road was not very appealing, so I headed up the Patea Trail. This one was also well maintained and I enjoyed the 4 km uphill journey. After leaving the mountain, I made my way to Wanganui to find out my options regarding the Bridge to Nowhere, one if the icons in the Whanganui River National Park. This turned out to be another disappointment. It is only accessible by boat (kayak or jet boat) or as part of a 4 day walk. Money and time both meant this would not happen. But I wanted to drive through the parts of the park that were accessible, so I headed north from town along the river and found a nice free campsite with water and restrooms about half way to the place where the boat tours left from, should I decide to do it anyway tomorrow.
October 29 Thursday It was raining when I first woke up at 6:30, so I decided to take it easy and slept in for another hour and a half. Then it had mostly cleared up and blue patches were showing up in the sky. I had my breakfast, got the Spaceship ready for travel and then read long enough to finish my current book, “Marching Powder” by Rusty Young. It is the true story of Thomas McFadden, a black British citizen convicted of drug trafficking in Bolivia and his incarceration at one of the most unusual prisons in the world in La Paz. It really is a fascinating story
It was noon when I eventually left my campsite and continued driving along the Whanganui River valley, lots of which was on gravel road. The recent rains meant that the river was much browner that it sometimes is and it was not particularly beautiful in it current incarnation. I did find a couple short walks so I wasn't driving only. It was still early afternoon when I left that National Park and crossed further east now into Tongoriro National Park. This is the other main ski area of the north island and there was a lot of snow on the mountains. The road I took into the park indicated it was closed at the 13 km mark due to the snow from the previous night and it looked like it might drop some more snow at any time. In the meantime it was a winter wonderland, with little piles of snow on every tree branch and bush. I drove up to the closed gate and there were two walks nearby to waterfalls. Both were beautiful with the snow all around. I took my chance and made a could small snowmen (who got included in a couple of the waterfall pictures). This was probably my favorite place on the north island to this point. When I came off the mountain, I began the drive back down to Wellington, so I could get my passport and visa on Friday. I did not plan to drive all the way down, but similar to what had happened near Mt Egmont, I could not find a safe/legal place to camp. This was a much more traveled road. I knew the hostel I wanted to stay at and while I arrived fairly late I went directly there. I had mentioned I should have checked out the Wellington hostels better in an earlier post. The hostel I stayed at tonight let me park on the property and stay in the Spaceship, but use their kitchen/bathroom/showers, as well as use the internet and recharge my camera battery and phone. All for less than the other place.
October 30 Friday I was at the Chinese embassy just after they opened and was able to pick up my approved visa and passport right away. I had had in the back of my mind the plan to stay in Wellington that night and attend church in the city, but knowing how long it had taken to drive down to Wellington already and knowing I was running out of time to see all I wanted to see, I found out where churches were on my way north and headed in that direction. Just outside of Wellington at Paramata, I picked up a hitchkiker, a New Zealander who was trying to get to Wanganui. I was able to get him as far as Bulls, and he said that was close enough that he could probably get someone to come pick him up. We had some interesting conversation. He works with young adults with autism and similar difficulty. He is caucasian, but has five daughters by a couple Maori women, so he told me quite a bit about their culture and answered some questions I had. After dropping him off I continued in the direction of Taupo, where I knew there was an SDA church. The road I took goes through what they call their desert. To me it was not desert, but you did remind me of parts of Arizona and between the gray clouds and the sun peaking through to illuminate the tumbleweed like grasses and plants it was actually very beautiful. I made it to Taupo before dark, stopped at the I-site which was already closed and an internet cafe to get good directions to the church, then drove up to a viewpoint overlooking the city. It was a nice view, but it was over the city and with sunset about a half an hour off, I did not want to wait there. I drove a little further down the road to Huka Falls, which I learned later is the most visited falls in New Zealand. It was already closed, but you could park outside the gates and walk into the park area. Several other cars were doing that so I joined them. This was amazing on a number of levels. Most waterfalls rely on height to be impressive. Huka Falls is almost more of a rapids than a waterfall, but it has an incredible amount of power behind it. That was clear the moment you first see it. Tremendous amounts of water surging through and churning up the water below it for at least the length of a football field. Added to this was the clouds and sunset colors AND a rainbow due to some rain in the distance and it was magical. I took a lot of pictures and stayed there until the sun was down. I had seen a couple potential places to stay in the short distance between Taupo town and the falls and one of those turned out to be just what I like.
October 31 Sabbath I got up early since I wasn't in a real campground, had a quick breakfast of cereal, yoghurt, a banana and the next to last piece of cake I have. Since I was so close to Huka Falls I went back to see it in the morning light. Different, but still immensely powerful. Being there early also meant I got more pictures and missed the bus load of 'aged' persons shuffling down the path as I left for church. I had good directions and it did not take me long to find the church, but when I arrived at 9:15 the parking lot was empty and the building locked up tight. The sign said services start at 10. That just means more reading time for me. After a bit a couple people came and when they opened the doors I went inside, where they welcomed me warmly. As seems to be a tradition, when I visit a church, the main pastor is away and a guest speaker will be presenting the sermon. Today it is one of the elder's wives from a neighboring town. First we had a lesson study on Numbers chapters 11 through 14. There was an active discussion, which is good. The sermon did not connect with me. It meandered all over the place and felt like it needed to be worked on some more. It was too unfocused and hard to follow. There was a potluck afterwards and one of the people I met was a guy about my age named Mathew, who was visiting from Auckland. We exchanged email addresses and I'll get in touch with him when I arrive there. Another member gave me two walks in the area that were worth doing in the time I would have. Both were good recommendations and I'm glad I followed up on them. First was the Opere Forest, a short walk through an old logging operation that has been thoroughly taken back by the vegetation. It was a nice walk with enough odds and ends to keep it interesting. Next I went up a local mountain, which I do not have the name of at the moment, although I know it is on one of the maps I have. This was a more strenuous hike to the peak of the mountain, through sheep pasture and forest and other terrain, but it was well worth the effort. Three hundred and sixty degree views and the sky was clear enough to take full advantage of that. I met a german backpackers when I was hiking back down. It was his second trip up because he wanted to get sunset pictures. I went a third time to Huka Falls, this time to another viewpoint on a hill further away and stopped at a place called Craters of the Moon. It is on private land and they charge to enter, so I was not intending to go in, but I wanted to see if there was anything to see on the way. Well it was mid afternoon and the place was already closed. There were several cars in a parking lot near some mountain bike trails and I left the Spaceship there to walk further in past the gate. From a couple points along the road you could see thermal activity and it did look interesting, although I could see no relation to the Moon. Not sure how they arrived at that name. When I got to the entry way there were three women who had similarly just wanted to see what was out there. Everything was locked up. We walked back together and in talking two of them were is a bit of a bind beecause they needed to get to Rotorua, where all their stuff and hostel were. By going to the Craters they had missed their last bus and it was really out of the way for the third woman to drive them there, even though she seemed willing to do it. I told them that was actually where I was heading and so it worked out for them and their host. I dropped them off at their hostel just before sunset and went to one of the thermal parks in the town to get pictures. I'm glad I did. The steam and sunset colors made for incredible photographs. Once it was sufficiently dark I drove a little more than 10 kms outside of town and found a place to park overnight near a cattle farm.
Another thing I forgot to mention. Rotorua is in the midst of a highly active thermal vent area. You can see puffs of smoke/steam rising from places all around as you drive or walk even in town. That also carries with it a relatively strong sulfur smell and you notice THAT long before you arrive in town. I'm not sure how the people that live there deal with it, they probably do not even notice after a while, but it is strong. Before I realized what it was I kept thinking there was something wrong with the Spaceship – then the lightbulb went on in my head.
October 27 Tuesday I was quite close to the Waitomo Caves, but after arriving at the visitor center and getting prices for the cave tours (all the main caves, and there are many, are on private property) I decided I was not going to do any of the packages. All were more than I could justify. I told myself that having seen parts of Mammoth Caves in Kentucky, I have already had this experience. I had a map with many free things and sights and I somewhat reluctantly went to explore as many of those as I could. I also made a quick stop to exchange dvds since this was one of the locations where that is possible. There was supposed to be a “Natural Tunnel” nearby, where gloworms could be seen, but either I missed the sign or there was none. I did find the second location on my map, the Natural Bridge, which was amazing. It is a narrow canyon of limestone that has eroded to leave two bridges stacked on top of each other. I next found the Puripuri Cave, a cave set on park land and therefore free. When I got to the cave entrance a crew was working on repairing and expanding the viewing platforms inside the cave, so I could not go in very far, but they also had massive lights to aid their work and it made the viewing I could do much better than it would have been otherwise. I enjoyed the rest of the afternoon slowly driving along the coast in a southerly direction. Apparently, there was a rally race going on and many cars with racing numbers passed me. I had actually seen them the day before going in a different direction than I was and had not paid any attention, but now they were all around me. This was on a scenic section of road and again it was mostly gravel. At the town of Mokau I changed course from where the race continued. I wanted to end up near Egmont National Park, which encompasses Mt. Taranaki, a dormant volcano and one of the main ski areas on the north island, but as I got closer and closer to the park, I could not find a place to pull off and camp. I had met an elderly couple out fishing for Whitebait at a beach earlier in the day and they had recommended which sides of the mountain to see, as the roads into the park come from many directions, but are not connected. So I actually ended up in the National Park before I had found a place to stay. It was also getting foggy as I drove up the mountain side. I passed a ranger station and figured if they saw me passing in the fog they would come and ask me to leave. I did eventually find a turn off with a level gravel area and made my camp. About an hour after I arrived a truck did drive past, but in the fog they did not see my location and I was undisturbed the rest of the night.
October 28 Wednesday A beautiful morning greeted me at 6:12 when my alarm went off. The sun was almost visible and the sky over Mt. Taranaki was completely clear. Fog all gone. I watched the sunrise on the mountain, read a little and had breakfast. Because I was not supposed to be camping inside the National Park where I was, I waited until a couple vehicles drove on up the road before I drove up to the top parking lot. I was almost there anyway, but if I had gone there last night I would have been found. Between the fog and the location I actually used, no one would have found me. But it was a perfect place for my whole morning. The viewing platform from the car park gave almost the same view as I had had. There were several long walks you could take from this top parking lot. I chose a trail called the Enchanted Track and headed off. It was supposed to go by a hut and I could see one in the distance and assumed that was the goal. But the trail started heading downhill and seemed to not have received any maintenance at all during the winter. There were trees and branches and washouts and lots of mud all along the trail and I really should have turned back early on, but I kept on because I did not want to go back UP the trail I had just come through. I figured that I had been wrong in thinking the hut I had seen was where I was heading and that instead I was going down the mountain to a ranger station I had passed the night before (and had alerted them to try and find me). After a while I came to a split in the trail where one branch continued to the ranger station and another that joined the Around The Mountain trail. From here on the trail was well maintained and you could see where they had been working even recently. I noticed that several of there traps had been tripped and contained dead rats mostly. Good for the birds. At the ranger station I had the choice of going back to the car park by following the road or taking a different trail. I certainly was not going back the way I came down and the road was not very appealing, so I headed up the Patea Trail. This one was also well maintained and I enjoyed the 4 km uphill journey. After leaving the mountain, I made my way to Wanganui to find out my options regarding the Bridge to Nowhere, one if the icons in the Whanganui River National Park. This turned out to be another disappointment. It is only accessible by boat (kayak or jet boat) or as part of a 4 day walk. Money and time both meant this would not happen. But I wanted to drive through the parts of the park that were accessible, so I headed north from town along the river and found a nice free campsite with water and restrooms about half way to the place where the boat tours left from, should I decide to do it anyway tomorrow.
October 29 Thursday It was raining when I first woke up at 6:30, so I decided to take it easy and slept in for another hour and a half. Then it had mostly cleared up and blue patches were showing up in the sky. I had my breakfast, got the Spaceship ready for travel and then read long enough to finish my current book, “Marching Powder” by Rusty Young. It is the true story of Thomas McFadden, a black British citizen convicted of drug trafficking in Bolivia and his incarceration at one of the most unusual prisons in the world in La Paz. It really is a fascinating story
It was noon when I eventually left my campsite and continued driving along the Whanganui River valley, lots of which was on gravel road. The recent rains meant that the river was much browner that it sometimes is and it was not particularly beautiful in it current incarnation. I did find a couple short walks so I wasn't driving only. It was still early afternoon when I left that National Park and crossed further east now into Tongoriro National Park. This is the other main ski area of the north island and there was a lot of snow on the mountains. The road I took into the park indicated it was closed at the 13 km mark due to the snow from the previous night and it looked like it might drop some more snow at any time. In the meantime it was a winter wonderland, with little piles of snow on every tree branch and bush. I drove up to the closed gate and there were two walks nearby to waterfalls. Both were beautiful with the snow all around. I took my chance and made a could small snowmen (who got included in a couple of the waterfall pictures). This was probably my favorite place on the north island to this point. When I came off the mountain, I began the drive back down to Wellington, so I could get my passport and visa on Friday. I did not plan to drive all the way down, but similar to what had happened near Mt Egmont, I could not find a safe/legal place to camp. This was a much more traveled road. I knew the hostel I wanted to stay at and while I arrived fairly late I went directly there. I had mentioned I should have checked out the Wellington hostels better in an earlier post. The hostel I stayed at tonight let me park on the property and stay in the Spaceship, but use their kitchen/bathroom/showers, as well as use the internet and recharge my camera battery and phone. All for less than the other place.
October 30 Friday I was at the Chinese embassy just after they opened and was able to pick up my approved visa and passport right away. I had had in the back of my mind the plan to stay in Wellington that night and attend church in the city, but knowing how long it had taken to drive down to Wellington already and knowing I was running out of time to see all I wanted to see, I found out where churches were on my way north and headed in that direction. Just outside of Wellington at Paramata, I picked up a hitchkiker, a New Zealander who was trying to get to Wanganui. I was able to get him as far as Bulls, and he said that was close enough that he could probably get someone to come pick him up. We had some interesting conversation. He works with young adults with autism and similar difficulty. He is caucasian, but has five daughters by a couple Maori women, so he told me quite a bit about their culture and answered some questions I had. After dropping him off I continued in the direction of Taupo, where I knew there was an SDA church. The road I took goes through what they call their desert. To me it was not desert, but you did remind me of parts of Arizona and between the gray clouds and the sun peaking through to illuminate the tumbleweed like grasses and plants it was actually very beautiful. I made it to Taupo before dark, stopped at the I-site which was already closed and an internet cafe to get good directions to the church, then drove up to a viewpoint overlooking the city. It was a nice view, but it was over the city and with sunset about a half an hour off, I did not want to wait there. I drove a little further down the road to Huka Falls, which I learned later is the most visited falls in New Zealand. It was already closed, but you could park outside the gates and walk into the park area. Several other cars were doing that so I joined them. This was amazing on a number of levels. Most waterfalls rely on height to be impressive. Huka Falls is almost more of a rapids than a waterfall, but it has an incredible amount of power behind it. That was clear the moment you first see it. Tremendous amounts of water surging through and churning up the water below it for at least the length of a football field. Added to this was the clouds and sunset colors AND a rainbow due to some rain in the distance and it was magical. I took a lot of pictures and stayed there until the sun was down. I had seen a couple potential places to stay in the short distance between Taupo town and the falls and one of those turned out to be just what I like.
October 31 Sabbath I got up early since I wasn't in a real campground, had a quick breakfast of cereal, yoghurt, a banana and the next to last piece of cake I have. Since I was so close to Huka Falls I went back to see it in the morning light. Different, but still immensely powerful. Being there early also meant I got more pictures and missed the bus load of 'aged' persons shuffling down the path as I left for church. I had good directions and it did not take me long to find the church, but when I arrived at 9:15 the parking lot was empty and the building locked up tight. The sign said services start at 10. That just means more reading time for me. After a bit a couple people came and when they opened the doors I went inside, where they welcomed me warmly. As seems to be a tradition, when I visit a church, the main pastor is away and a guest speaker will be presenting the sermon. Today it is one of the elder's wives from a neighboring town. First we had a lesson study on Numbers chapters 11 through 14. There was an active discussion, which is good. The sermon did not connect with me. It meandered all over the place and felt like it needed to be worked on some more. It was too unfocused and hard to follow. There was a potluck afterwards and one of the people I met was a guy about my age named Mathew, who was visiting from Auckland. We exchanged email addresses and I'll get in touch with him when I arrive there. Another member gave me two walks in the area that were worth doing in the time I would have. Both were good recommendations and I'm glad I followed up on them. First was the Opere Forest, a short walk through an old logging operation that has been thoroughly taken back by the vegetation. It was a nice walk with enough odds and ends to keep it interesting. Next I went up a local mountain, which I do not have the name of at the moment, although I know it is on one of the maps I have. This was a more strenuous hike to the peak of the mountain, through sheep pasture and forest and other terrain, but it was well worth the effort. Three hundred and sixty degree views and the sky was clear enough to take full advantage of that. I met a german backpackers when I was hiking back down. It was his second trip up because he wanted to get sunset pictures. I went a third time to Huka Falls, this time to another viewpoint on a hill further away and stopped at a place called Craters of the Moon. It is on private land and they charge to enter, so I was not intending to go in, but I wanted to see if there was anything to see on the way. Well it was mid afternoon and the place was already closed. There were several cars in a parking lot near some mountain bike trails and I left the Spaceship there to walk further in past the gate. From a couple points along the road you could see thermal activity and it did look interesting, although I could see no relation to the Moon. Not sure how they arrived at that name. When I got to the entry way there were three women who had similarly just wanted to see what was out there. Everything was locked up. We walked back together and in talking two of them were is a bit of a bind beecause they needed to get to Rotorua, where all their stuff and hostel were. By going to the Craters they had missed their last bus and it was really out of the way for the third woman to drive them there, even though she seemed willing to do it. I told them that was actually where I was heading and so it worked out for them and their host. I dropped them off at their hostel just before sunset and went to one of the thermal parks in the town to get pictures. I'm glad I did. The steam and sunset colors made for incredible photographs. Once it was sufficiently dark I drove a little more than 10 kms outside of town and found a place to park overnight near a cattle farm.
October 21 Wednesday We were on the 8 am ferry so got up early, had the free hostel breakfast of cereal and bread and drove to the loading zone for the Bluebridge ferry company, one of the two that operates between Picton and Wellington. Julie and I spent most of the three hour trip on the open decks watching first the Marlborough Sound, then the receding south island and the growing north island as we approached. It was very windy, but the ship is so large you hardly noticed the seas. Two little bonuses were seeing a seal about halfway across and a bit later a school of dolphins. Once we arrived in Wellington, we disembarked and drove to the city center and the I-Site. Julie did not know where she wanted to stay that night. She was waiting to discuss that with her boyfriend. I picked up info on several hostels for myself. Julie had expected to have to wait a while before her boyfriend arrived, but actually he arrived shortly after we were ready to leave the I-Site. That worked out well. We said our goodbye's and since my vehicle was in a secure place I decided to walk to a couple of the hostels to check them out. Well the first one I got to looked good and I booked two nights. They could get me discounted parking vouchers (street parking is extremely regulated here). It turned out to be a good place to stay, but I should have checked out the others because one of the others that I stayed at later, was half the price and had off street parking. Oh well. So once I had lodging arranged I drove over to the Chinese embassy and got the correct paperwork to enter the country. I needed to get passport type pictures taken, so that is an new quest for me to resolve. Since the embassy is right next to the Botanical Gardens, I spend a couple hours exploring there. It encompasses a hill so there are several lookout points, a number of interesting sculptures, and even a free tram that brings people up and down. The embassy was already on the high side of the gardens so I did not ride the tram. These gardens are so much more interesting when the flowers are blooming and while that was a missing component of many of the gardens in Australia, it is now summery enough that the flowers are out in most places. After a while I drove down to the marina area, where the Te Papa museum is. It is a large place and because I was getting there in the late afternoon I only had time to see a single floor, but I will be back to see the rest. It is one of the more fascinating museums I have been in. It is a mix between a traditional museum and the Exploratorium in SF. There is so much interactive stuff (largely geared towards children, but still) that it made the experience a lot of fun.
October 22 Thursday I got up, had a free breakfast of cereal and bread, and found out where I could get passport photos taken. It took a while to find the place and I had to come back in a few hours to pick them up, which meant I did not get the paperwork turned in today. I spoke with Gabe on the phone for a bit, so he could reassure me that things are progressing on his end and that he is still going to join me in China. I went back to the Te Papa museum and spend quite a while there seeing nearly everything I had missed the day before. I also did some grocery shopping and wandered around the city, finding graffiti and sculptures and other interesting things to photograph.
October 23 Friday I got up, showered, packed my bag, loaded the Spaceship, called and talked to my mom, had breakfast and checked out of the hostel at 9:30. I drove over to the Chinese embassy to drop off the visa application. First surprise: they would not accept my Swiss passport, so I had to amend my application to use the US passport. I think this was purely a money thing. They charge $100 more for a US visa than a Swiss one and it was my mistake for asking too many questions about the differences before, so they knew I had both. I would also have to return in a weeks time to pick up the passport and visa if approved. I went out to the Spaceship and spent an hour or so looking at what that meant for my traveling plans on the north island. I had hoped that returning might not be necessary, because it would eat up so much time doing so. I also could not just hang around in Wellington, or I would see nothing else. I considered staying in Wellington for Sabbath, but Wellington really has not caught my attention and I was more than ready to keep moving, so I made the decision to head for Napier and the eastern side of the north island to begin visiting all four of the national parks. I drove pretty much straight through and after the none stop beauty of the south island I was rather underwhelmed. So much more development/so much less 'nature'. I found a place to camp in the evening a bit outside of Napier and settled in for the night.
October 24 Sabbath I got up and drove the last 28 kms into Napier. I had hoped to find a picnic spot on the way and eat breakfast there, but there were none in that area for whatever reason. My map was very basic and even though I had an address for the church I did not see any roads that I had listed. So I drove all the way downtown to the I-site and they gave me a better city map. I had to back track and found the church 10 minutes before sabbath school started. So I skipped breakfast, but that was okay in the long run. I had met a man from this church when I was at the church in Queenstown, but he was traveling again. The rest of the church was just as friendly as he had been. It was a fairly small church and so they did not have an organized potluck, but a couple said they were designated hosts for that weekend and I was welcome to join them and a few others for lunch at their home. So I followed the husband in my Spaceship, which several of them were interested in see, as they notice them on the roads, but had not had the opportunity to look at the interiors. There were nine people for lunch and it was a very pleasant afternoon. I had their names written down, but can't find that piece of paper now. About 4 pm I took my leave and continued north east towards Te Urewera National Park.
October 25 Sunday I fueled up before heading into Te Urewera NP and made it to Lake Waikaremoana mid morning. There are so long walks around the lake, all too long for what I have time for. I did do a short walk to some caves. They were caves in the same way as the caves around Linda Falls. The rocks have piled themselves in such ways as to leave small passages between them and you can go back inside them, but none deep enough that a flashlight (torch) would be necessary. There was also a walk/climb to Lou's Lookout which gave a comprehensive view of the lake area. I had to traverse 60 kms of gravel road and that made for rather slow going. And despite being back in a natural setting, it still was not as nice as most of the south island had been. Eventually I got to the town of Whakatane on the coast north of the national park. I picked up some information at the town center and exchanged dvds at a Spaceship substation, but did not spend much time in the town. The activity the town is most known for is cruises to White Island, which is clearly visible from the anywhere in the surrounding area. What is special about White Island is that it is an active volcano, but it spews gas and not lava/magma. Instead I continued west now towards Rotorua and made a roadside camp for myself near Kawerau.
October 22 Thursday I got up, had a free breakfast of cereal and bread, and found out where I could get passport photos taken. It took a while to find the place and I had to come back in a few hours to pick them up, which meant I did not get the paperwork turned in today. I spoke with Gabe on the phone for a bit, so he could reassure me that things are progressing on his end and that he is still going to join me in China. I went back to the Te Papa museum and spend quite a while there seeing nearly everything I had missed the day before. I also did some grocery shopping and wandered around the city, finding graffiti and sculptures and other interesting things to photograph.
October 23 Friday I got up, showered, packed my bag, loaded the Spaceship, called and talked to my mom, had breakfast and checked out of the hostel at 9:30. I drove over to the Chinese embassy to drop off the visa application. First surprise: they would not accept my Swiss passport, so I had to amend my application to use the US passport. I think this was purely a money thing. They charge $100 more for a US visa than a Swiss one and it was my mistake for asking too many questions about the differences before, so they knew I had both. I would also have to return in a weeks time to pick up the passport and visa if approved. I went out to the Spaceship and spent an hour or so looking at what that meant for my traveling plans on the north island. I had hoped that returning might not be necessary, because it would eat up so much time doing so. I also could not just hang around in Wellington, or I would see nothing else. I considered staying in Wellington for Sabbath, but Wellington really has not caught my attention and I was more than ready to keep moving, so I made the decision to head for Napier and the eastern side of the north island to begin visiting all four of the national parks. I drove pretty much straight through and after the none stop beauty of the south island I was rather underwhelmed. So much more development/so much less 'nature'. I found a place to camp in the evening a bit outside of Napier and settled in for the night.
October 24 Sabbath I got up and drove the last 28 kms into Napier. I had hoped to find a picnic spot on the way and eat breakfast there, but there were none in that area for whatever reason. My map was very basic and even though I had an address for the church I did not see any roads that I had listed. So I drove all the way downtown to the I-site and they gave me a better city map. I had to back track and found the church 10 minutes before sabbath school started. So I skipped breakfast, but that was okay in the long run. I had met a man from this church when I was at the church in Queenstown, but he was traveling again. The rest of the church was just as friendly as he had been. It was a fairly small church and so they did not have an organized potluck, but a couple said they were designated hosts for that weekend and I was welcome to join them and a few others for lunch at their home. So I followed the husband in my Spaceship, which several of them were interested in see, as they notice them on the roads, but had not had the opportunity to look at the interiors. There were nine people for lunch and it was a very pleasant afternoon. I had their names written down, but can't find that piece of paper now. About 4 pm I took my leave and continued north east towards Te Urewera National Park.
October 25 Sunday I fueled up before heading into Te Urewera NP and made it to Lake Waikaremoana mid morning. There are so long walks around the lake, all too long for what I have time for. I did do a short walk to some caves. They were caves in the same way as the caves around Linda Falls. The rocks have piled themselves in such ways as to leave small passages between them and you can go back inside them, but none deep enough that a flashlight (torch) would be necessary. There was also a walk/climb to Lou's Lookout which gave a comprehensive view of the lake area. I had to traverse 60 kms of gravel road and that made for rather slow going. And despite being back in a natural setting, it still was not as nice as most of the south island had been. Eventually I got to the town of Whakatane on the coast north of the national park. I picked up some information at the town center and exchanged dvds at a Spaceship substation, but did not spend much time in the town. The activity the town is most known for is cruises to White Island, which is clearly visible from the anywhere in the surrounding area. What is special about White Island is that it is an active volcano, but it spews gas and not lava/magma. Instead I continued west now towards Rotorua and made a roadside camp for myself near Kawerau.
Saturday, November 7, 2009
Heading to China.....
Traveling in the Spaceship, I did not have nearly enough time to keep my blog updated. I'm catching up on my notes still and will get everything up before I head into China for a couple reasons. Chiefly, that while I have been assured by many Chinese I have met on the road that the internet/wifi is free to everyone in China, the censorship means that this blog will not be updated while I am there. Blogger is one of the blocked websites. Facebook is also out, so I'll have to see how I can best keep people apprised of what is happening to me. Even Yahoo is selectively blocked, but I think my email will be fine. It appears it will only be a few more weeks before I am joined by Gabe and I look forward to that. So, I should have this up to date by Tuesday morning before I leave for Hong Kong.........
October 16 Friday We got up just after 7, had breakfast, then went into town so Julie could make a decision on the bungy jump. After she chose the option she wanted and was underway, I headed back to the hostel, with a brief stop to exchange a DVD. I had a relaxing morning, checked out of Deco Backpackers at 10, but then stayed and used the internet until almost noon, while Julie bungy jumped. I checked at the jump center at our meeting time, but they said since it had been a small group in the morning they actually had gotten back an hour early, so I returned to the car, which was still in the same place from the previous day. I knew that Julie had wanted to see the Botanical Garden and assumed that she must have gone there when they came back early. This turned out to be the case. So by early afternoon we had had some lunch and began driving towards the glaciers. We made a few stops, including the Gates of Haast and ended up finding a sideroad only 5 kms from Fox Glacier to stay at for the night. A couple lads from London with a Jucy van joined us for the strength in numbers principle of free camping and we settled in for the night.
October 17 Sabbath In the morning we went to the Fox Glacier and walked the main track to what is called the glacier terminal end, basically where the glacier is currently stopped. It is still almost a quarter mile from the glacier, but a tremendous view. We also took a walk on the other side of the valley that took us up a ridge where we had views looking down to the glacier. We saw morning tours heading to the glacier itself. In the afternoon we got a cold rain, but the forecast was for great weather on Sunday.
In the evening we drove the 26 kms to Franz Joseph township and camped for the night at a new business development park, that currently was just a roughly graded street layout in a forested section just outside the town ship. We planned to see this glacier in the morning.
October 18 Sunday Franz Joseph was nearly as impressive as Fox, but I liked Fox better. The groups going out to the Franz Joseph glacier were much bigger and they walked right up the terminal end, which just did not have the right feel to it when we saw it. There was much more information on Fox too, with a 550 meter cliff that used to be almost completely covered by the glacial ice and is now exposed. The glacial valleys get up to 7 meters of rain at the bottoms and nearly 15 meters of rain at the summits, if you can imagine. Both glaciers are “contracting” and there are markers showing where they were in 1930 and 1750 and they have shrunk a shocking amount. Again, we walked to the terminal end and also another trail that gave us some elevated views. The sky was steadily getting cloudier and when we drove down to Lake Matheson, which is famous for its reflective surface with the mountains in the background, the view was mostly obliterated and a non event. Eventually we left and continued up the coast which included an amazing visit to the Pancake Rocks region. I don't know how to describe the formations in this area, and got many good pictures, hopefully, I can post a few that do it justice. We continued on and made it past the town of Merchison, where we found a place to stay for the night
October 19 Monday Abel Tasman National Park was not much further, once we got up in the morning. But the information center had some bad news for us: all kayaking trips (which is the primary way of seeing most of the coastal formation in the park) have to be booked at least 24 hours in advance, so no kayaking for us. We got what information we could and headed for Cape Farewell to make the most of the day. The weather was not cooperating very well again. We could see very little from Cape Farewell, but did see quite a few other interesting things, enough to keep us occupied until we found a camp site next to a farm near Motueka. We had stopped in town and eaten at a great kebab place with the bland name of Coffee and Kebabs. Despite the name the food was phenomenal. The lady working there made giant falafels for us and was extremely friendly. The evening did turn out to be very special because the sunset combined with the low tide and the clouds to create a photographic wonderland of reflections. I took a lot of pictures, but should have taken even more.
October 20 Tuesday We got up and out of our campsite at 7:45. First stop back into Motueka for the bathrooms, breakfast and brushing teeth. Then we thought we could take our time driving to Picton, which really was not that far away. Unfortunately, there turned out to not be very much to see along the way. The town of Nelson was one of the places we did stop. It is the home of the geographic center of New Zealand, which happens coincidentally to rest at the top of a mountain overlooking the city. Coincidentally. It also decided to coincidentally begin raining when we got halfway up that mountain, so we took a few rushed pictures at the summit and hurried back down. The rain stopped before we made it back to the car. Nelson also had a library where we could get free internet and so while we did some email catchup, Julie also recharged her phone and camera. We got into Picton, found our hostel and a grocery store, and prepared for one more evening on the south island. Julie was excited that we would be in Wellington the next day and she would get to see her boyfriend again.
October 17 Sabbath In the morning we went to the Fox Glacier and walked the main track to what is called the glacier terminal end, basically where the glacier is currently stopped. It is still almost a quarter mile from the glacier, but a tremendous view. We also took a walk on the other side of the valley that took us up a ridge where we had views looking down to the glacier. We saw morning tours heading to the glacier itself. In the afternoon we got a cold rain, but the forecast was for great weather on Sunday.
In the evening we drove the 26 kms to Franz Joseph township and camped for the night at a new business development park, that currently was just a roughly graded street layout in a forested section just outside the town ship. We planned to see this glacier in the morning.
October 18 Sunday Franz Joseph was nearly as impressive as Fox, but I liked Fox better. The groups going out to the Franz Joseph glacier were much bigger and they walked right up the terminal end, which just did not have the right feel to it when we saw it. There was much more information on Fox too, with a 550 meter cliff that used to be almost completely covered by the glacial ice and is now exposed. The glacial valleys get up to 7 meters of rain at the bottoms and nearly 15 meters of rain at the summits, if you can imagine. Both glaciers are “contracting” and there are markers showing where they were in 1930 and 1750 and they have shrunk a shocking amount. Again, we walked to the terminal end and also another trail that gave us some elevated views. The sky was steadily getting cloudier and when we drove down to Lake Matheson, which is famous for its reflective surface with the mountains in the background, the view was mostly obliterated and a non event. Eventually we left and continued up the coast which included an amazing visit to the Pancake Rocks region. I don't know how to describe the formations in this area, and got many good pictures, hopefully, I can post a few that do it justice. We continued on and made it past the town of Merchison, where we found a place to stay for the night
October 19 Monday Abel Tasman National Park was not much further, once we got up in the morning. But the information center had some bad news for us: all kayaking trips (which is the primary way of seeing most of the coastal formation in the park) have to be booked at least 24 hours in advance, so no kayaking for us. We got what information we could and headed for Cape Farewell to make the most of the day. The weather was not cooperating very well again. We could see very little from Cape Farewell, but did see quite a few other interesting things, enough to keep us occupied until we found a camp site next to a farm near Motueka. We had stopped in town and eaten at a great kebab place with the bland name of Coffee and Kebabs. Despite the name the food was phenomenal. The lady working there made giant falafels for us and was extremely friendly. The evening did turn out to be very special because the sunset combined with the low tide and the clouds to create a photographic wonderland of reflections. I took a lot of pictures, but should have taken even more.
October 20 Tuesday We got up and out of our campsite at 7:45. First stop back into Motueka for the bathrooms, breakfast and brushing teeth. Then we thought we could take our time driving to Picton, which really was not that far away. Unfortunately, there turned out to not be very much to see along the way. The town of Nelson was one of the places we did stop. It is the home of the geographic center of New Zealand, which happens coincidentally to rest at the top of a mountain overlooking the city. Coincidentally. It also decided to coincidentally begin raining when we got halfway up that mountain, so we took a few rushed pictures at the summit and hurried back down. The rain stopped before we made it back to the car. Nelson also had a library where we could get free internet and so while we did some email catchup, Julie also recharged her phone and camera. We got into Picton, found our hostel and a grocery store, and prepared for one more evening on the south island. Julie was excited that we would be in Wellington the next day and she would get to see her boyfriend again.
October 11 Sunday We left the church in Oamaru and made our first stop at the Moeraki Boulders. The lighting and the tide were different so I have another whole set of pictures of these strange beach features. Then in Dunedin, I took Julie up to Signal Hill, we both walked up Baldwin St this time and took a walk through the Botanical Garden. I stopped at the train station so she could get her own pictures of the most photographed building in Dunedin. This time as we left we went out to explore the Otago Peninsula, instead of the northern side. We drove out to the actual Albatross colony sanctuary and were told at the visitor center that due to the new hatching of five chicks no one could disturb the birds or even go to the viewing station, but that if we waited around the cliffs a bit further south and watched the sky we should see a few of the adults in the air. It took a while, but yes we did see the albatross and they were beautiful. Very hard to photograph, but that was secondary to just seeing them in the wild. There are two penguin colonies in this same area, but both are on private land and the land owners charge $50 or more to go and see them. You also have to be there at specific times late in the evening when they return from eating in the sea all day. We had a map that showed us a number of places where we potentially could see both the blue eyed and yellow eyed penguins so we were not eager to spend that much money and wait several more hours for the penguins to make an appearance. We continued south into a region called curiously enough the Southland and a large section of coastal parkland called the Caitlins. We reached the coast itself at Kaka Point near sundown and by the time we got to Nugget Point it was getting dark. We began walking out to the lighthouse, but turned back. The place was so remote we just decided to camp in the car park for the night. The only downside was that there was a bitterly cold wind howling through. (The beach below the lighthouse is called Roaring Bay, and the wind makes it apt) We parked as close to the outhouse as possible to create a windbreak, eventually cooked a pasta dinner and watched a film before bedtime.
October 12 Monday Woke up early to watch the sunrise from our 'camp site' at Nugget Point/Roaring Bay. The sky was clear and we made it out to the lighthouse shortly after the sun had come up. No animals other than seagulls in sight, but it was pretty nonetheless. It was rather windy still so we made our way to Owaka and had breakfast behind the information center, which was not going to open until 9:30 so we decided not to wait and went on down through the Caitlins. There were a series of four waterfalls that we visited: Purakaunui, Matai, Horseshoe, and MacLean. Then we stopped for a bit at Curio Bay, which has a petrified forest embedded in the rock. This is best seen at low tide and the tide was already coming in, but we could still see many of the tree trunks scattered like pick up sticks in the rock surface. Three other places we would have liked to stop were closed still due to the lambing season: The Cathedral Caves, Slope Point (the southernmost point of the south island) and Waipapa Point. We had a little bit of a scare because all our side trips used more fuel than expected and we were in an area with few gas stations. The empty light was on and we arrived at one tiny town that was supposed to have fuel and their station was closed. The next option (only option really) was another 15 kms down the road. We made it there and their pumps were down as well. There was a power outage from the high winds. Luckily, while we were considering what to do, the power came back on. I had prayed to myself several times as we had gone further and further with the empty light on and this was just a little answer for me. It also gave me a chance to see how far I can push the spaceship. After refueling we made the last little leg into Invercargill. I texted Alex B who we planned to couchsurf with, but did not hear back from him. I had their address, so we just drove over and they were at home so there was no problem. They were three Uni students sharing a place. They are all studying various phases of music and it was fun to talk with them for the evening. One was leaving early the next morning to do a performance tour. Julie and I went back out and ate at a Indian restaurant. I had a really good spinach dish. Back at the couchsurfers place we got showers and shortly thereafter went to bed.
October 13 Tuesday We got up early, had a quick breakfast and then headed the 30 kilometers to the town of Bluff where we could catch a ferry across the Foveaux Strait to Stewart Island, It was not encouraging weather at all, with heavy overcast and actual rain as we neared Bluff. But we could see blue sky out on the horizon and the forecast said this was our best chance if we were going to go to the island at all. There was still a fair amount of wind and the hour long ferry ride was quite choppy, but it was partially blue sky that greeted us by the time we arrived in the town of Oban in Halfmoon Bay. We had booked a Paterson Inlet Cruise, which gave us a couple hours to explore before we had to join that tour. We walked from Oban around the Bay, past Butterfield Beach and Bragg Bay and decided we had enough time to take a trail along the coast to Horseshoe Point and then back by an inland route. The trail was pleasant at first, but got muddier and muddier and it really slowed us down. We started realizing that we were running out of time and were going as fast as we could. By the time we made it back to a paved road we had only 20 minutes to go almost 4 km, possible but not likely without running. We continued walking and hoped for a car to come by that could give us a ride. There are not many vehicles on the island. We were lucky though. A lady that just moved to the island a few months ago stopped and gave us a ride right to where we needed to be with several minutes to spare. She said she loved living on the island and her three children liked the personalized attention they were receiving at the 19 student school on the island.
For the afternoon we went on the Patterson Inlet Cruise, which went to a number of sites on the inlet and included an hour long guided tour on Ulva Island, a completely predator free island where many birds are being reintroduced and raised. The guided tour was extremely informative and my highlight of the cruise. We learned to identify several trees, birds, and plants I had been wondering about for weeks (lancewood, rimu, tui, and weka for instance). Ulva Island used to be the home of the area postmaster, when Stewart Island was a collection of 18 or more lumber mills. There is a private family residence on the island to this day and the current owners are in full cooperation with the bird saving initiatives. After the cruise we again had some time before our return to the mainland. We did another loop walk that took us along the coast to Deep Bay, which is so called because it goes so far inland (it is actually very shallow and two of the three boats that were moored there were up in the mud for the low tide).The ferry ride back was much calmer and we had no problems. We stopped back at the Couchsurfers place to retrieve our backpacks, grabbed a quick dinner to go in Invercargill and began driving towards Te Anau, where we planned to stay with another Couchsurfer. I had texted him earlier in the day to say we would be coming rather late in the evening. I had not gotten a reply. When we got to the edge of town I called Nathan. He had not received the texts, but remembered my emails and since we had the spaceship it was not a problem. He actually had someone staying on his couch already, an American from Florida, named Ryan. We all talked in the kitchen until almost 1 am and then headed out to bed.
October 14 Wednesday We were in no real rush based on the forecasted weather, so we had a leisurely morning before leaving Nathan's place in Te Anau. We stopped at the local library and were able to use the internet for only a few minutes before they chased us all out so they could use the computer room for a meeting. But we were able to still get a strong enough signal out in the parking lot and stayed long enough to check a few things. Julie bought some souvenirs in town, then we drove down to Lake Manapouri, which is the gateway to Doubtful Sound. As I mentioned the weather was not very good, with sprinkles off and on. In some ways that was a good thing as it made it easier to accept our earlier decision to skip the Doubtful Sound tours. They are much more involved (it takes two boat rides and a bus drive in between to reach this sound) and therefore much more expensive. Prohibitively so. But still tempting. Anyway, knowing that there were potentially at least 14 interesting stops on the way up to Milford Sound, we began that journey. The weather did absolutely not cooperate though. Everything was clouded over or fogged in and we only really got to see the Interpretive Center at Knob's Flat. We had to hope for a better weather day tomorrow and that is what the forecast was telling us we would get. We arrived at Milford Sound and went into the Information Center/Restaurant. The info center was closed and they were busy decorating for an Oktoberfest party. Really we should have had to go back more than 20 kms to an official campground (of which there were several), but we were told we could just stay in the car park. I half expected to be told to move at some point in the night, but it was certainly more convenient to be right there. We would not have to drive far in the morning, or get up as early as we would otherwise. We checked in at the restaurant later, but no music was playing yet and we decided not to eat there. No one bothered us at all that night, so it was a good decision for us to have made.
October 15 Thursday We got up from our No Camping allowed location and after a quick breakfast we walked over to the port where the four companies offering cruises in the sound are located. I also took some pictures as the sun was just beginning to hit Mitre Peak. There was a photographer who had waited an hour standing hip deep in the very cold water to get some shots very similar to mine. He was happy and I was happy, but a lot less cold. I had already decided I wanted to go with Mitre Peak Cruises and I think it was the right decision. They have the first cruise in the morning so we had the sound to ourselves at the beginning. They also have a lower price for that first cruise. The lighting was great as the sun slowly exposed itself on the walls of the fjord. There were so many waterfalls from the rain yesterday and the scenery was incredible. We went all the way out to the Tasman Sea and saw a yellow eyed penguin on the rocks, a few blue eyes swimming in the water, fur seals on rocks in another part of the fjord, and beauty all around in places with names like Bowen Falls, Harrison Cove, The Lion and the Elephant, Stirling Falls, and the Overhang. The cruise was informative and fun. There is so much rain in the sound that there is actually a layer of fresh water up to 12 meters deep sitting on top of the ocean salt water. We got close enough to one of the falls so that everyone got partially wet.
The weather was holding up and so on our return trip to Te Anau, we were able to make all the stops we had skipped yesterday. The interesting Chasm, The Homer Tunnel, Lyttles Flat View, Falls Creek Waterfall, the Hollyford River, Pops View, The Divide, Lake Gunn Nature Walk, Mirror Lakes, Eglinton Flats, and the Te Anau Downs Harbor all were out from their cloaks today. Even with all the stops we covered a lot of ground and made it all the way to Queenstown before dark. I went to the Deco Backpackers and they gave us a discounted rate for me being a return visitor and bringing a new person with me. They put us in a room where we could actually get internet signal, a great bonus. It was late enough that Julie could not book her bungy jump this evening, but we did get some information.
October 12 Monday Woke up early to watch the sunrise from our 'camp site' at Nugget Point/Roaring Bay. The sky was clear and we made it out to the lighthouse shortly after the sun had come up. No animals other than seagulls in sight, but it was pretty nonetheless. It was rather windy still so we made our way to Owaka and had breakfast behind the information center, which was not going to open until 9:30 so we decided not to wait and went on down through the Caitlins. There were a series of four waterfalls that we visited: Purakaunui, Matai, Horseshoe, and MacLean. Then we stopped for a bit at Curio Bay, which has a petrified forest embedded in the rock. This is best seen at low tide and the tide was already coming in, but we could still see many of the tree trunks scattered like pick up sticks in the rock surface. Three other places we would have liked to stop were closed still due to the lambing season: The Cathedral Caves, Slope Point (the southernmost point of the south island) and Waipapa Point. We had a little bit of a scare because all our side trips used more fuel than expected and we were in an area with few gas stations. The empty light was on and we arrived at one tiny town that was supposed to have fuel and their station was closed. The next option (only option really) was another 15 kms down the road. We made it there and their pumps were down as well. There was a power outage from the high winds. Luckily, while we were considering what to do, the power came back on. I had prayed to myself several times as we had gone further and further with the empty light on and this was just a little answer for me. It also gave me a chance to see how far I can push the spaceship. After refueling we made the last little leg into Invercargill. I texted Alex B who we planned to couchsurf with, but did not hear back from him. I had their address, so we just drove over and they were at home so there was no problem. They were three Uni students sharing a place. They are all studying various phases of music and it was fun to talk with them for the evening. One was leaving early the next morning to do a performance tour. Julie and I went back out and ate at a Indian restaurant. I had a really good spinach dish. Back at the couchsurfers place we got showers and shortly thereafter went to bed.
October 13 Tuesday We got up early, had a quick breakfast and then headed the 30 kilometers to the town of Bluff where we could catch a ferry across the Foveaux Strait to Stewart Island, It was not encouraging weather at all, with heavy overcast and actual rain as we neared Bluff. But we could see blue sky out on the horizon and the forecast said this was our best chance if we were going to go to the island at all. There was still a fair amount of wind and the hour long ferry ride was quite choppy, but it was partially blue sky that greeted us by the time we arrived in the town of Oban in Halfmoon Bay. We had booked a Paterson Inlet Cruise, which gave us a couple hours to explore before we had to join that tour. We walked from Oban around the Bay, past Butterfield Beach and Bragg Bay and decided we had enough time to take a trail along the coast to Horseshoe Point and then back by an inland route. The trail was pleasant at first, but got muddier and muddier and it really slowed us down. We started realizing that we were running out of time and were going as fast as we could. By the time we made it back to a paved road we had only 20 minutes to go almost 4 km, possible but not likely without running. We continued walking and hoped for a car to come by that could give us a ride. There are not many vehicles on the island. We were lucky though. A lady that just moved to the island a few months ago stopped and gave us a ride right to where we needed to be with several minutes to spare. She said she loved living on the island and her three children liked the personalized attention they were receiving at the 19 student school on the island.
For the afternoon we went on the Patterson Inlet Cruise, which went to a number of sites on the inlet and included an hour long guided tour on Ulva Island, a completely predator free island where many birds are being reintroduced and raised. The guided tour was extremely informative and my highlight of the cruise. We learned to identify several trees, birds, and plants I had been wondering about for weeks (lancewood, rimu, tui, and weka for instance). Ulva Island used to be the home of the area postmaster, when Stewart Island was a collection of 18 or more lumber mills. There is a private family residence on the island to this day and the current owners are in full cooperation with the bird saving initiatives. After the cruise we again had some time before our return to the mainland. We did another loop walk that took us along the coast to Deep Bay, which is so called because it goes so far inland (it is actually very shallow and two of the three boats that were moored there were up in the mud for the low tide).The ferry ride back was much calmer and we had no problems. We stopped back at the Couchsurfers place to retrieve our backpacks, grabbed a quick dinner to go in Invercargill and began driving towards Te Anau, where we planned to stay with another Couchsurfer. I had texted him earlier in the day to say we would be coming rather late in the evening. I had not gotten a reply. When we got to the edge of town I called Nathan. He had not received the texts, but remembered my emails and since we had the spaceship it was not a problem. He actually had someone staying on his couch already, an American from Florida, named Ryan. We all talked in the kitchen until almost 1 am and then headed out to bed.
October 14 Wednesday We were in no real rush based on the forecasted weather, so we had a leisurely morning before leaving Nathan's place in Te Anau. We stopped at the local library and were able to use the internet for only a few minutes before they chased us all out so they could use the computer room for a meeting. But we were able to still get a strong enough signal out in the parking lot and stayed long enough to check a few things. Julie bought some souvenirs in town, then we drove down to Lake Manapouri, which is the gateway to Doubtful Sound. As I mentioned the weather was not very good, with sprinkles off and on. In some ways that was a good thing as it made it easier to accept our earlier decision to skip the Doubtful Sound tours. They are much more involved (it takes two boat rides and a bus drive in between to reach this sound) and therefore much more expensive. Prohibitively so. But still tempting. Anyway, knowing that there were potentially at least 14 interesting stops on the way up to Milford Sound, we began that journey. The weather did absolutely not cooperate though. Everything was clouded over or fogged in and we only really got to see the Interpretive Center at Knob's Flat. We had to hope for a better weather day tomorrow and that is what the forecast was telling us we would get. We arrived at Milford Sound and went into the Information Center/Restaurant. The info center was closed and they were busy decorating for an Oktoberfest party. Really we should have had to go back more than 20 kms to an official campground (of which there were several), but we were told we could just stay in the car park. I half expected to be told to move at some point in the night, but it was certainly more convenient to be right there. We would not have to drive far in the morning, or get up as early as we would otherwise. We checked in at the restaurant later, but no music was playing yet and we decided not to eat there. No one bothered us at all that night, so it was a good decision for us to have made.
October 15 Thursday We got up from our No Camping allowed location and after a quick breakfast we walked over to the port where the four companies offering cruises in the sound are located. I also took some pictures as the sun was just beginning to hit Mitre Peak. There was a photographer who had waited an hour standing hip deep in the very cold water to get some shots very similar to mine. He was happy and I was happy, but a lot less cold. I had already decided I wanted to go with Mitre Peak Cruises and I think it was the right decision. They have the first cruise in the morning so we had the sound to ourselves at the beginning. They also have a lower price for that first cruise. The lighting was great as the sun slowly exposed itself on the walls of the fjord. There were so many waterfalls from the rain yesterday and the scenery was incredible. We went all the way out to the Tasman Sea and saw a yellow eyed penguin on the rocks, a few blue eyes swimming in the water, fur seals on rocks in another part of the fjord, and beauty all around in places with names like Bowen Falls, Harrison Cove, The Lion and the Elephant, Stirling Falls, and the Overhang. The cruise was informative and fun. There is so much rain in the sound that there is actually a layer of fresh water up to 12 meters deep sitting on top of the ocean salt water. We got close enough to one of the falls so that everyone got partially wet.
The weather was holding up and so on our return trip to Te Anau, we were able to make all the stops we had skipped yesterday. The interesting Chasm, The Homer Tunnel, Lyttles Flat View, Falls Creek Waterfall, the Hollyford River, Pops View, The Divide, Lake Gunn Nature Walk, Mirror Lakes, Eglinton Flats, and the Te Anau Downs Harbor all were out from their cloaks today. Even with all the stops we covered a lot of ground and made it all the way to Queenstown before dark. I went to the Deco Backpackers and they gave us a discounted rate for me being a return visitor and bringing a new person with me. They put us in a room where we could actually get internet signal, a great bonus. It was late enough that Julie could not book her bungy jump this evening, but we did get some information.
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