Monday, August 29, 2005
NZ 5: Wellington - Taupo - Matamata - Waitomo Cave - Auckland - Sydney
Deeply sorry that I didn't touch the blog recently, so many people sick around me, made me a bit ill as well. Hopefully they all get well soon. OK, let me update the last piece of my journey...
The next morning in Wellington, our first town in the northern island, we went to the Te Papa Museum, an unusually nice museum according to Catherine we met in Punakaiki, just to see how special is it. Basically, it was like going back to your high school geography lesson, quite interesting though the interactive games they have there were rubbish. We met Danny again in the museum, what a coincident! In the conversation, we also awared that he's going to the similar places as we do, so we decided to meet up in Taupo. In other words, he has became our travel buddy as well. Hey hey hoo!
Taupo, a place where we stayed for 4 nights, which is the longest stay among all other towns in New Zealand. Once we arrived, it was night already, so we just made some stuff to eat and sleep. Next day was really slow, since some had hangover and some didn't sleep well, we still have managed to do something before dusk.
Headed to Craters Of the Moon, if you silly enough to think that we took a rocket up to the moon, no, it's just a volcanic thermal area in Taupo. It was quite amazing to see this landscape, pretty much like a Scotish battlefield after a war - smoke everywhere in a forest area. Two of the craters in this place was erupted (when steam passages below the surface, after heavy rain/earth movements) in September 2002, also the biggest eruption in a decade, you can see the pumice stones and a myriad of colors in the craters.
In the evening, I didn't stay up too late, coz we have a huge mission to do the next morning. What so inportant??? Well~ We planned to do SKYDIVING the next morning! Now that's something I can never say I'm ready no matter how much time I got... As some of you might have known that, falling from the sky is the worst nightmare I had in my childhood, possibly is my biggest fear. Cannot believe I did that, not even now.
We got up really early just to throw ourselves out of a plane, and we paid to do it, how stupid?? But hey, at least I did something that I am always fear of! I personally don't know what to expect to feel, so I wasn't like freak out until the moment I know I have to jump. I was silly enough to ask "dude, is this thing safe?", I almost shit my pants! What has to be done is done, I landed safely, 10 pointswith 5 points bonus for kicking one of the assistants into his face and got caught in the video, it was hilarious to watch it again and again... hell yeah!
The activity in the morning was too intense, so the crew decided to chill in one of the hot pools here, and me went back to meet up with Danny. I went to his hostel and watch his solo skydive plus 3 times bungy performance DVD, which was absolutely extremely. Told you! Dutch are mental! :p Headed back to my hostel and gathered up with Jon, HAnna and Lena, off we went to the Huka falls. No, instead of doing rafting there, we did a nice walk around the area.
Next day me, Lena, Joe and Danny have planned to do the Tangariro Crossing 6 in the morning, which is basically walking through the valley between the Mountain Ngaruhoe and Mountain Tangariro to the other end of Mt Tangariro. Here is the map for you to get the idea (We were walking the red route):
Crazy huh? yeah, we were all quite excited, but also a bit worry that the weather wasn't really stable. Hell, everyone says you can't say you've been to northern new zealand without doing the crossing, so I just gave it a go. The snow mountains were stunning, but when we arrived south crater (see map below), the weather began to get worse. When we attempted to climb up the red crater, a big snow storm almost blow me away, thank god Danny grabbed me back on time. We could hardly see anything around the mountain, everything were entirely white, I could barely see anyone who's five steps away from me. Hence, the guide said we need to cancel and return to the base. Boo...
I guess most ofthe people in the group were very disappointed, Lena was trying to convince the guide to keep going, but no hope. To be honest, I don't really give a shit anymore, coz it was freezing up there, have you even experience the cold that can cause you so many pain? It was like your face was constantly slapped violently, and all your fingers were stung by a thousand bees... I was indeed pretty happy that we headed back, though I have to say we are quite unlucky. But the thing is, traveller should learn to enjoy theirselves no matter how crap the situation is, so me and Danny were playing snowball battle and making snowman, it was good fun. After attacked by the vicious snow storm, everyone was exhausted... So we decided to get back to the thermal area and enjoy the hot pool in the rest of the evening.
The next day, we all packed up and headed to Rotorua, apparently it is a very beautiful place where you can see lots of amazing volcanic stuff as well as the Mauri village. We were fully expecting the best in the car, but didn't expect the worst once we arrived. God this place is so stink, it was like everyone in the town farts in every 10 seconds. The crew thinks it's not a bright idea to stay there any longer, so we planned to go up Tauranga, a poshy town in the bay of plenty. Stay for a nite and straight up to Matamata and visit the Hobbiton.
We didn't follow the Hobbiton tour, but just hung around the outside region. (coz me 50 bucks to see those 'Hobbiton' shithole!? no way!) It was so misty a minute ago (some people call this place 'silver mist'), but after a while, the mist began to clear up and the amazing scenery started to show! The landscape is really story tale like, crispy air, pure green lawn, lovely sheep, layered hills... I would say that is probably the most impressive scenery in the northern island.
However, the time was running out! We have to drive all the way to the Waitomo cave, coz we have determined to do the underwater tubing (known as rafting in the leaflet). Met up with Danny and off we go! Took like an hour just to put the swimming suit on, they are soooo tight and everyone could barely breath! We went in to the cave and sat our arse to the tube-ring then slided down to the waterfall. It was so dark, so it's a good idea to do some splashing and pushing. (coz you never know who did it... heehee) The glow worms were so kool, there're so many and it gets brighter if you shout in the cave. (I still don't understand why tho.)
After the chilling activity, we headed to our last destination - Auckland. This is a pretty kool city (tho I prefer Wellington!), where we can see people doing bungy at the sky tower. We went to the local market and shop around for the first day, they got some pretty kool stuff, but also very expensive... We waited fo Danny the next day and wandered the city, a spontaneous idea came out when me and Joe sawthe game center - "how about a dance machine challenge, Biatch?" I can see the fire in his eyes, so I accepted his challenge and filfull my wish to kick his arse! Man! I haven't play this shit like forever, but it was somehow really fun to play with these people! :)
After mucking around in the game arcade, we went to see Sin City! FINALLY!!!!!! God this is such a good film, I was so impressed by its visual effect and the comical perspective. Was a bit freak out by Kevin, especially knowing the fact that he is starred by Elijah Wood (aka. Froddo). But overall, really good cast for such a legendary comic film. Excellent intepretation. [5 out of 5] touchdown*
After the movie, we went out and get pissed, and the rest I just couldn't remember anymore. haha... peace out. Golly, I'm back to Sydney in a blink of eye! It's been great to see New Zealand and meet lots of kool people there. keep in touch fellows!! xo
P.S. Photos will be uploaded very soon! I just put up some new photos in album 5, including more additional picture in shane & Chrissy farewell, Blue mountains trip with Bill, and My Sydney Diary IV (pre-birthday celebration at Bank Thai Restaurant, museum station, crazy karaoke nite, cockatoes at botanic garden). Check it out! :)
[[audio: AmbulanceLTD - Ancedote]]
Deeply sorry that I didn't touch the blog recently, so many people sick around me, made me a bit ill as well. Hopefully they all get well soon. OK, let me update the last piece of my journey...
The next morning in Wellington, our first town in the northern island, we went to the Te Papa Museum, an unusually nice museum according to Catherine we met in Punakaiki, just to see how special is it. Basically, it was like going back to your high school geography lesson, quite interesting though the interactive games they have there were rubbish. We met Danny again in the museum, what a coincident! In the conversation, we also awared that he's going to the similar places as we do, so we decided to meet up in Taupo. In other words, he has became our travel buddy as well. Hey hey hoo!
Taupo, a place where we stayed for 4 nights, which is the longest stay among all other towns in New Zealand. Once we arrived, it was night already, so we just made some stuff to eat and sleep. Next day was really slow, since some had hangover and some didn't sleep well, we still have managed to do something before dusk.
Headed to Craters Of the Moon, if you silly enough to think that we took a rocket up to the moon, no, it's just a volcanic thermal area in Taupo. It was quite amazing to see this landscape, pretty much like a Scotish battlefield after a war - smoke everywhere in a forest area. Two of the craters in this place was erupted (when steam passages below the surface, after heavy rain/earth movements) in September 2002, also the biggest eruption in a decade, you can see the pumice stones and a myriad of colors in the craters.
In the evening, I didn't stay up too late, coz we have a huge mission to do the next morning. What so inportant??? Well~ We planned to do SKYDIVING the next morning! Now that's something I can never say I'm ready no matter how much time I got... As some of you might have known that, falling from the sky is the worst nightmare I had in my childhood, possibly is my biggest fear. Cannot believe I did that, not even now.
We got up really early just to throw ourselves out of a plane, and we paid to do it, how stupid?? But hey, at least I did something that I am always fear of! I personally don't know what to expect to feel, so I wasn't like freak out until the moment I know I have to jump. I was silly enough to ask "dude, is this thing safe?", I almost shit my pants! What has to be done is done, I landed safely, 10 pointswith 5 points bonus for kicking one of the assistants into his face and got caught in the video, it was hilarious to watch it again and again... hell yeah!
The activity in the morning was too intense, so the crew decided to chill in one of the hot pools here, and me went back to meet up with Danny. I went to his hostel and watch his solo skydive plus 3 times bungy performance DVD, which was absolutely extremely. Told you! Dutch are mental! :p Headed back to my hostel and gathered up with Jon, HAnna and Lena, off we went to the Huka falls. No, instead of doing rafting there, we did a nice walk around the area.
Next day me, Lena, Joe and Danny have planned to do the Tangariro Crossing 6 in the morning, which is basically walking through the valley between the Mountain Ngaruhoe and Mountain Tangariro to the other end of Mt Tangariro. Here is the map for you to get the idea (We were walking the red route):
Crazy huh? yeah, we were all quite excited, but also a bit worry that the weather wasn't really stable. Hell, everyone says you can't say you've been to northern new zealand without doing the crossing, so I just gave it a go. The snow mountains were stunning, but when we arrived south crater (see map below), the weather began to get worse. When we attempted to climb up the red crater, a big snow storm almost blow me away, thank god Danny grabbed me back on time. We could hardly see anything around the mountain, everything were entirely white, I could barely see anyone who's five steps away from me. Hence, the guide said we need to cancel and return to the base. Boo...
I guess most ofthe people in the group were very disappointed, Lena was trying to convince the guide to keep going, but no hope. To be honest, I don't really give a shit anymore, coz it was freezing up there, have you even experience the cold that can cause you so many pain? It was like your face was constantly slapped violently, and all your fingers were stung by a thousand bees... I was indeed pretty happy that we headed back, though I have to say we are quite unlucky. But the thing is, traveller should learn to enjoy theirselves no matter how crap the situation is, so me and Danny were playing snowball battle and making snowman, it was good fun. After attacked by the vicious snow storm, everyone was exhausted... So we decided to get back to the thermal area and enjoy the hot pool in the rest of the evening.
The next day, we all packed up and headed to Rotorua, apparently it is a very beautiful place where you can see lots of amazing volcanic stuff as well as the Mauri village. We were fully expecting the best in the car, but didn't expect the worst once we arrived. God this place is so stink, it was like everyone in the town farts in every 10 seconds. The crew thinks it's not a bright idea to stay there any longer, so we planned to go up Tauranga, a poshy town in the bay of plenty. Stay for a nite and straight up to Matamata and visit the Hobbiton.
We didn't follow the Hobbiton tour, but just hung around the outside region. (coz me 50 bucks to see those 'Hobbiton' shithole!? no way!) It was so misty a minute ago (some people call this place 'silver mist'), but after a while, the mist began to clear up and the amazing scenery started to show! The landscape is really story tale like, crispy air, pure green lawn, lovely sheep, layered hills... I would say that is probably the most impressive scenery in the northern island.
However, the time was running out! We have to drive all the way to the Waitomo cave, coz we have determined to do the underwater tubing (known as rafting in the leaflet). Met up with Danny and off we go! Took like an hour just to put the swimming suit on, they are soooo tight and everyone could barely breath! We went in to the cave and sat our arse to the tube-ring then slided down to the waterfall. It was so dark, so it's a good idea to do some splashing and pushing. (coz you never know who did it... heehee) The glow worms were so kool, there're so many and it gets brighter if you shout in the cave. (I still don't understand why tho.)
After the chilling activity, we headed to our last destination - Auckland. This is a pretty kool city (tho I prefer Wellington!), where we can see people doing bungy at the sky tower. We went to the local market and shop around for the first day, they got some pretty kool stuff, but also very expensive... We waited fo Danny the next day and wandered the city, a spontaneous idea came out when me and Joe sawthe game center - "how about a dance machine challenge, Biatch?" I can see the fire in his eyes, so I accepted his challenge and filfull my wish to kick his arse! Man! I haven't play this shit like forever, but it was somehow really fun to play with these people! :)
After mucking around in the game arcade, we went to see Sin City! FINALLY!!!!!! God this is such a good film, I was so impressed by its visual effect and the comical perspective. Was a bit freak out by Kevin, especially knowing the fact that he is starred by Elijah Wood (aka. Froddo). But overall, really good cast for such a legendary comic film. Excellent intepretation. [5 out of 5] touchdown*
After the movie, we went out and get pissed, and the rest I just couldn't remember anymore. haha... peace out. Golly, I'm back to Sydney in a blink of eye! It's been great to see New Zealand and meet lots of kool people there. keep in touch fellows!! xo
P.S. Photos will be uploaded very soon! I just put up some new photos in album 5, including more additional picture in shane & Chrissy farewell, Blue mountains trip with Bill, and My Sydney Diary IV (pre-birthday celebration at Bank Thai Restaurant, museum station, crazy karaoke nite, cockatoes at botanic garden). Check it out! :)
[[audio: AmbulanceLTD - Ancedote]]
