New Zealand's North Island

For this blog post I'm going to go through my winter vacation trip to the North Island of New Zealand in a mostly chronological kind of order.

Getting to New Zealand, first of all, was a bit of a long haul, with a six hour wait in between getting to Seoul and getting on the plane and then another six hour layover in Australia, but it actually didn't feel too bad because it was an overnight flight and the time difference between Korea and New Zealand is only four hours.  Oh, and I think I should also mention that Air New Zealand gets bonus points for making their safety video the most interesting one I've ever seen -- the staff on the video were all dressed up in Lord of the Rings themed costumes and they adjusted their wording to make it sound Lord of the Ring-ish.  Peter Jackson even made a cameo appearance in it.  Not bad for a safety video.
 


An almost full moon out the plane window




 

    Sunrise on the plane over Australia


           
AUCKLAND

When I finally got into Auckland and arrived at my hotel, the first order of business was to find something to eat - BUT - when I went out to do that, I wasn't entirely sure if I'd actually left Asia -- the part of town that I was staying in was surround by Korean, Chinese and Japanese restaurants and stores.  I swear I had no idea that was the part of town my hotel was in!

Anyway, my first full day in New Zealand started off with me catching up on a bit of the sleep that I'd missed out on thanks to about 24 hours of travel.  After that I headed out to explore Auckland a little bit.  Originally I had planned to go out to an island to do a hike that day - but the morning ferry had already left and the people at the ferry terminal (or whatever it's called) recommended taking a full day to do it, so I changed gears and went into exploration mode.  I ended up going to the summit of Mt Eden, an old volcano whose crater is all filled up with grass now, and it's also apparently the highest elevation in Auckland -- but at 259m that's not all that high.  About 5 minutes after reaching the top - it started raining, so I just took a few quick pictures, and headed back down, ending up at Dominion Park, Auckland's oldest park.  It had a 'winter garden' -- so it was sheltered, so I took a stroll through there to escape the rain and saw some interesting plants.



View from Mt Eden

Mt Eden's crater

A short video of the view from the top of Mt Eden:

If the video doesn't work, click here.

       

At the winter garden

Although there aren't that many, more photos from Auckland can be found here.

PAIHIA/BAY OF ISLANDS

The next day, I had booked a tour to go up to Paihia in the Bay of Islands to go swimming with dolphins.  It turned out that it was about a four hour bus ride to get up there.  I don't think I had been expecting it to take quite that long, but there you have it.  The trip to get up there was quite nice, as I got to see a lot of the countryside, and our bus driver gave us a little bit of commentary on the drive as well.  So I learned about things like the possum problem they have in New Zealand -- apparently they systematically strip down whatever trees they live in, and since they were brought over to New Zealand (which originally had no predatory mammals) there are no other animals to keep their population in check, so their numbers exploded, which made things very difficult for a lot of the native New Zealand birds because since there hadn't been any mammal predators for them, they evolved to wander around on foot on the forest floor and places like that, so they became very vulnerable to the animals brought in (like stoats and possums - who apparently evolved in NZ to eat bird's eggs -- especially the kiwi's eggs).

Anyway, when the bus finally arrived in Paihia, there was a bit of a wait before the trip started, but eventually, I did get to go out on the boat.  On the boat, the first thing that they explain to you are that there are tons of rules and regulations about how and when you can swim with the dolphins (if you find them, of course).  Things like you can't swim with them if they're feeding or sleeping, you can't if there's a baby with them and if they're not in the mood to (cruising instead of playing) you also can't swim with them -- they're wild after all, so it's not like you can make them swim with you.

It didn't take us too long to find our dolphins, and there were even two pods hanging out together, so there were lots of them to see.  However, there was a baby with one of them, so we unfortunately didn't get the chance to swim with them.  This was a little disappointing, but on the plus side, how often do you get to see a baby dolphin?!

After a while of watching the dolphins and taking pictures (or at least trying to!) our boat set off to see if we could find any other dolphins in the bay that we might be able to swim with.  Unfortunately we never found any more.  But, I did get to see a lot of beautiful views!

You can see pictures from my day of sailing to find dolphins here.

RANGITOTO ISLAND

This day was my first day of hiking in NZ.  First thing in the morning I caught the ferry out to Rangitoto island, an old, dormant shield type volcano just off of Auckland (about 30 minutes on the ferry).  Before you go to this particular island though, you have to make sure to check your shoes, clothing and bags for any little insects, plant material and dirt because it is a closed, protected ecosystem and they are very particular about you cleaning your stuff off before you go out there.  When you get off the ferry and start out on the trail, there are TONS of porous black volcanic rocks EVERYWHERE! It was so cool!  Well, actually it was rather hot -- enough that you could see the heat coming off of the rocks, but you know what I mean.  And the plants don't have an issue with it at all - they just grow up through the rocks.  Awesome! 

So the first trail I took was the popular one that takes you up to the crater and the summit of the mountain.  This particular path had quite a few people on it, but once you get near the top, you have two options, either go straight up to the top or walk the path around the rim of the crater.  I took the rim path detour before going up to the top - and as a result I got to see a couple of bonus views that the other people didn't get to! 

View from the top of Rangitoto Island:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

After getting to the top, and taking the requisite pictures, you are faced with more options.  Do you go back down to the area where the ferry dropped you off (no way!) or do you take the path to the lighthouse or the 'coastal path'?  After looking out in both directions, I decided to take the coastal path because I was more inclined to take pictures in that direction rather than in the direction of the lighthouse.  So I set off on that path.  And didn't see any other humans for the rest of the afternoon.  Apparently the lighthouse path must be more popular.  However, I was more than happy with my choice.  Where I was walking was absolutely beautiful!  I stopped for lunch at Islington Bay - the connection of Rangitoto and Motutapu Islands. 

  

My lunch view

Originally I had been thinking about walking a bit onto Motutapu Island as well, but since I had to be back to the ferry location before the last one left in late afternoon, I just stuck to Rangitoto.  After lunch, the path took me along the coast of the bay for a while before turning into the forest.  When the path went into the forest it became more difficult to walk because the path was no longer smooth - you were picking your way over piles of the volcanic. rock for about an hour and a half.  Don't get me wrong - it was lots of fun - but very HOT!  Eventually, I finally made it out of the forest area and was back along the coast line looking out towards Auckland, and since there was no one around other than a flock of gulls it was quite peaceful, and I had to stop every so often to take in the amazing views all around me.  I got back to the ferry area just in time to catch the second last ferry of the day which worked out quite well as I was starting to run out of water and was getting pretty hot thanks to heat from the sun and the rocks' absorbed heat radiating out at me.  AMAZING day!  I think it took about 5 hours to do this walk, if you were curious.

 Lots more pictures from Rangitoto Island here.

WAITOMO

The next place that I went to was Waitomo - a small little town - and when I say small, I mean it.  I was told that the total population of the permanent residents of entire county was about 70, although they get about 600,000 people coming through the town every year.  If you're wondering where I got this information from -- well that's an interesting story itself.  The bus that I took from Auckland didn't actually go all the way to Waitomo - it stopped in the town of Otorohanga, so I had to find transportation from there out to Waitomo.  Not to worry though - that was really easy - after making a quick stop at the Otorohanga i-Site, I was able to book a 'shuttle' out to Waitomo.  That was an interesting drive.  My driver was Bill, a 76 year old resident of Waitomo, who apparently has been driving people out to Waitomo for, well, let's say quite a few years now.  He was also accompanied by his 'trainee driver' - another older guy, but he didn't have too much to say.  Unlike Bill.  On the drive out to Waitomo he told me all kinds of things about the history of the area, the old Maori king, why the area is referred to as 'Kingsland' and lots more.  I was also quizzed on whether I thought kiwis grow on trees or vines.  At this point, we stopped at a little rest area where they grow some kiwis. (All a part of Bill's shuttle service, he said).  Once we stopped there, he first tried to convince me that the kiwis grew on the giant trees across the road. Which of course brought him ask me the question of how they would get the kiwis down from those massive trees.  Without even waiting for an answer, he went on to explain that they send monkeys up the trees to pick them.  Hahaha.....uh-huh, sure they do....  Anyway - he told me that it's quite funny when he tells that story to Asian tourists - apparently they all start taking pictures of the trees right away.  The truth, however, is that kiwis grow on vines.  Mind you, I thought the stalks were pretty thick -- maybe you could say they're tr-ines or v-rees? Excuse my randomness.  I also got a quick history lesson on kiwis as well - from what Bill said, they were originally brought over to New Zealand from China.  After leaving the kiwi area, we were back on the road and Bill packed in as much info as he possibly could in the short time it took to get there (it's only about 15km between Otorohanga and Waitomo).  So, all in all, if you ever need to travel between Otorohanga and Waitomo, I'd definitely recommend going with Bill - fun and informative!! He even brought my suitcase right up to the main door of where I was staying, even though I said I could do it on my own - he insisted it was all a part of his service.

Kiwis!



Once I dropped off all of my stuff, I headed out to explore Waitomo and go out on the Ruakuri Bush Walk - about a 3 hour walk that went through a park, farmland, and ended up on a scenic reserve where there are lots of natural limestone formations, caves and things like that.  But, before I did all that, I went out to the lookout, because even though my host recommended against going up there, saying it was 'not exciting' - I went anyway, and was not disappointed.  It was beautiful!!  I even saw some turkeys! 

View from the lookout

Anyway, going back to the bush walk - in the section where you go through farmland, it's very pretty, but you need to be kind of careful where you walk because there are some cow piles around... You also get to walk right alongside some cow enclosures - and they of course give you the 'what are you doing here' look, but it's all good. 

Here's a short video of a part of the farmland part of the walk, sorry about the wind...

If this video doesn't work, click here.

Once I finally got to the actual scenic reserve section, I can't even explain how much I enjoyed it.  Here's some words that go with it: Limestone. Forest. River. Waterfalls. Natural cave tunnel. Rock faces. Stalagmites. Geo-geeking. Awesome. Beautiful. Amazing. Dark. Beautiful. Funfunfun.

This video is from the scenic reserve -- although it and my pictures can't really do it justice...

If this video doesn't work, click here.

GLOW-WORMS

The next thing I'll talk about in Waitomo is the glow-worm caves - the main reason why Waitomo gets so many visitors.  In Waitomo there are about 3 different caves that you can go into to see the glow-worms.  Most of the trips just involve you either walking or going on a little boat ride through the caves.  While I'm sure that is quite interesting, I decided to have a little bit more fun with it.  I went tubing through the caves!  And when I say tubing, it was really so much more than that. 

The first step was of course, to get all wet-suited up, and then it was off to the cave area, where we did a little bit of practice preparation for our adventure.  As a side note, if you look at some of my pictures from Waitomo, you'll see how clear the water is -- we saw an eel at one point on this adventure -- but it is also VERY cold!  When we got into the cave, we did a little bit of walking to get in and down, and then we could float through the areas where the water was deep enough.  There were even a couple of waterfalls along our path that we got to jump off of!  No big deal - they were pretty small waterfalls. ;)  And of course, looking up to the top of the cave, we could see the bioluminescence of the glow-worms (they were blue and green) -- well actually, it's not the worms themselves that glow, but their mucus and poop, but that doesn't sound as nice does it?  Looking at these glow-worms is definitely a one-of-a-kind experience - kind of like going out to look at stars, but inside and during the day.  They were beautiful!

The guides for this adventure were also pretty amusing as well - they teased us a lot.  At one point, my group stopped to look at the glow worms and have our photos taken and such, and our guides asked if anyone was hungry yet and pulled out a container.  She then told us that inside the container there was a special New Zealand product that came from the cave we were in and that we could try it if we chose.  But, we should be care careful because they a) aren't always dead yet, and if that was the case, to just hit it on your helmet so it'll die, and b) they sometimes try to jump out of the container.  Hmmm.....  Turns out they were fish-shaped chocolate-covered pink, fruity marshmallow things.  LOL!  Then, near the end of our adventure, they told us to turn off our head lamps (so it was pitch-black other than the glow-worms overhead) and that we were going to play a game -- find your way out of the cave.  And then, she tells us to "go this way, not that way because there's a big rock there," but we of course couldn't see her or which way this and that were...hehehe...So, all there was to do was follow the glow-worm path and head towards the little bit of light that was the sunshine outside of the cave.  Once we got out of the cave, more group photos, then we floated down the stream to where the vehicle was, warming up a little bit in the sun, and headed back to base for warm showers, soup and a bagel.  Overall it was an AMAZING time -- wish it had lasted longer!

To see pictures from my Waitomo adventures, please click here.

ROTORUA

The next stop for me was Rotorua, which is another interesting place.  The main attraction here, other than it's large lake, is the geo-thermal activity in the area.  In fact, in one part of town, there is a park that is literally steaming.  There are pools of boiling mud, boiling water, steaming rocks and all kinds of interesting things.  But you do need to be careful in that part of town because the ground can potentially give way quite easily due to the active thermal activity and there can also be little eruptions as well -- in fact, while I was there, there was an obviously recent steaming hole roped off just off to the side of the path.  It was very interesting to see!  The drawback is, of course, the smell.  The whole town smells of sulphur - some parts worse than others, but you get used to it after a day or so.

A quick video of some pools of boiling mud and one of the colorful, steaming ponds:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

Thanks to it's thermal activity, Rotorua also has a number of spas in town with hot mineral pools.  I spent one rainy afternoon at one of them, the Polynesian Spa, which is apparently one of the top 10 spas in the world.  And I have to say, it was quite nice (not that I've ever really gone to one before, so I don't really have anything to compare it to...)  Anyway, I went into the adult pools section (rather than the family pools) and in this section of the spa, there are 7 different pools, each at a different temperature between 32-43 degrees Celcius.  Nice and warm!  Of those 7 pools, some were acidic (to help with joint pain), while others were alkaline (for healthy skin).  It was also open air, so while you were in the pools, you also got the cool outside air and rain - so relaxing!   Not to mention, you had a beautiful view of Lake Rotorua.  If I hadn't been turning into a raisin, I probably could have stayed for much longer!!

The link for pictures from Rotorua itself will be further down in the Wai-O-Tapu section, as I combined the two into one album.

From Rotorua, I did a number of half-day activities (the other half of the day usually spent by the lake or exploring in town).


HOBBITON

The first activity that I did out of Rotorua was going to Hobbiton!  Hobbiton is located on a farm in the county of Matamata, which is about an hour drive out of Rotorua.  The bus ride out there (and although I keep saying this, it's true), was very beautiful. To get there we had to cross over a mountain range and farmland -- saw lots of cows and sheep and of course the mounds that are a result of the thermal activity around Rotorua.  Once we got out to the farm in Matamata, it was proving to be a perfect day weather wise -- blue skies, sunny and warm!  There were sheep everywhere! On the side of the road, on the road, under trees, hanging out in the grass -- everywhere! 

When you get out to the Hobbiton set, you have to be part of a group accompanied by a guide and you only get to spend about 2 hours there.  The group I was with was led by an incredibly energetic guide, who kept trying to get everyone to say, "Sweet as!" As a side note, I've noticed this seems to be a Kiwi thing -- "word + as!" -- heard and saw things like, "sweet as, kiwi as, cool as, warm as, weird as"  I guess they like you to fill in the final blank for the similie yourself...Anyway, back to the point.  Hobbiton.  On the set there are 44 hobbit holes, 4 of which haven't been shown in any of the films, but are due to be shown in the 3rd Hobbit movie.  These hobbit holes are all built to different scales, Bag End is 100% (the only one), and the rest are between 60-90%.  So you can have different sized people appear to be different sizes by standing in front of different hobbit holes. (How many times did I just use different?)  You can only go inside of one hobbit hole, and there isn't really even anything in there, other than support beams (because all of the interior hobbit holes were filmed in studio).  Our guide, Dan, also told us many things about how they filmed things -- like putting actors in different locations to give the false perspective that they are different sizes than they actually are.  He also told us that before filming, the crew had to set off explosives to scare away birds, because they were too loud, Peter Jackson apparently had the frog population moved because they were also too loud (although they have recently moved back to the area).  The native New Zealand vegetation in the area was transplanted because Peter Jackson wanted vegetation that looked closer to English veg, and they even went as far as to strip all the leaves and fruit off of an apple tree and replaced it with fake plum tree leaves and plums (it appears for maybe 5 seconds) because he wanted it to be as accurate as possible -- apparently there's a passage in the book that talks about little hobbits playing under a plum tree.  Intense! 

A super quick look at Hobbiton:

If this video doesn't work, please click here.

Also, if you look closely at the tree above Bag End, in my photos, you might notice that it doesn't look quite real.  That's because it's not.  I guess for the Lord of the Rings movies they had an old oak tree brought in in pieces, and they glued it together and put it up.  But, for the Hobbit movies, the tree needed to look younger, so they brought in a fake tree, and I guess some people had the job of wiring on all of the leaves...wow!  Speaking of Bag End, you were only allowed to take pictures of it, no opening the gate or going up to the door.  When we wound down to the party area, our guide made us all stand in a giant circle and told us to show off our best 'Hobbit dance' -- think Bilbo's birthday in the Fellowship of the Ring.

After that, it was off to the Green Dragon, which is a full-sized building, that you can actually go in, sit down, order food and drinks.  Although, with the tour of Hobbiton, once you get to the Green Dragon, you're allowed a complimentary drink of your choice of pale or dark ale, apple cider, juice, or pond water.  After that though, you're put back on the bus for a quick stop at the souvenir shop before they ship you back off to wherever you started from.

Overall Hobbiton was very pretty and it's well maintained -- flowers and hobbit holes all look amazing -- would've been nice if you could explore on your own though.  I was also definitely thankful for the nice weather (it rained the next couple days) and got lots of nice pictures.

For Hobbiton pictures, click here.

ZIP-LINING

Another activity that I did out of Rotorua, was zip-lining.  If you've never been zip-lining, I HIGHLY recommend it! It's tons of fun!  Basically what happens, is you're put in a harness and then you go up (in my case, into the forest and up into the canopy of the trees), and then you get clipped on to a cable, go down a few steps, and lean back and you're flying!  It kind of feels like you're in the Avatar forest or maybe on the Ewoks' or Wookiee's planets... The forest that this activity took place in was 100% natural native bush -- it hasn't ever been cut down and replanted by humans, and as a result of that there are of course some very large old trees (the oldest one we got to see was 900 years old! and some were so tall that no matter how much you looked up, you couldn't see the top), but also, more interesting was the ground -- it was spongy and springy -- apparently this only happens in native forest due to the different combinations of vegetation or something like that.  The strange thing about this forest though was how incredibly quiet it was.  We only heard one or two birds the entire time we were in there.  This is due to the possum (was told that there are more than 18 million possums in New Zealand -- more than the amount of sheep! -- that's what you call a pest problem) and other mammal predators that were introduced to New Zealand by it's settlers.  From what I understand, because there hadn't been any of those kind of predators in New Zealand prior to human settlement, many of the bird species in New Zealand had evolved to walk around on the forest floor, because there were no dangers to them down there.  But with the introduction of those other mammals, they became easy prey, and so the bird population drastically declined.  But now, NZ has a trapping initiative for animals like the possum, stoats and rats, who are dangers to the birds, and thanks to that, the bird population is slowly starting to come back in the forest.  Anyway, that tangent over, back to zip-lining!  Right, so, as you go on the zip-line, you see the most amazing views of the forest, and the shades of green are incredibly intense (probably looked even more green than normal because it was raining) -- photos don't do it justice at all.  Not to mention, it feels like your time up there goes by way to fast, and I don't know about everyone else, but I wanted to keep going back for more!  Which leads me into another funny story.  So, the longest section that we zip-lined on was 220m long, and what happened to me was I made it almost to the landing platform, but not quite, so Dan, our guide, pushed out this wooden block with a rope on it for me to grab onto, but I couldn't quite reach it in time, so I ended up going back down to about the middle of that section, becoming what our guides called a "sight-seer".  I thought it was great though, because I got to see an amazing view all over again!  Although, I wasn't out there for long -- Dan came out to pull me back in -- as our other guide described it -- "rescued by a knight in shining metal".  I would have almost felt bad about it, but I wasn't the only one it happened to, and Dan also mentioned that he actually liked it when "sight-seeing" happened because he got to work out his arm muscles.  So, a win-win situation, I'd say.  Oh, and did I mention that on the last section, we could go upside-down?  That was fun!  I really enjoyed this day!  (Even if there were a lot of lame jokes told -- things like: 'if Tigger (Winnie the Pooh) got a real job, what would he be? --- A bouncer.' and 'Why shouldn't you pick up a bra in the forest? --- It might be a booby trap.')

The path taken on this activity!

              

                            Yes, there was a swing bridge!                    One of the trees our zip-lines were attached to.

My group 

For more pictures from my zip-lining adventure, click here. There aren't that many, because I was too busy enjoying the view and having an epic time...

WAI-O-TAPU

The final activity that I did in Rotorua, was to visit Wai-O-Tapu, a thermal park that had been recommended to me by a Kiwi I met in an i-Site - who told me that out of all the thermal parks in around Rotorua (he said he'd been to all of them), that this one had the most colorful features.  So, since I wanted to go out to one, I decided, might as well try this one.  The bus that I took out there, first stopped at Lady Knox geyser, which is set off at about 10am every morning.  Yes, I say set off because while it would erupt naturally, they start it artificially for the tourists (by putting in a type of soap of all things!) It was interesting, but somehow, not nearly as exciting as I thought it would be -- plus it was a little difficult to see thanks to all the people and their umbrellas that were there.  (It was POURING rain this day).

Here's a quick video of Lady Knox geyser as it erupts:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

Now, as for the actual Wai-O-Tapu park itself - it was quite cool!  There were definitely all different kinds of colors to be seen.  The colors are due to different mineral content.  According to my brochure, green is from colloidal sulphur or ferrous salts, orange = antimony, purple = manganese oxide, white = silica, yellow = sulphur, red/brown = iron oxide, black = sulphur and carbon.  Oh, memories of geology and identifying what minerals were present in rocks (or what minerals were what for mineral samples)... However, due to the rain, some things were more difficult to see because the there was more steam coming off of the pools due to the difference in temperature of the water and air.  One of the places you stopped at was called the thunder crater actually did sound like there was thunder coming out of it!  One of the most unique features at this park is called the Champagne Pool (because it has a pink edge and it bubbles).  This pool is the largest one in the park (65m diameter and 62m deep!)  It's surface temperature is a whopping 74 degrees!! You don't want to fall into this pool!

The Champagne Pool

While I was at this park, I also made a new friend.  While walking along, I was requested to take someone's picture, and as we were following the same path, it happened a few times, so we just decided we might as well walk together.  I would take his picture with his camera when he wanted it, and he'd share his umbrella with me, so I didn't get quite as soaked.  Good deal, I think!  Anyway, it turned out that this guy was actually a Korean, and was the same age as me -- same age friends are a big deal in Korea -- (anyone else feel the irony that the first Korean friend I make is in New Zealand while I'm actually living in Korea?).  Anyway, it turns out that 박휸윤, aka, John, was from Daegu -- a city I've actually been to (about 3 hours away from Yeosu) -- and he's been living in Australia, working, but was on vacation before he went back to Korea (even though he would have rather stayed in Australia).  Anyway, since I'd been spending so much time going around on my own, it was definitely nice to spend time with another person, you know, not being the only one gaping in awe at these super sweet geo-features - not to mention it kept me much drier than I would've been otherwise!

For pictures from Wai-O-Tapu and Rotorua in general, click here.

TAUPO

My first full day in Taupo was spent doing a lot of wandering around and relaxing (because the next day I had the Tongariro Crossing booked).  So, the first thing I did while I was there was to go out to Huka Falls, a fast-moving, waterfall that's connected to the Aratiatia Rapids (think Dwarves in barrels). 

Here's a video that I compiled from my little videos at the Falls:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

After that, I took a bit of a hike out to the Honey Hive.  The Honey Hive, as its name implies, is a place that is full of locally produced honey products, and they also have a bit of an apiary there as well.  The products that they had included things like different types of honeys (even honey still in the honeycomb), jams, cosmetic and bath products, honey wines, liquors, ice-cream, beeswax candles, candies and much, much more.  It was a pretty interesting place.  AND -- at the back you could also sample all of the different kinds of honey so that you could decide on which type you liked the best.  They all had different tastes - I don't think I realized before how different honey could taste depending on the type of plants the bees pollinate.  After spending an hour or so in there, I took a walk back to town (about 2 hours) along the side of the river that led up to Huka Falls, and finished my day relaxing on the edge of Lake Taupo.  As a side note, Lake Taupo is the largest lake in New Zealand, and it's a crater lake -- approximately the same size as Singapore (if I remember right, something like 35km x 41km).

The walk back to Taupo

The edge of Lake Taupo

On my final day in Taupo, I hopped on board the Fearless, a sailing boat, that would take us out to the Maori rock carvings, which can only be accessed by water.  Apparently they are only 35 years old, but they're still interesting to see.  Also, our boat captain told everyone lots of information about Taupo, the lake and more on the ride out there.  For example, the government has to pay for people to use the lake because it belongs to the Maori (as does ALL of the undeveloped land surrounding the lake).  So apparently they have to pay 1.5 million dollars EVERY year just to use the lake!  Also, apparently in New Zealand, you can own and use a boat without having a license (which irritated our captain because there were people not following the rules or considerations for other people sailing on the lake).  And also, as a point of interest, if anyone ever decides to go to Taupo, the captain made the offer to everyone, that if anyone ever wanted to go sailing with him again, and didn't want to pay for it, then if you're a backpacker on a budget, show up with a tin of Tim Tam biscuits (not sure what those are, but ok...) or if you're a rich backpacker, show up with a bottle of wine, and he'll take you out on the lake.

The Fearless

Maori Rock Carvings

That afternoon, I spent most of my time at the side of the lake again (was a little tired after the Tongariro Crossing), but, before I did that, I watched the powerboat races that were going on that afternoon for a few minutes.  I didn't stay too long there because it was SO LOUD!!! 

Here's a little video of one boat zooming around the track:

If this video doesn't work, click here.



To see more of my pictures from Taupo, click here.

TONGARIRO CROSSING

I'm not even sure where to start in my description of this particular day, because it seemed almost surreal.  A couple of basic facts about the area first:  The hike is 19.5km long, goes up to about 2000m elevation at the highest point, it took about 7.5 hours to complete, part of the area you hike through is an active volcanic region, it's last eruption was Aug-Nov 2012, when it actually shut down a part of this hike, and it is absolutely BEAUTIFUL and awe-inspiring, and very difficult to describe if you haven't actually done it, but I'll try my best!

I suppose I'll start at the very beginning, and go from there.  So. First of all, the bus that took me and all of the other people doing this hike (and there were a lot of people), picked me up at 5:30am, and it took about 1.5 hours to get out to where the hike started.  While I knew it would take a little bit to get out there, I don't think anyone ever mentioned that it would be that long on the bus, so I was a little surprised, but it was definitely worth the wait! At the beginning of the bus ride, our driver gave us a map/some info on the volcanic hazards in the area to read, and told us that if there was an eruption while we were up there, to "dodge the falling rocks".  Right, because it would be that simple if that happened.

On arriving at the base, the first order of business was to rent another coat, because it was COLD!  Even with the 3 or 4 layers I was already wearing, and my logic was, if it's this cold at the base, it's going to be even colder up at the top (which it was).  First thing in the morning, it was very cloudy and raining a little bit, and we were already high enough up that the clouds weren't very high overhead at all.  In fact, it didn't take long before everyone was actually walking through the clouds. 

The first section of the hike was fairly easy -- winding it's way along, and not a lot of feeling of going up.  It was quite pretty as well, there was a lot of little vegetation, flowers and small little streams.

After the first section however, it started getting more difficult.  At this point there was a lot of stairs, and walking uphill, and the rain got a bit worse.  I remember having to stop every so often to remember to take a few pictures as well as to give my legs a bit of a rest.  Also in this section, you were more surrounded by the black volcanic rock.  Honestly speaking, this section was the most miserable out of the whole hike.  Glad it was over with at the beginning. ;)  Also along this section was a side path you could take up the summit of Mt Ngauruhoe (aka Mt Doom), however they strongly recommended against going up this summit if the weather wasn't great -- and as I mentioned, it was raining and you couldn't even see the path to go up there because of the clouds, so, I passed that side path over (I don't think you would've been able to see much even if you did go up there because of the cloud cover).

After finally reaching a bit of a plateau, I came out at a completely flat section (it was also quite expansive...well, what you could see outside of the clouds anyway.) I think it took about 15-20 minutes to cross. On this section I met a new friend, Natasha (who was from Edmonton), and we did the rest of the hike together.  It was quite nice to have someone to talk to along the way, and it also gave us both the chance to have our own pictures taken by the other in various locations along the way. 

Once we were across the lovely flat part (who would've thought anyone would be so happy to see flat ground?), we faced another steep uphill section.  At this point, there was a lot of, how should I describe it? False celebrations? Because every time you would get to the top of a hill, it felt like you finally reached the top, but then the clouds would move for a second, and you would see that no, in fact there was another steep uphill climb left to do.  Yeah, that definitely happened two or three times.  Anyway, this section was the rim of the Red Crater, and when you get up to the top of the first hill, when the clouds clear, you get an awesome view, but on either side of you is a cliff going quite far down, and because of how strong the winds were, it felt a bit dangerous, so after taking a couple of pictures, we tried to leave that area as quickly as we could.  Once we reached the very top of the red crater (the highest point of the hike), there was another side summit option - the Mt Tongariro summit, which I had been considering going up, but again, when we reached that point, the path was completely obscured by clouds, and only about 2 people were even heading in that direction, so I decided it might be in my best interest to not go up there.

After reaching the top of the Red Crater, it was a short walk before the Emerald lakes (hot, mineral crater pools) came into view (well intermittently anyway, when the clouds cleared).  At this point it was still quite cold, although the rain had stopped, and the wind died down.  Because it seemed like the clouds were also starting to clear off, Natasha and I went down a little bit to find a good viewpoint to take photos of the lakes.  In order to do this, we had to do, what I'm going to refer to as 'rock surfing'.  So what happens is, the path turn into a thick layer of relatively small black pebbles, almost sand like, but bigger, and you can't really walk down it, more slide or surf down it.  Anyway, as we went down, and waited for a bit, the clouds did indeed clear off, and the view we were rewarded with was absolutely amazing!

Waiting for the clouds to clear off

When it's finally clear -- time to celebrate!





Here's a quick video of the view of the Emerald lakes:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

After taking, in my case, quite a few pictures, we headed down to the lakes, where we stopped at ate a well-deserved lunch.

Lunch views -- and although I realize it's hard to see, there are colorful specks here...those are people



After lunch, we left the Emerald Lakes behind, and there was another little uphill jaunt, although this one seemed like nothing, after what we'd just done, to go to the Blue Lake.  On the way there, I couldn't stop looking back at the mountain that we'd just climbed over.  It didn't feel real!

Looking back -- here you can see the red of the Red Crater

The Blue Lake

Looking back again

After leaving the Blue Lake, the rest of the hike seemed to be very easy, although it felt like it took quite a long time.  In this section of the hike, the vegetation that you didn't see anywhere near the Red Crater, returned, so there were all of these little shrubs and daisies everywhere.  Very pretty.  Also, by this point the clouds were basically completely gone, and it got quite warm, and I was able to shed 2 or 3 of my layers.  This path was long and winding and gently took you back down.  It also gave a view of the steam coming out of the volcano that had erupted last in 2012.

The active volcano! Mt Rahui

Eventually, this path led to a resting area, with the first bathrooms that we'd seen since early that morning, so we made a brief pit-stop before continuing on our way down and out of the mountain.  I think it took about 2 hours (maybe a bit less) from that area.  For the most part this was an easy walk, although there was one point where we had to go down a LOT of stairs to cross a river (that wasn't so bad) but, then we had to go back UP the same amount of stairs on the other side of the river.  After that, we started getting into an area with subsequently taller and taller vegetation, until we were in a rainforest kind of area (which as a side note, was a lahar danger zone).  By this point there wasn't a lot of talking going on, as it had been a long and amazing day, but I think everyone was a bit tired.

Looking back is always interesting!

After getting out of the rainforest, we had arrived at the car park, where there were buses waiting to take us back to our accommodation.  So, another 1.5 hours on the bus to make the entire adventure round out to have been about 10.5hours, and back to Taupo to clean up and find some dinner.  Surprisingly enough, although my feet/knees/legs hurt a little bit that night, the next day, I only felt a bit stiff right when I woke up, but that disappeared as soon as I got out of bed, and there was no other pain at all.  Not bad for a days walk!

For pictures from the Tongariro Crossing, click here.  And there are a lot.  I couldn't stop from taking pictures (a lot of the same thing) because it felt so surreal and amazing, that at times you just had to take pictures to kind of reassure yourself that what you were seeing was real, and that yes, you were just up on top of that tall mountain in the background.

WELLINGTON

The next stop on my trip was Wellington.  From Taupo it was about a 6 hour bus ride, but it turned out to be a good day for travelling because it POURED rain that day.  So, on arriving in Wellington, that first night I didn't do too much because I had already gotten quite wet finding my way from the station to the hotel (even though I took a bus to near my hotel).

LORD OF THE RINGS TOUR

The next day in Wellington, the weather was still quite cool, but the rain had at least stopped, which was good.  That day I went out on a Lord of the Rings tour.  So on this tour, there were people from all over -- France, Greece, Russia, Sweden, Germany...and then there was me -- they may have made fun of me a little bit for being the only North American, but there you go.  Anyway, we went out to a number of different locations in and around Wellington where they had done filming for the movies.  The first stop was at the quarry where the Helm's Deep and Gondor sets had been.  After that we went to a park where they had filmed Gandalf and Saruman having a conversation at Isengard.  Here we were given wizard staffs as props for a photo op.  We also visited the spot where Aragorn washes up on the river after falling off the cliff in the Two Towers (although him washing up was added in later, and the original river they'd filmed was in Queenstown on the South Island -- the 2 rivers flow in opposite directions).  Along the way our guide told us lots of interesting things like that.  We also visited the park where they did filming for Rivendell -- in that area there are a lot of LOTR sign posts and such.  Another photo op took place here -- we stopped at the tree where they had done the promotional poster for Legolas, and we were give a bow and elf ears (and in the case of the boys, a blond wig).  After that we headed out to Mt. Victoria, where there were a number of different scenes filmed, such as the hobbits running away from the black riders, Frodo and Sam stopping to camp for the night, the hobbits falling down after being chased by the farmer, hobbits hiding from the black riders (photo op here as well).  All along the different stops, we were shown little video clips and/or pictures of the scenes that were filmed at the locations, and told a little bit more about how they filmed it, what they added in with CG, if the backgrounds were shot in different locations, etc. 

In the 'Rivendell Park' -- this was supposed to be to scale of how tall the characters were to be

I'm almost as tall as Gandalf!

Pretending to hide from the Black Rider

After Mt Victoria, we drove past the Stone Street Studios, where they did a lot of the studio work for the movies --- it has a GIANT green screen that can be seen from the road.  Actually the entire area is quite large, but very unobtrusive, so if you didn't know it was there, you'd probably have no idea (unless of course they were filming, and then I imagine the noise would be rather significant). The last part of this tour ended at the Weta Cave, only a couple blocks away from the Stone Street Studios.  Weta Cave is basically a shop for the special effects company Weta (who did the special effects for Lord of the Rings).  Apparently they are the 2nd best special effects company in the world, only behind ILM (George Lucas).  Outside of the shop they have life-size replicas of the three trolls, and inside there's Gollum,  Gandalf, an orc on the wall and an Uruk-hai.  While we were there, we watched a video that basically gave the background on what Weta does, a bit on how they do it, and movies that they've worked on - it was kind of interesting to see.  On the way back to downtown Wellington where we were dropped off, we also drove past the area where the actors lived while they were filming -- not that exciting, but I guess for interest's sake.

I spent the remainder of this day in Wellington exploring around, looking at some of the different buildings, and going down to the wharf area.

For pictures from this day, as well as a couple from the trip to Wellington and my own hike to Mt Victoria, click here.

The next day was a very busy one.  I started off my day by heading out to Mt Victoria because I wanted to go up to the lookout.  It was a nice view.

A view from Mt Victoria

After coming down from Mt Victoria, I went for lunch -- a delicious chicken soup if I remember correctly. 

SOUTH COAST & SEALS 

That morning, I had booked my activity for the afternoon -- a trip out to the South Coast of Wellington that would go 4WD through some farmland and along beaches to see seals!  And I have to say, I really enjoyed that particular afternoon.  I really lucked out on this tour because the group was quite small.  There was me, a couple from the Netherlands, and our guide, Billy.  That was it.  The first stop on this tour was the gas station.  I lie not!!  We actually had to stop for gas because there was only about a quarter tank left -- kind of strange that he didn't do that before he picked us up, but whatever.  Anyway, the first real stop was along the edge of the road to get a view of Wellington (where we stopped was even higher than Mt Victoria -- and I actually got to see that mountain), as well as a wind turbine (although the pair from the Netherlands of course, had a lot to say about how unattractive wind turbines are). 

Views of Wellington

Wind turbine

After a quick little drive, our next stop was to visit 'George', the ostrich.  Our guide, Billy wanted to take some of George's feathers that were coming out, but he was having none of that which was a little bit funny.  Now, I'm not sure what the ostrich's real name is, or if he even has one, but Billy calls him George (well since there were 2, George and George Jr.).  His explanation for that name was that they looked like the Bushes, and I quote, "beady-eyed and evil, but cuter".  I also learned that you can tell whether an ostrich is a male or female based on the color of their feathers.  Males will have darker more black feathers, whereas the females are lighter - their feathers are more of a grey color.  Interesting!

George

The next stop was to look at some special sheep (in the distance).  Apparently these particular sheep are unique because they don't need to be sheared - they shed their wool.  While we were looking at them, two males started fighting, which is apparently a rare sight too.

Sheep below and LOTS of wind turbines off in the back

After that, we stopped at a bit of a deer farm to say hello to them.  And yes, Billy had names for the deer as well, but I don't really remember those names, because there was no amusing explanation.  Anyway, apparently the owners of these deer have gotten them addicted to bread, so that if they ever escaped their enclosure (as I understand it, this has happened before), all they have to do is leave the gate open with a big pile of bread inside, and the deer will come back on their own.

After visiting with the deer, we finally headed out to the beaches where we saw a number of different kinds of birds, a leaning lighthouse, and the stars of the trip - the seals!  On the way to see them, we stopped at this tree with tiny little reddish-orange fruits on it, and we all tried one - they were quite unique -- the inside tastes quite sweet at first, but then as you chew it, it changes to be a spicy kind of flavor.  Quite different.  Apparently the Maori also used this particular fruit as a natural anasthetic (when Billy said this, the expression on the other lady we were travelling with was quite funny), but eating one little piece, you didn't feel anything at all, although after he said that, I was reminded a little bit of the taste of Orajel -- and wondered if they used something similar to this fruit in it...

When we reached the seals, there was quite a strong wind blowing -- apparently it comes up from the south -- starting up around Antarctica, so it was a bit chilly, but it was absolutely beautiful out there!  Also from this particular area, you can see mountains off in the distance, and those mountains are a part of the South Island, which is apparently only about 20km from Wellington (over water).  While we were looking at the seals and the overall splendor of the area, we were also given delicious blackberry and white chocolate muffins, and we had a choice of hot drink - coffee, tea, or tea made from freshly picked manuka leaves.  I tried the manuka tea.  It was amazing!  Very light and just a little bit sweet - yum!

 

Seals!

Here's a video of the area where I saw the seals:

If this video doesn't work, click here.

The final point of interest on this trip, was the purplish-red basaltic rocks, but unfortunately, since we were a bit behind schedule, we didn't get to get out here to take any pictures, which made me a little bit sad, but since I want to show what they look like, I found a picture instead.



Overall an AMAZING experience -- if you're going to Wellington - DO IT!!!!!

For pictures from my afternoon out to the South Coast of Wellington, click here.

Once I got back to central Wellington, I went out to the Carter Observatory, which was actually relatively close to my hotel, and I think this was one of the first times I did an indoor activity on this vacation.  Anyway -- I wandered through the exhibits and got to watch a planetarium show, and got to see some of the constellations that you don't get to see in the Northern Hemisphere.  The exhibits that they had in this particular observatory were quite interesting because they also included some of the Maori beliefs on how the universe was created and some of the legends and myths about the planets and stars.

After that, I went for a stroll through the Wellington Botanic Garden (the Carter Observatory is located in a corner of those gardens, so might as well right?)  It was very pretty and they had all kinds of different plants and gardens.  At the main entrance, all of their flower beds were designed to look like different quilt patterns.  I think my favorite 'mini-garden' in the overall garden area was the 'Fragrant Garden'.  It smelled divine!!

If you'd like to see a few more pictures from the Botanic Gardens, click here.

BACK TO AUCKLAND

I made the trip back to Auckland from Wellington all in one day -- making for a long day (about an 11 hour bus ride), but I got to see a lot of scenery, and it kind of traced my way back through a few of the places that I'd already been.

Here's a little video I took on the bus as we were driving along the 'Desert Road'.  (I saw sand dunes!) This video shows a couple of mountains (Mt Ruapehu and Ngauruhoe) -- they kind of popped up out of nowhere, and my reaction was -- I was there! I hiked up there! (Well at least on one of them anyway)...

If this video doesn't work, click here.

After spending the entire day on the bus, I decided to spend my last full day in New Zealand at the beach.  So, although it looked a bit cloudy when I left my bed and breakfast in the morning, I started out by scouting out which beach I wanted to spend my day on (there were 3 all within walking distance!).  By the time I decided on where I wanted to park myself, (at the middle beach with a nice view of Rangitoto Island), the sun had already broken through the clouds, and it turned out to be an excellent day to chill out at the beach.  After a good long time on the beach, I went around to hunt out some dinner -- ending up at a Japanese restaurant for a delicious meal. (There may have been some ice-cream/frozen yogurt involved too afterwards...)  And I finished off the day by going back to the beach for the sunset, until it cooled off, and then it was back to the B&B to pack up and get ready for the long flight back to Korea.  And that, my friends, was my vacation on the North Island of New Zealand!

My final day's view in New Zealand