Wow, its only been a couple of days, but very action packed! So in Whitianga I also hand carved a piece of sheep bone into a necklace, in the style of a Maori fish hook, it took just under 3 hours to make.
From here we drove down to Rotorua, where it just smells of sulphur, as its a volcanic area / lake. The lake itself is a funny colour, almost yellow in places! Here is where we Zorbed down a hill together, it was good fun and very wet!
We also went up a cable car to have a go on the luge tracks, which is basically a sophisticated version of go-carts on purposefully designed tarmac ‘roads’. Good fun and great scenery!
We then paid a visit to Waitomo Caves – famous for it’s glowworms. We took a 45 minute tour around the caves and eventually we got into a boat to go along the river into the very dark ‘glowworm grotto’. It’s hard to explain the sight of thousands of dots (about match head size) glowing bright above our heads, almost blue in colour. Really an amazing experience.
Lake Taupo was next, well known for being ‘the’ place to skydive. The weather was perfect, little wind and not a cloud in sight. We turned up at the airport, where there are three companies competing in the skydive market. So we’re told we can go up in perfectly good plane and jump out at around 2pm. So there are two heights, 12,000ft and 15,000ft – the difference being the amount of freefall time. The very nice people explained that from 15,000 foot because the weather is so good you can actually see coast to coast! No question, I had to do 15,000 foot. This is about 10,000 ft freefalling (lasts 60 seconds) before my instructor pulled the parachute and we glide the last 5,000 foot and land around 5 minutes later.
No, i’m not finished talking about the skydive, to explain the feeling needs its own paragraph. So I’m sat on Alex’s lap (my instructor) our legs dangling out of the side of a bright pink plane, the wind, noise and cold are preventing me from admiring the view at this point! To be honest, I wasn’t afraid, not because I’m inhumane, because I didn’t have time! Before I knew it I was face down looking at New Zealand. It took a little while to get used to the feeling of the wind and noise but after a short time Alex was showing me around and I could see both the Pacific ocean and the Tasman Sea!
Alex pulled the parachute and it went very quiet, and we slowed down dramatically. To date the most surreal thing to see is your own feet dangling beneath you, with a lake the size of Singapore beneath you. Definitely the most exhilarating thing I have ever done! Awesome!
We then visited Jenny’s cousin Nicola and family who run a farm. It’s 1,200 acres with over 2,000 sheep and quite a few cows too! We got right stuck in and in no time Kynan had me riding one of the quadbikes and herding sheep with it. Myself and Jenny moved 20 sheep from one field to the next all on our own! It was really great seeing a major aspect of New Zealand and experiencing it in such a hands on manner – cheers guys!
So we headed down to the capital, Wellington – where we visited the large museum there – Te Papa which was cool! A fairly nice city, but very small. From here we had a ferry down to the south island of New Zealand.
We first headed to a winery (Vavasour) to gatecrash a party and meet up with Em & Stu who were celebrating the end of the harvest. Great fun!
Then onto Hanmer Springs via Kaikoura (more about here another time, as we’re going back) . Hanmer Springs is famous for its geo-thermally heated pools. A bit smelly but very relaxing and very hot! The hottest pool was 41 degrees.
Driving further west took us to Franz Joseph and Fox glaciers. We didn’t do a walk as we have both walked on glaciers before - but we admired the views from the different view points and then visited the nearby Lake Matheson - famous for its reflection of mount Cook and vista.
Heading further down the coast and inland we arrived in Wanaka - another lake and town. Gorgeous scenery in New Zealand! We visited ‘Puzzling World’ full of illusions rooms, puzzles and a large maze. Inside was an Amos room (think Charlie & Chocolate Factory room where you walk from one end to the other and the proportions stay the same but the room gets smaller - or google it) and an entire room built on a 35 degree slant - which makes for some cool effects!
Finally we arrived in Queenstown today, known as the adventure capital of New Zealand its home to all the bigger bungy jumps etc. Personally I like to be flying for longer than a bungy and so I went Hang Gliding!
Running towards the edge of a cliff and finding yourself lift up is a peculiar feeling, very surreal. We then went down quite quickly in order to build up speed so that we could take a look around - and what a view! We took off from from the Coromandel Peak (or near it). I then got handed control over the hang glider and did some basic turns and speed/angle control - definitely the closest I’ve felt to flying! When I gave control back is when the video starts and we started to stall the glider, so that it would nose dive and we could spiral it and perform a few aerobatics - scary but great fun!