The last week and a bit we have been busy doing all sort if tourist activities and so we thought we'd update you all in one!
We set off from Auckland and headed down to a place called Matamata. We checked into a lodge which had electricity for our van, hot showers and a pool - 5 star stuff as far as we were concerned. After a quick swim in the morning we headed for Hobbiton. Now I (Bertie) haven't seen The Lord of the Rings films (don't shoot me) so I was slightly less excited than my hobbit counterpart and also didn't really know what was going on.
Rotarua was up next and after a scout round the town we saw some activities which looked like fun and the first of these was white water rafting down the Kaituna River. We were the only people who seemed interested in a trip that morning so were told we were gonna have a 'bros trip' with just us and two instructors. We started down a few little rapids doing some spins and fancy stuff before the serious rafting began. What had attracted us to rafting here and nowhere else is that on this stretch of the river there is the highest commercially raftable waterfall in the world at 7m high. Apparently because there was only two of us and the fact we were on a 'bros trip' meant that we could try and do more dangerous things. What they proposed to do down this waterfall was to put all the weight at the front of the raft so that we go quite far underwater at the bottom of the waterfall and then the buoyancy would fire us back out and flip the boat upside down. The first part went to plan - we were at the front and were fully submerged - but instead of firing us out and flipping the raft hadn't quite got far enough over so we shot out and landed the right way up instead!
Bertie understandably forgot to include details about us rafting down the first 'waterfall', it was less a river, more a stream. The instructors exact words were, 'don't worry, no ones fallen off at this one, I've never heard any girls scream here either'. Seconds after these words were uttered, Bertie was bottom up, feet in the air - entering the water as gracefully Eric the eel.
We had heard about 60mph karts and thought it would be silly not to try them. The format was a ten minute practise/qualifying time followed by a ten minute race. I (Bertie) had never karted before but I've watched a lot of F1 and thought that it couldn't be that hard. I was wrong. I was also rubbish. The visions of me becoming the next Lewis Hamilton were shot to pieces after being lapped by JJ in the short practise time and also being told by the instructor that I was using the break too much and not utilising the throttle as much as I could - I thought I was going far too fast already. With some more tips we lined up for the race. I managed to stay with the pack until the 4th corner when trying my best to stick with them I obviously didn't use the break enough and flew off the track into the airbag off the side of the bend. With nothing but my pride hurting I set off again a way behind my fellow competitors and thought I might as well just enjoy the ride. I thought I'd almost got the hang of it by the chequered flag but I came in to find out that even at the end my lap times were still over 6 seconds slower than JJ's. He drove to our next destination.
This sort of driving domination was just a continuation from luging the previous day. 'Luging' from what could discern was cruising down a mountain in a plastic kart with no engine and what felt like no brakes. Like the karting I (Bertie) was a bit of a wimp and JJ beat me down the mountain all 5 times, despite him falling out the kart on one occasion.
We headed off down the road the Lake Taupo. On the way we stopped off at a natural phenomenon. Due to New Zealand's position right on the edge of the Oceanic plate (year 9 geography coming into play) there is lots of volcanic activity and part of that is the production of thermal pools - or something like that - we both dropped geography well before GCSE. Anyway these particular pools were fully of cool colours because of the different minerals in the ground - I'm sure someone who's good at chemistry can tell you which is which all we could remember was sulphur was yellow and potassium purple. Despite our lack of knowledge and the abhorrent smell generated by the pools we made our way around the site amazed at what nature could throw up.
We moved onto Lake Taupo next and after relaxing for a bit we decided that we would do a sky dive the next day so we went to the info centre to see how much it would cost etc. At this point the sky was clear and the sun was shining so when the woman behind the desk asked us if we would like to do it at that moment we went for it! We got to the airfield and decided on the highest jump possible - 15000 feet. We got kitted out in all the gear and climbed into the plane with our professional jumpers. Due to the rest of the plane choosing the lower height of 12000 feet to jump from we had to stop at that height and watch them plop out the side - it was very surreal. When we finally got up to height we were told just to sit on the edge of the open plane whilst sitting on the instructors lap. Without warning we were simultaneously ejected from the plane and started the free-fall. We hit the ground about 5 minutes later after free-falling for about a minute followed by a gentle parachute ride afterwards. There were great views all around us with the lake and the mountains in the distance, it's definitely something we won't forget. (Photos of the dive were extortionate but here is someone else's photo of what we saw!
After some great mountain views the drive down to Wellington was surprisingly uneventful and we reached Wellington in good time and went to book the ferry over the South Island for the following morning. Similarly with the sky dive, we were told there was one leaving at 2.30 in the morning which would mean that we got to Picton early in the morning so we could hit the road...early. We took it and went off into Wellington to find a beverage.
We disembarked at 6 and headed straight to a place called French Pass. The scenery we drove through was probably the most beautiful we had ever seen. You can judge for yourselves but we still don't think the pictures do it justice!
We were told on many occasions that we should visit the Abel Tasman national park. We had found a campsite on the road atlas and headed for it. Unfortunately for us, the weather was rubbish so the magnificent views promised were just heavy rain and cloud. We reached the campsite safely though and set up for the evening.
The morning saw much better weather and after one of our customary big breakfasts we headed back through the scenery we were unable to see the previous day - it didn't disappoint.
After a drive and a rest we were set up to drive along a road called Arthur's Pass and it is supposed to be one of the best driving roads in the world in terms of the scenery. It was magnificent.
We hit Christchurch later that day and discovered that there are actually no campsites anywhere near so treated ourselves to a motel for the night.
After a well deserved lie in we decided to go and see what Christchurch had to offer. The first thing we saw was a 7s tournament at the local park so we parked up and went to watch some rugby.
When we returned JJ jokingly said that it looked like someone had tried to break into the van. It turned out they had. All that was taken was my small rucksack and JJ new headphones. As I was running through what was in my bag I realised that I thought the rucksack would be best place to keep my passport and computer. How wrong I was! After a visit to the police station we went back to watch the rugby - after having parked somewhere much more visible! I then got a phone call from the polices saying the bag had been handed in - but it was found in a river with all the original contents in! Praise The Lord! We celebrated by treating ourselves to a curry and another night in a motel.
We headed off to Church in the morning then we headed off to meet a family friend of mine (Bertie's) before heading down to Lake Tekapo and Lake Pukaki. We were blown by the scenery yet again especially the colour of Lake Pukaki - apparently it's caused by the glacier at the top crushing rocks into dust and the sun reflection off the dust making the incredible blue.
This week also saw us finish our journey through Philippians where we learnt to 'rejoice in The Lord always' as that was Paul's underlying message to those in Philippi because of the great news that is Jesus' life, death and resurrection. We thought it seemed very easy here in this magnificent country with no real troubles, but it's definitely something we'll need to keep in the back of our minds when harder times come.
We're are now heading off to Queenstown, the backpacking hub of New Zealand and all that it has in store, see you then!
Come on boys - where's the latest instalment?! X
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