This location for this post is on a beach in Rarotonga.
I had a visit with my parents for two days (so short, I know) on the island of Rarotonga. We did a lot of snorkeling, ate good food and caught up with eachother. The whole time I was there it was rainy and overcast, but still hot so it wasn’t bad at all. I’ll definitely be returning to the Cook Islands some day.
I’ve just left Christchurch… I’ll be going back and copying my written journal back into the previous entries and posting photos soon, I swear it! Just updating the map for now. On my way to the Cook Islands at the moment.
I’m now in Queenstown. In 30 minutes I will jump off of a gondola to do a 130+ meter bungee jump, photos below. Its the second third highest in the world (highest in NZ). Wish me luck.
Update: I jumped, and it was fantastic.
Update II: I reconnected with Jared and the Swedish danger-duo: Jenny & Malin in QT…
Even though I had tons of fun there, Queenstown is not my favorite city. Its a small yet expensive, ultra-touristy place. Several times I heard comments about how much it’s changed in the last 5 years - I can see how it used to be quite a nice town. I ended up having a really good time, though, because of the people I met up with.
I arrived a day before Jared, so I went and did the Nevis bungee jump alone (see above). When Jared got in the next day, Lucy and I met up with him to do the luge-thingies up on the hill (I rode them before in Rotorua also) - great fun. We all went out drinking later on with a posse of hostel friends which was also great fun.
The next day Jared and I did the canyon swing - a giant 106 meter swing above a canyon. I thought it was more fun than the bungee jumps because of how much the staff messed with us. They played up the scariness and kept us on our toes. The day before, someone at the hostel had told us that the second jump is free is you go naked - a detail that the staff had left out because our group was all male. Jared and I badgered them until they agreed to let us go on two conditions: 1) We put on our own harnesses so they didnt have to touch is and 2) We convince two girls to jump naked. We jumped, of course. The danger-duo rolled in later and there was another late night of drinking on the town. I had to leave the next morning due to my whirlwind schedule - I would have stayed longer otherwise.
I stopped in Franz Josef to climb up the glacier. Perfect day. Took lots of photos. Will upload them soon. Here are someone else’s.
Stopped in Greymouth to spend the night in one of the most boring places I’ve ever been. Not much else to say.
I stayed in Nelson for two days to spend a day kayaking in Abel Tasman, which was beautiful. The day before, I got in touch with Jared Grippe - an old friend from Burbank who is also traveling through New Zealand. We went kayaking together the next day.
(these aren’t my photos, I still have yet to upload my own photos, but it looked just like this!)
And now I’m in Wellington! It reminds me of San Francisco quite a bit - it’s actually said to be San Francisco’s “sister” city. They have trolley-cars, a big bay, earthquakes and lots of hills and even a few homeless people. I’ll be here for the rest of today and then continue south to Picton and Nelson to do a hike and kayak though through the Abel Tasman park.
I’ve been taking plenty of photos, but have had poor luck finding places to plug in my laptop to upload them. I’m hoping that I can do it when i get to either Queenstown or Christchurch. I am keeping the travelogue map up to date, though. This location is at the top of Mt. Victoria which overlooks the entire bay.
Update: I stayed in Wellington for two days and really enjoyed it. I think if I were to move to New Zealand, I would move there. I visited the Te Papa museum, hung out with some new traveling friends and had a great time all around.
On the way into Taupo I stopped at Huka falls to take some photos and saw that a Taupo Tandem Skydiving shuttle was there in the parking lot ready to take a load of people to the airport. On a whim, I hopped on the shuttle with a few other nervous folks. Shortly after, we were all returned because the weather had gone sour and there were to be no more jumps for the day. I was disappointed but vowed to stay in Taupo long enough to do a jump…
Just an hour prior to that we stopped at Taupo Bungee and I did my first bungee jump! 43 meters over the lake - scary as hell but I loved it.
I ended up staying for two days, at which point the weather cleared and I did a tandem jump from 12,000 ft. It was an incredible experience - I’d recommend it to anyone! Apparently Taupo is the cheapest (and busiest) place in the world to jump, and one of only a few sites that allow jumps from 15,000 ft. I was on the last plane of the day, so the sun was just starting to go down - the view was amazing.
From Whitianga I went to Thames, a nice town on the coast. I arrived in the early afternoon and it was a great day so I hired a bicycle and took it on the ferry across the bay. From there, my plan was to just follow the road and see where it took me. After about 30 minutes I turned onto another small road going up towards the coast. It led me up a long gravel path which dead-ended with a fence blocking off an overgrown path that looked very promising. I locked the bike to the fence and walked down the path to find a huge green field on a cliff overlooking the bay - and not another human being in sight for miles in any direction. I sat down in the grass and just looked out until the sun started to go down, then rode back to the hostel. After spending the night there (I stayed at “On the beach” - very nice place) I got back on the bus…
On the way to Rotorua we stopped for a couple hours in a town called Waitomo. Waitomo is famous for its caves, and several companies offer tours of them. The caves there are unique because they’re home to the glow worms. Glow worms are the phosphorescent larvae of a mosquito-like insect that use their glow to lure in other bugs. When they fly into the light they are trapped by the single sticky thread which hangs from each worm (you can see them in the photo below). I did a blackwater rafting tour - really fun! We all put on wetsuits and floated through the caves on innertubes.
(not my photos)
I got to Rotorua (Maori name: roto = lake, rua = second) in the afternoon and took a stroll through town. Not too much there, but it is known for its stinky natural springs which are all over the place. They are cool to see, but they end up making the place reek of sulfur.
Just outside of town there is an odd set of tourist attractions grouped together as “the Agrodome.” I took a bus out there to experience the Freefall Extreme - a giant fan-powered skydiving simulator. It was quite fun, but not much like the real thing…
The next day, a massive storm came through so I just hung out around the hostel and read.
From Auckland, I hopped on the bus going east for a brief trip to the Coromandel. The first stop was Hahei, famous for its “hot water beach” - a beach which has hot springs running underneath it. When the tide is out, you can dig a hole in the sand and it will fill up with hot water. Unfortunately for me, the tide was in and I wasn’t able to spend another night in Whitianga. Next time!
Near Whitianga we stopped at Cathedral Cove and I hiked down to the beach there. Amazing place! The sun was beating down so i doubled up on the sunscreen and walked along the sand all afternoon…
