Where is everybody please?!!!

Erm, we have noticed viewers, that you have become very lax in your comments in recent days. This makes us sad :( Do you not love us? Have we done something to offend you? Sad Sally and Crying Kt.

Punting on the Christchurch Express

Hello again. We have just arrived in Dunedin after a 6 hour bus journey with a really bad driver (clutch control man!!). The sun is still shining, the only rain we have seen was about half past eleven last night and that only lasted an hour. Yes we have been very fortunate with the weather. (please do not think we mention this to rub it in that most of you are in the freezing cold, grey, rainy and sporadically snowy UK - we would not do this, it's merely so you can further understand our experience). Anyhoo back to Christchurch. On our first full day we set out to explore the city and do a bit of shopping. We did minimal amounts of both. The highlight of our day was definitely our Punt along the river Avon (pictured below). We were lucky to be in a boat with some lovely australians, and fun was had by all, though i think we were a little disappointed not to have been in the earlier punt with the choir of chinese ladies who cruised past on their way out sounding lovely and harmonious, and came back sounding like they'd spent a night at the boozer (we could not find an explanation for this, but it certainly was entertaining). Good to see some other people with a sense of humour.

The next day (being Sunday) we were up early to board the TranzAlpine Express to Greymouth and back ( a return journey of 660 k, which i reckoned to be about 400 miles - though do correct me if i'm way off - i'm sure someone will). This route took us across the Alps and through Arthurs Pass (again see picture below). There was some spectacular scenery, but i think if we were to do it again we would disembark at Arthurs pass and have a walk around there as there wasn't much between the pass and Greymouth.I'm glad we did get to Greymouth though, as we got to walk in the footsteps of Billy Connolly and see the sea defences and fisherman featured in his world tour of NZ (Fisherman below - i know the pics on it side, but put a little effort in people. we can't do it all for you).

Our last day in the city was another wandering day. Sally was up early and visited the art gallery. We then met and went to the Cathedral - nothing to write home about (so i won't). We came back feeling warm and so jumped in the pool (very briefly coz it got cold very quickly) and later in the evening we went to the cinema to see Walk the Line. A good time was had by all. That's all folks (for now). xx

Dinge, Drugs, Dolphins, and Whales

Well my friends, what a night we had last night. I tried putting off going back to the hostel for as long as possible, but eventually it had to happen. We should have just stayed out all the good it did us. Neither me or Sal got more that an hours broken sleep, we were both up by five and sat round the heater in the living area. The reason being we were in a pokey little room with an extremely loud snoring person, and the room was freezing (no blankets provided). Then to top it all off after waiting till 7 to shower , only one shower out of four had hot water. I ended up with a cold one. Hideous. It was then firmly decided by Sally that she wasn't go to stay there any longer (I had already decided to move on to Christchurch today). She went off at 8 to try and get in another hostel but there was no room at the inn, and so now she is also heading down to Christchurch with me.
Luckily we had a real treat in store for us with the whales (made a little more interesting at first with the drugs i took for sea sickness- as Sally put it I was still me, just more concentrated. Basically i felt dizzy, laughed a lot at silly things, lost my ability to walk properly, and found it difficult to talk sense. I did recover). We saw three sperm whales in total ( a rare occurence apparently), all within a few minutes of each other. Two of the shots I got are below.



Then we came across a seal beating up it's fish dinner, followed by loads of jumping fish, and last but by no means least a pod of about 100 playful dusky dolphins. They were jumping and swimming really close. Absolutely adorable. Now we're waiting for the bus to take us away. Speak to you from Christchurch. Kt. xx

Picture diary of the last week

Wellington from Mt. Victoria

Outside the Chocolate Fish Cafe (Where all the cast of LOTR used to go apparently)

Picton Waterfront

In the Sea in Abel Tasman National Park

"Sally! You Goonie!"

Okay, so I was lying about the whole Italian sonnet thing. If I had my Norton anthology of poetry with me I could maybe give it a go, but as I have no idea what the Italian sonnet form is, you'll just have to make to with plain, boring prose for this post. So Katie and I had a lovely few relaxing hours at Manhana Lodge after we had walked the Queen Charlotte; I don't think either of us wanted to leave the next morning but leave we did and got a boat back to Picton, and then a coach from Picton to Abel Tasman National Park which is right in the top left-hand corner of the South Island. Here it gets a little hazy for me for a while as I started feeling really poorly on the windy roads round the mountains, and had a nasty light-headed episode when we changed buses at Nelson. However, as soon as we arrived at Marahau and I was able to get off the coach I started feeling a lot better. We stayed in a lovely little three-bedroomed house (with our own room!) and proceeded to have two days of rest and not much else. Abel Tasman is pretty damn stunning with sandy beaches, blue sea and deep green hills. We spent our first day on the beach (having a pretty exciting time, but personally I think Katie should tell you about that!), the second I caught a boat further up the coast and walked a little into the park to Cleopatra's Pool, where the river skips down lots of big stones, making little mini waterfalls that you could slide down just like the bit in the Goonies before they find One Eyed Willy's ship! Of course I slid- I would have ended by slide by shouting "HEY YOU GUYYYYSSS!" at the top of my lungs like Sloth, but there was no one to shout to. I did hear one murmur that if you bathed in the pool you came out as beautiful as Cleopatra but I'm yet to see any evidence of it myself. I came out with a scraped elbow.
We left lovely little Marahau this morning at caught three buses to get to Kaikoura, where we are just now, about to have a lovely meal out as our hostel is minging and Katie is hungry. Methinks much shall be eaten. Aideu, aideu, to you and you and you!

The Track of Queen Charlotte

Hello my friends. Sorry for the rather abismal title, just trying to get the blog up to date, and so haven't got time to be thinking of witty things to amuse and intrigue you all. So, as Sally so wonderfully haikued it, we came over to South Island on Saturday by ferry, and played mini golf. We had fish fingers in baps and broccoli for tea. The next day we were up bright and early to catch our water taxi at 8 to take us to the start of the Queen Charlotte track, which is situated at Ship Cove. From there we had an arduous 45 min walk up hill to the first lookout point (the point at which we looked was lovely). Luckily it was a lot more easy going from then on and we arrived at Furneaux lodge (the halfway point for our intended walk) a lot earlier than predicted meaning time for a swim. The bottom was rather stoney, so it took some manouvering to get to a point where you caould swim (plus there was fish nibbling my toes - seriously!!) but it was done. After a brief splash it was lunch. I had decided (pretty early on) that i was going to catch the water taxi from Furneaux Lodge to our hostel instead of continuing the further 12k, so i got to lie around a bit after lunch, while Sal trooped on. I met her at the homestay a few hours later, and needless to say she was rather tired. We had a lovely tea (with chocolate cake for pudding mmmm) on the terrace overlooking the spectacular bay and gardens. And then it was pretty much straight to bed. Up the next morning and water taxi back. That's that. more soon. xx

The tea time view at Mahana Lodge

Haiku NZ

Right my friends, this needs must be very short and brief as the internet is extremely expensive in this one horse town we've found ourselves in and as I am within fifty pages of finishing Bleak House (thank the Lord!) I didn't have time on the beach today to compose this post. So I shall continue in the form of Haiku (if I knew what that meant):
Annie left Wellington.
We were sad, we drank smoothies.
The smoothies were good.

We saw Peter Jackson's house.
We saw his oscar
And we were surprised.

I walked to Katherine Mansfield's house
She had written many stories.
I write Haiku badly.

We sailed across the Ocean
To the beautiful South Island
Well, not really sailed as we were in a ferry.

We played mini golf
And I ate ice cream.
Katie did not eat ice cream- she ate chocolate.

We got a boat.
Where to? Who knows.
For I am bored and don't want to finish this post.

Feel free to comment in Haiku: the next instalment shall be in the Italian sonnet form. S xx

Giving It Welli with Annie!!

Sorry for the long absence old chums, but activity has been rife and communication tools scarce. So what have we been doing since we last spoke? Well the day after our intrepid adventure over the Tongariro Crossing we made our way down from Taupo to Wellington (a nice easy 6 hr bus journey) accompanied by our new and wonderful friend Annie (who is off to the Cook Islands today I believe - you lucky thing, enjoy!!). On arrival the bus driver was kind enough to drive us to our hostel where we presented ourselves to the staff of the Welli YHA, a grand establishment on all accounts. And here we were to stay 3 nights. After settling (ie. dumping our stuff) into our room, we got a rather strange concoction of food for our tea, and headed down to the Reading Cinema to see Brokeback Mountain ( a brill film - go see it). The next day (the 15th so you know where we're at) we had decided to 'do' Welli, and so we got up, had a lovely breakfast outside St. James' Theatre on Courtenay Place (thanks Annie) and took a walk around the centre and harbour, before getting the Cable car up to the view point. We then leisurely wandered back through the botanical gardens, through the city, and booked ourselves a table for dinner at a little place called the hummingbird. Very funky music selection, good wine, good conversation, and very nice food. Sally was brave enough to swallow a few oysters, although she didn't seem that enamoured with them. It was a fab evening, definitely one of our best so far (and one of our saddest, as we had to say farewell to Annie). The next morning, she left us, and above Sally will continue our story. xx

Tongariro Pics

Me, Sal and AnnieThe red crater (foreground)

Me and Sal on top

Sal on her way down to the Emerald Lakes

Rocky lives in Mordor, with biscuits

Having just viewed Katie's skydiving pictures (see below) I realise I can't possibly compete with their aceness, but will endeavour to make this as entertaining as possible. Rocky lives! Katie, Annie and I completed the Tongariro Crossing today, and no training montage was necessary as we all did spectacularly well. Feeling rather buff and smug at the moment, a la Rocky 4 when he runs up the mountain in Russia before meeting Drago. The walk itself was just amazing, amazing, amazing. When we started at 7am mists surrounded us on all sides and closed in as we made our way up the slopes of Mount Doom on the Devil's Staircase. As we attained the summet, the mists cleared and the sun rose and we were surrounded by the most incredible landscape as far as the eye could see in every direction. Above us was Mount Tongario, beside us was a dormant volcano with a deep red crater, and below us were the emerald and blue lakes. Hopefully some pictures will appear soon to illustrate how magnificant it all was...
Woooo, guns n roses just came on in the internet cafe I'm sitting in and so I'm inspired to write more. (It's Welcome to the Jungle by the way). Yesterday Katie decided to go for a sail in the Barbary, which I had visited the day before (see below). Last night, however, I managed to gain passage on the noble vessel with a packet of biscuits and nothing else. Despite it being cloudy and rather cold we hardy pair decided it was a good idea to go swimming... not a good idea. Song over, so post over. S xx Arggh no way, the opening chords of 'Sweet Child O' Mine' just turned into 'Goodbye My Lover', the bloody James Blunt gods strike again!!!!!!!

Nothing to see here...

No skydiving for me. No way. So while Katie was scarting across the sky, I was enjoying life at a more leisurly pace (although it did have its moments of unspeakable fear and adrenalin pumping, for reasons best kept to myself). I took to the seas again (well, Lake Taupo) on a gorgeous boat called the Barbary for a lovely evenings sailing. She once belonged to Errol Flynn who won her in a card game, so I was sitting on the same boat that the libertine had sailed and of course ravished hundreds of hollywood ladies in. Our skipper let me steer for a little while as we sailed across the beautiful clear lake, a moment only enhanced by an american newlywed couples re-enactment of Titanic for us all (did I say enhanced? I might mean something else).
In preperation for the 17k hike we're doing tomorrow, Katie and I have spent an extremely lazy day lying around in hot water. Together with Annie (our room-mate at the Rainbow Lodge) we walked down to the hot springs that run into the river above Lake Taupo. Absolute bloody bliss- Taupo rests above a volcano and so water runs from the springs at bath temperature, aaahhhhh! This is my kind of life. However I am a little worried about the walk up Mount Doom tomorrow... perhaps we should have maybe done a Rocky-type training montage with Katie as Micky and Annie as Apollo, running along the beach... too late now, damnit! Love to you all, especially Elsie, two months old tomorrow, horray!

Kt goes Skydiving, Sally brings biscuits.

Yup, I did it, I went skydiving!! After waiting one and a half days for the right weather I went up in the smallest of small planes with three other nutters and jumped on out at 15000 feet!! (the other wusses got out at 12000, but I figured if you're gonna do it, you may as well go all the way). It was an experience and a half I can tell you. The feeling is totally undescribable. There was a freefall of 10000 feet which lasted a minute, and that was pretty intense, and then out came the parachute and a gentle float to the ground whilst admiring the stunning scenery of Lake Taupo and the surrounding hills and mountains. I have a dvd of the whole thing (with soundtrack - Top Gun theme to start of course!!)to remember my experience, and some photos too. (I forgot the cd with the photos - I'll be adding them later). So yeah. That's what I did yesterday, and it was good. Kt.xx

Feasting, Spontaneous Horse Adventures and Sore Bottoms

Well hello my friends. I did start to write this entry yesterday but the computer wouldn't let me rotate the picture and i soon ran out of time trying. So I'm back, and I've managed to do it, wahoo! This here picture is of me and my noble steed Eno, who allowed me to escort him on a two hour trek of a forest just outside Taupo. (There would also be a photo of Sally and her horse Tiger, but the camera ran out of batteries at the most inopportune moment, as cameras are wont to do, but fear not we have video footage of said beast).

So yes, we went a riding, but that was not the original plan. Oh no. Alllow me, if you will, to take you through our tale, for it is most uninteresting. It began on Wednesday evening about halfpast 5 when we were waiting in reception to go to a maori experience night which had been recommended to us by a fellow traveller (aka Jo). I had nipped off to the loo, leaving Sally alone (or so I thought), but when I returned who should I spy with the beauteous Sally but Sarah, a lovely lady we had met in Paihia the previous week. Great was my surprise and joy, as she was also to accompany us to the evenings festivities. So Tim the bus driver came and picked us up and transported us to the venue where we were treated to a traditional maori show with dancing and singing and thrusting. Very entertaining. Then came the food, and oh the food that came!! there were potatoes and kumara (sweet potatoes), chicken and lamb (oh the lamb!!) and gravy and mint sauce, and stuffing, and other stuff, lots of other stuff. And for afters chocolate log (there were healthier options, but i took no notice of those!!) As many helpings as you liked. I think the average for backpackers was two trips for each course. We were stuffed to the point of feeling sick. Ooh i'm running out of time so i'd better be brief now. We went on a bush walk - more gloworms (pretty). Next morning we had planned to go lugeing but we started talking horses and decided to do that instead and ended up driving down to Taupo with Sarah and going trekking there (a thing none of us had planned). Sarah wasn't supposed to have travelled past Auckland, and had planned to drive back up on the thursday, but (and this was solely her decision) she ended up staying another night. We went out for a meal that evening and it was so so so so good - all of it. Ah man the noises and faces we were making, we were in heaven!! Aah no time, must go. Sorry for the rushed end. Byeeeee. xx

More photos from the Shire

Where Sams house used to be (very sad but very beautiful)


Myself in Bag End


Hobbit and Elf


Sal in Bag End


The Special Brew

The Shire!! (with pictures!!) Double Whammy!!

Oh my Lord - I've figured out how to put pictures onto the blog!! How excited am I?!! And how fitting that the first picture should be of the shire!! I don't know if I can write anymore I'm so darn excited!! Be sure there will be many more pictures to come!! Ok, enough exclamation marks. So, there you see it - The Shire. Bag End and Bagshot Row in all their glory. Yes my hobbits, that is where we have been today. It was a magnificent day of sunshine and the most amazing scenery. If only I could have figured out the picture thing sooner you could see so much more. But you will, you will. (seriously I am so excited I am finding it difficult to sit here and type). Anyhoo. I can't describe how ace it was to see the shire for real, and I can't wait to watch the films again so we can see the sacred ground on which we have trodden. There was the party tree, and the lake, and there were markers where certain things had been filmed - such as the much quoted scene of sam and frodo leaving the shire (Sam "This is it", Frodo "What?", Sam "If I take one more step, it'll be the furthest from home i've ever been", Frodo "Come on Sam. Remember what Bilbo used to say.." etc etc). Don't worry we did our own interpretation!! After our tour, which lasted about 2 hours, we went back to 'The Shire Rest' where I tasted the beer made specially for the movie (Sobering, 1% alcohol!!). Ah man it was ace!! Better go, not much time left. Love to all. Kt xx

'Bridge Crew Camin' Atcha!!

Yo yo yo! This post is dedicated to me freestyling homies havin' it large in Cambridge, feedin' dinner to the hungry and painting fences of the needy! Yo yo yo!
Anyway, Katie and I left Pahia and the beautiful bay of islands behind and headed South for the sleepy little town of Cambridge. At our one hour stop in Auckland we were both busy with our own concerns: Katie found a music shop and I found a smoothy!! Have become addicted to the juice bars in Auckland- unfortunatly have not seen any outside of the city- keeping my fingers throughally crossed for Wellington.
In Cambridge we met up with two other goregous Aberdeen alumni, Kate and Pheebs! (Ello, ello, ello PHEOBE!) Seasoned travellers that they were, they were set up in the lap of luxury in a family friends house. Of course Katie and I lapped it up too and had a weekend of rest, relaxation, and a bit of freestylin' on Katie's keyboard that she bought from the warehouse for twenty dollars (The warehouse is the greatest shop in New Zealand. It sells everything for about two quid) We did manage to move from the garden and the pub on Monday afternoon and went down to the Waitomo caves, where we spent a lovely hour or two drifting through the caves on a raft in the dark with thousands of glowworms overhead. When our tour guide Norm, suggested we sing a song of our country, Pheebs treated us to "Ae Fond Kiss"- I thought about bursting into the Proclaimers "A Thousand Miles" but resisted. Tears were shed on parting with our friends at Cambridge bus stop (there's only one) but Katie and I cheered ourselves up by doing impressions of Mick Jagger and Keith Richards on the bus to Rotorua. Katie's pretty damn good at struttin'.
Anyway much love to me girls Kate and Pheebs, I'm feelin' the love between us, we'll meet again soon... and much love to you all aswell xx

Yo ho, yo ho, a pirate's life for me!

I write with bad news: your faithful correspondant is currently rolling all around the shop like Captain Jack Sparrow having spent the whole day on a sailing boat- I had no trouble gaining sea legs but getting back my land legs is proving a bit more difficult. Result being, I feel like a real drunken sailor without any of the booze... rubbish!
So me and the beautious Katie have come to our last night in the gorgeous bay of islands... the long pause in our blogging came as a result of having nothing to write. The day we arrived brought lovely sunshine but the morning after brought the rain, and wind, and rain, and three-metre high waves, and rain, intermingled with periods of cloud, and just occasionally, sunshine. I braved the stormy seas yesterday to go dolphin watching... it was pretty damn rough but we came across a huge pod of dolphins who came within inches of the boat, jumping and twisting and playing. Because they had babies we couldn't swim with them but it was wonderful just to see them, massive beasts that they are in New Zealand. Today Katie took her own dolphin trip and had similar good luck, and I set sail on the good ship Tucker, a real old-fashioned sailing ship. Of course I was far too over-excited from the start. The sun came up and we landed at a beautiful island, and we all took turns swinging from one of the boat ropes into the sea. Everyone else was graceful as swans... I proceeded to do a series of arse-flops into the water. Not good, expecially as I'd burnt my bum at the beach. But bearing pain is the pirate way, I guess. Anyway, my high spirits were restored by swimming from the beach back to the boat, just like a shipwreaked mariner.
Tomorrow we head south to Cambridge to see the Waitonomo Caves, Mata Mata (Hobbiton), and the gorgeous Kate! Aideau!