Full Circle! - (updated 20/07/08)

Its been a while since I updated this blog and a fair bit has happened! I stayed in taupo for another night and did my first washing of the trip. The hostel had facilities so that made life easier. However, one of the Dryers had broken meaning a huge backlog of wet laundry from other travellers. I had to wait until the following moring to dry my smalls leaving me with only my swimming shorts and a t-shirt to survive the night! I met Katja and we cooked an elaborate meal of pasta together. I also came across two housemates of my old school friend Oli Filler!!

The following day I checked out of the hostel and headed South-East on SH 5 to Napier. The drive was amazing with stunning hills and snow-capped peaks adorning the horizon. This town in central in Hawke's Bay and NZ's wine country. It suffered the worst natural disaster in EnZed's inhabited histroy in 1930 when a massive earthquake flattened the city. The rebuilding of the city was done in the fashion of the era - Art Deco. Most building and monuments around the centre of town are in this style. It is said to rival Miami as 'Art Deco Capital of the World'! I stayed in a cool hostel called Stable Lodge which had a super comfy bed! I spent the afternoon walking round town and checked out the National Aquarium of New Zealand. The hostel had laid on a Pizza evening where they made the bases and we could do the toppings. It was great.


I left Napier early and headed back to Taupo to pick up Katja. I had offered to give he a lift to Auckland as she was flying out on Wednesday and I kinda needed to be up that way soon so it made sence to share a lift. The drive was about 6hrs in total but fueled by Tim Tams, muffins and L&P (local soft drink) supplied by Katja we made it just fine. We checked into City Garden Lodge in Parnell - a very posh part of town. It is the Auckland Fil Festival at the moment so we decided to go watch a film in town. After a mad dash across the city we just made it to the SkyCity Theatre and watch an awsome film - The King of Kong.

Today we took a ferry to Rangitoto Island... I shall continue soon, but my time on the computer has run out!!

.. picking up where i left off! We caught the 12.15 ferry from pier 2a just in time and floated to Rangitoto via Devonport in about 20mins. I think the ferry pilot was a novice as he took a fair while docking the boat at the wharf, including a few big shunts of the timber jetty! The last ferry to leave the island would do so at 15.30 so we didnt have much time to hang around. There were a few bach's (NZ cottages) dotted around the wharf which seemed strange as this is Auckland's newest volcano at just 600 years old. A mangrove ecosystem as just about started to develop close to the shore and there was a fair few trees covring the dark volcanic rock. The walk to the summit took around 45mins going at a fair pace – luckery we dodged the showers and made it to the crater rim dry. The lookout over the city was great and I could see the Coromandel Peninsula on the horizon. After a few photos on the top we headed back down but took a detour to look at the lava caves. Katja had cunningly packed her torch so we decided to go down one. The first one ran out pretty quickly so we decided to try our luck on another one. This one went much deeper and once in total darkness i noticed a glimmer of light coming from further inside the cave. It turned out that there was another exit so we squeezed out into dazzling daylight! We made it to the ferry in good time. There were a few people getting off the ferry with large rucksacks – i think they were going to the camping on the volcano. Back in Ponsonby we decided to go out for a meal. Japanese was the choice and we both tucked into a big bowl on Teriyaki Chicken and noodles. Tasty!