New Zealand

Alright, many (none) of you having been waiting eagerly for this moment… my first blog entry!

Straight into action

Thursday, Feb 16 marks the start of my travels. The destination: Wellington.

Wellington is a pretty nice city FYI.. my favourite in NZ..

I arrive in the afternoon, and amidst all the excitement of starting another trip, I can think of nothing better to do then to go straight to bed for a nap.

The nap is short lived as a Welsh guy comes in the room and offers me a beer. I oblige. It’s an Export Gold, and makes XXXX gold look like top shelf (or whatever the equivalent term is for good beer). After this beer, Welshy goes out to get a haircut (not really relevant) and I return to my nap.

My nap is once again interuppted when a dutch guy and dutch girl enter. After some brief conversation, they convince me that we should go out and drink tonight, and when Welshy returns, we all go out. Later, we run into a Contiki group, who, in no time at all, have started dancing on the tables and taking their clothes off.. and it’s at that point I know that night 1 is gonna get messy… and it does…

Welshy steels my shoes

The next morning begins with a hangover. I refuse to wake up early to go with the Dutchies to the Te Papa museum, and instead head there myself later. Pretty interesting museum, although it turns out an earthquake simulator does not aid a hangover.

So the second night, me and the dutchies are having a few quiet beers in the hostel. Welshy is at a different hostel and he decides he wants to come drink with us again. So he turns up to the hostel (in jandals aka thongs aka flip flops). A few drinking games later, and we’re going out again, only Welshy only has thongs. So I lend him my white shoes. He wears these, and proceeds to go home at some point with my shoes. I’m not concerned, because I gave him my number, and he called my phone (so I think I have his). Well turns out his number is private, so I have no way of contacting him the next day. I never hear from him again.. and so on night 2, I’ve had my first item stolen (sort of).

Jacqui tries to travel with David

                                                                 

I meet Jacqui on the Sunday. Jacqui is a friend of mine from my London days. She has never travelled with me before, and she’s in a for a shock. Turns out she got to read most of the ‘Girl with the Dragon Tattoo’ series in the time between when she would wake up, and when I would wake up every morning. She is also amazed as I power walk my way through NZ's top attractions, like the (apparantely) awesome geyser park in Rotorua:

 I’m not easy to please it turns out. Anyway, I’m grateful she stuck it out enough to get me from Wellington to Auckland.

How to get down quickly from high places

I zorbed my way down a hill in Rotorua:

I luged my way down another hill in Rotorua (I'm not affiliated with these other dudes in the pic):

I jumped off the Sky Tower in Auckland:

Zorbing and luging were great fun. The jump off the sky tower looks hardcore, but it's really a disappointingly slow drop (192m in 11 secs). For those playing at home, gravity alone could have got me down in a much more efficient 6.25 secs.

Emily knows how I roll

Once Jacqui can’t stand me a minute longer, I get the boat from Auckland to Waiheke island, to meet up with Emily (another friend from London). She has an uncanny resemblance to the girl in the picture below:

Thankfully, Em has travelled with me a lot before and knows how I roll. We have a great time chillin in Waiheke. Also did a day trip back to Auckland to do some Windsurfing which was really fun! Only the 11:30pm last ferry back to Waiheke doesn’t exist on Sunday, so we are stranded in Auckland for the night.

Summary

Awesome:

Luging and Zorbing and Windsurfing, Te Papa Museum (Wellington)

Craptacular:

Geysers (boring), Sky Jump (too slow for my daredevil liking.. plus expensive)

Lessons learnt: 

Don't assume transport runs at a time of your choosing

What's Next

Singapore: 2 massive casinos and not much else that I know of. Can't see this ending well...