Queenstown to Auckland

After updating my blog I had a rather weird afternoon. One of the girls I went to school with added me to facebook. She told me she was living in Queenstown and as soon as I found out I emailed Karyn back to tell her I would be in town later that day. Well while I was on the net Karyn text me to let me know she was in town and as it happened in the internet place over the road to where I was sat. 5 minutes later a 5 months pregnant Karyn walked though the door! Not seen her in about 2 years and here we were on the other side of the world and 19,000 miles from home and in the same small town. Anyway she took me to the best hot chocolate place in town and we sat chilling out and catching up until I had to leave to go pony trekking.

Dare I say after I got over the fear on actually being on a horse me and Sully got along (when he wasn’t biting the horse in fronts bum that is!) There were just 4 well 5 including the guide on the trip which took just to Paradise…literately! Which is where Peter Jackson set a lot of the scenes from Lord of the Rings and where The Lion the witch and the wardrobe was set. (cant say ive seen that though, the tv programme always creped me out) the horse weren’t just any horse though…oh no…Vicki you would be prove I promised id go horse riding in this absolutely stunning scenery and well I did it in style. All the horse had appeared in the fight scenes in Lord of the Rings and my horse is also the horse that advertises the company! Sully was pretty well behaved for me part from the biting and the running, but I got used to him and took the upper hand… it was just a shame I could see the start when I was just getting used to it. Anyway gorgeous scenery and a really good laugh.

Tuesday was a very early morning… the day started with Tyler and Andy having to run round the coach in their boxers, they’d lose to pool the night before and that was there challenge… you think they’d learn as the week when on but we all got quite used to the boys and mainly Andy taking his kit off! Mandy had to stay behind to make sure we had a hot meal waiting for us on our return and that all our activities etc were sorted for Wednesday and Shane led our very sleepy bus down to our first stop at Te Anau. We made a couple more stops through the showers and the sleet at the Mirror Lakes and at the Homer tunnel. The rain was still pretty heavy as we boarded the boat for the cruise round Milford sound. It was safe to say part from Shane who got excited over every tree he saw the majority of us were pretty happy to sit inside the boat looking out the windows at the thousands of waterfalls than brave the deck and get soaked by the rain and the waterfalls. To most of us this place was a bit of a let down. So many people had built it up to be this truly magical place and a must see but maybe that was the problem…we could see a great deal. The waterfalls to be fair were amazing, I just don’t feel I saw Milford at its most beautiful.

Wednesday was meant to be a really exciting day, I was meant to be Hang gliding over Queenstown but it was cancelled due to strong winds. So instead me and Emma headed to be Skyline Gondola and headed up to see Queenstown’s views. We meant up with some over very disappoint hand gliders and checked out the high speeds of the luge before experiencing the burgers at Fergburger for lunch. A very unproductive day really but ended on a high when we went bowling then into town.

Thursday was yet again another early start… but we had signed up for adventure not to lie in bed all day! Next stop Fox Glacier. It was safe to say the weather once again was against us. We’d signed up to do the Helihike on Fox Glacier and we were all kitted out and sat waiting in the bus when it started spitting…yes not raining spitting! They cancelled on us and we ended up just doing the normal hike on the Glacier. A really good experience, very weird but I really enjoyed it and surprising it wasn’t cold. They had us crawling through ice caves and everything.

Friday was spent mainly on the road…we headed north along the west coast the inland to Arthur’s Pass. This was a good stop, there was thick snow going over the pass so we all jumped out and had a snowball fight and Natalia even got to make her very first snowman! We lost a lot of our team that night, think it was 13 out of 36.

Saturday we headed up to Kaikoura, some of the team we going whale watching and judging by how green and pale most of them were when we picked them up im glad I decided to take the free walk over the coast to spot some seal, which we did. Then headed into town to have the best Hoki and Chips! This was a really long day and we didn’t arrive in Nelson until about 8ish when dominos delivered our dinner!

This was one of my favourite days, after having to say bye to Shane (who had to go over to Brisbane to run a coach for travel agents!) we headed up to the Happy Valley to try our hand at quad biking. After a shaky start I got the hang of what I was doing and gave my right thumb a really good work out. When we got to do the race track at the end it was a chance to really get some speed up without thinking I was going to fall of the side of the cliffs! I was very chuffed with the speed I got and I didn’t kill one sheep or anything! So much fun. Alex covered himself in sheep poo which was so funny! And Morton managed to turn his bike over and have to pay for the damages but other than that we had so much fun…highly recommended and id definitely do it again.

Monday was another long day, we made a stop at 10.30 at the village winery to take in some tasting of their local wine and schnapps before heading on to the local chocolate factory…I was in heaven! We caught the 1.15 ferry over to Wellington and had a very quick tour of the Te Papa Museum. We lost anyone 5 of our team, Lizzy presented up all with awards… I think I must drink a lot of tea or always be asking whos making a brew as that what my award was… my award was (rubbing my hands together) and saying “ooo you making a brew” (sponsored by Yorkshire Tea!) I very good night and one I could blame Kerri for the following day when my head was banging from telling me one more bottle of wine wouldn’t hurt.

Taupo on Tuesday was so relaxing… we watching Alex do his 4th bungy jump then heading further down the river to the nature hot springs. Very relaxing and chilled out day…unlike Wednesday!

After arriving in Rotorua we headed into the Te Whakarewarewa, a Maori cultural area situated on the thermal reserves. We were taken on a tour of their village and there we their local school children running round on an educational trip learning about the communities culture. We were then invited to sample there traditional Hangi meal followed by a Maori concert which I caught on film. The cutest bit was all the kids joining in with the moves! But im sure I can bore you all with the video when im home and ive worked out how to get the things working! That afternoon me, Nat, Kerri, Lorraine and Sunelle went Zorbing. Basically you can have up to 3 people in this big almost inflatable ball which has got a big puddle of water in the bottom. Its quite a skill to get inside as you have to dive like you diving down a slide or something into this ball. Obviously you land straight into the water, I was the first in followed by the screams of Nat and then Kerri. We were told when signalled to stand up and push the ball, well the girls stood up and as I went to stand I slid between their legs and sat them back down again as the ball rolled down the hill. Oh and you cant see where your going…all you know is your rolling pretty face down this hill but it basically forces you to remain on you back. It was so funny and I have laughed like that in so long. Sunelle kicked up such a fuss about having to do it wet and then was the most excited when she got out. Ill show you the pictures as soon as I can but I cant upload them off this computer. Such a giggle.

Thursday was one of my favourite days of the whole trip and something id been looking forward to doing as soon as I found out I could! Me, Sham and Mike were off to Waitomo (meaning water hole) to spend the day caving. We’d signed up to do Haggas Honking Holes which was 4 hours of abseiling, climbing, crawling through rivers and through waterfalls and doing some much with would normally freak me out. I was more scared when the guide asked me to give him a hand with safety lines etc which I guess distracted me from what I was actually doing. Ive got a great photo of my on my tummy crawling…not even that lying down in this little cave that I was coming through. So much fun but I was so knackered at the end when we were climbing out. And this was some serious climbing at times which was a lot of hard work when your tired and only had half a glass of lemon juice to keep you going. If I ever come back to New Zealand im so doing it again! That night I went out dressed as…batman, sort of. I had the mask and cape but had a butterfly round my neck, couldn’t find a bat with only an hour to get a costume together before dinner. Another real good laugh, just a shame Mandy wasn’t able to come out and join us on our last night.

Our last day basically took us into Auckland via, hobbiton?! I think that’s what they call it, it was where that shire was filmed and after the film they re named or co named the town after the hobbits. There was nothing left which was anything like the shire but they do have something outside the visitors centre we all had our photos taken in. When we got to Auckland, it was a bit sad. We all knew we’d reached the end and after going up the Sky Tower we knew we had to say goodbye. After spending 2 weeks with the same people day in day out you become like a family, like we all did when we were in Peru! (miss you guys) but the English crowd are going to meet up again and Nat coming over from Melbourne in December and has already told me shes coming to stay! But shes given me her cold so I might not have forgiven her!

Anyway that was the tour and I highly recommend it to anyone under 35 (connections rules) but I’d highly recommend any of the connections tours to anyone. The Safari tours in Oz, the one me and Gaz did are open to anyone and it was fantastic. I had so much fun and have so many fantastic memories from both tours.

Im back in Stillwater now and today Gina and Pete took me to the west coast. We went to Muriwai beach, Piha beach and Karekare beach, they even took me to a point where we could see both oceans which was pretty cool. Not sure what the plan is for the rest of the week, not sure when Ian’s working etc. Hazel (Ian’s girlfriend Clare, sister) has very kindly offered to take me into the city before I leave on Saturday which will be nice but other than that who knows where ill be!

Love you xxx