Heaps of Lollies and Gumboots

Posted by Emily

If you speak kiwi, that title means "Lots of candies and galoshes". It has nothing to do with the subject of this post but I think those words are so cute that I had to use them somewhere.

I'm finally back from a little break from the modern world (more on that later) it's time for a little (i.e. hopefully not too long) update on what we have been up to over the past several days.

The day after we went rafting, we took a day trip to a little town (and I do mean little!) about 2 hours away from Rotorua called Waitomo to see the famous glow worm caves. There are many adventure options that can be done there, such as rappelling in the cave, rafting, caving, etc. etc., but we decided to just settle for a normal visit since we had already spent quite a bit of money on other adventure activities in the area.

First we visited a cave called "Cave of the Spirit", name by the Maori people that used to live in the area. No glow worms but the cave formations were interesting. It wasn't nearly as big as the cave I visited in Slovenia, but it was still nice to see. The second cave that we visited was the glow worm cave. This visit involved walking into a very damp cave with a hard hat/head lamp on. This part wasn't too interesting. Eventually we reached a raft (more boat-like really) that would float us down the small river part of the cave where most of the glow worms were. Once we turned of our headlamps it was completely dark except for the little green-blue light from the glow worms. It's just a little part of their tale that glows and in the darkness it gives the appearance of a little galaxy up there on the cave ceiling. As our eyes adjusted we became able to see more and more of these little lights and it was quite amazing. Our guide pulled us down the river for a bit and then back up and all we could hear was the rushing water.

After coming back to Rotorua, we hung around for the evening because we had decided to take the night bus to Wellington instead of wasting a day taking the 8 hour trip. Unfortunately for us, the bus was packed by the time we boarded and I had to sit next to a very broad man (not much room for me!) and Nicki had to sit next to a guy who snored and listed to loud rock music on his earphones. Needless to say, I slept better than her.

We arrived in Wellington at around 7 am, hung out at the train station, where we were dropped off, until the reception at our hostel opened, took a taxi there and then took a nap to make up for the restless bus sleep that we had gotten the night before. We got up, had some lunch at a very good Malaysian restaurant, and then went to see the Museum of New Zealand (I think that's what it was called....). It was a very cool museum and made we think of the Science Museum of Minnesota in the way that it was set up. The displays were very interactive and well presented and that made the whole experience much more interesting. We started the visit with a trip to the "Time Warp" area, which is really just a little virtual reality area where you can try out different activities. I decided to try the virtual sheep shearing and let me tell you, I was not good at it! It scores you for the amount of time you take, knicks and cuts to the animal, etc. The point is to have a low score. I score 82. Anything above 40 is "You sheer like a townie" so I think that means I sheer like a townie with 1 arm. And more poor little virtual sheep got all cut up! Sad. I think I will stick to public health.

The rest of the museum had exhibits on people and the impact that they have had on the lands of New Zealand (lots about imported species), geological history and characteristics of NZ, including lots of info about earthquakes and an aftershock simulation, Lord of the Rings (it was filmed here), which we didn't go to because it cost extra, Pacific Islander immigration and heaps of others that I can't remember. Also, admission was free! You can't beat that.

That's pretty much all we got to do in Wellington because we only had a day there before we hopped on the ferry to the south island early the next morning. It was a very nice ferry, very smooth and had a "reclining lounge" (think airplane seating) where we slept for pretty much the entire 3 hour trip. Quite nice really. We arrived in Picton, the very small town where the ferry comes in, at about noon and had to wait a little over an hour to take the water taxi to take us to the little lodge where we had reserved a place for 3 nights. It didn't take us too long to see the town but we did have time for a stop at the local bakery for some good stuff to eat.

At about 1:15 pm, we hopped on the water taxi with our driver, his little daughter and her friend, and headed to a Mahana Lodge, located on Endeavor Bay in the Marlborough Sounds area near Picton. The lodge is right near the Queen Charlotte Trail, a 3-5 day hike (depending on how fast you go) along the ridges and near the inlets that make up the Sounds area. There are lodges all along the trail and a boat service that will bring your packs from one lodge to the next, so it could be the easiest backpacking trip you ever took! On the way to where we were staying, our driver took us to a floating salmon farm where seals like to hang out. They used to get in and eat the fish, but after several years and about 8 modifications to the facilities, they seem to have figured out a way to keep them out. However, they still like to come there I guess. Good for us because they are very cute. I'm sure most of you have seen seals in zoos, but they kind of look like big rolly poley dogs with stretched back faces and big sad eyes. Very girlie of me to say but really, they are so cute! Nicki got some pretty good pictures. Next, the driver and his daughter spotted some penguins but we only caught a glimpse of their heads. Oh well.

We arrived at Mahana and since then, have pretty much been taking it easy. There was no internet, telephone, TV or radio there so we have been out of touch for the past 4 days. It was a lovely place to stay though and not much to update about there because we pretty much read, did puzzle and hiked. Oh, and kept the fire going in the fire place because there was no central heating. It got quite cold! We slept with hot water bottles at night to warm up the beds.

The scenery consisted of turquoise water with green, tree-covered fingers sticking out into it making many little inlets and bays. The land was very hilly....the hills were very large but not quite mountains and there has been snow at the top of them for the past few days. Thank goodness it isn't that cold down where we are quite yet, although we will probably run into snow as we head further south in a few days. Not really looking forward to the snow in June! We saw lots (or HEAPS) or little birds along the paths, walked through quite a lot of mud (which may be why they call hiking "tramping" in NZ) and saw lots of trees and ferns. Very lovely. The sky was even blue some of the time!

We are now back in Picton for the night staying at a hostel that serves free apple crisp and ice cream in the evenings. I am not ashamed to say that that is the reason why we chose that particular hostel. It feels like fall here so we might as well get a free fall-like treat. Tomorrow we are planning on taking another day trip to a small town called Blenheim where there are HEAPS of local wineries and opportunities for wine tasting. Also, places to rent bikes. Yep, we're doing a "wine by bike" tour. Sounds like a great idea, right? We'll let you know how it goes!