Down to Christchurch

After separating from Aurora, it was time to head down south to Wellington and the South Island.  However, we were to make one stop along the way: Poor Knights Island.  Supposedly, the island, which was discovered and named by the famous Captain Cook, is supposed to be one of the greatest dive sites in the world.  In New Zealand you do often hear superlatives like "the most beautiful" or "the greatest" ______ "in the entire world!"  Many of the people who give these opinions are native New Zealanders who have never left the country.  Not that their opinions are necessarily wrong, but Team Homer is a group comprised of people who have seen things like Machu Picchu, Iguazu Falls, Patagonia, Norweigian Fjords, etc.  These sites we've visited are internationally recognized as being some of the world's true wonders.  Now, so my own opinions are not misconstrued, I'll say that while I disagree with the superlative nature of the opinions you'll hear about New Zealand from New Zealanders, the whole of the country has a unique beauty all it's own.  From the crystal-clear waters and rolling pastures of the north to the snow-capped peaks of the south, NZ can boast a diversity of beauty I've never seen before in my life.  Our tour of the country was filled with awe-inspiring views on a daily basis.

Anyway, back to the story.  So the EAC (East Austalian Current, which you may remember from Finding Nemo) carries all sorts of little nuggets of tropical sea-life to Poor Knights Island, which then are deposited on the corals of the island to grow and start a new life.  Despite having been on several dives before in my life, I lacked the necessary documentation for them to allow me to dive.  PADI, the international money-making machine that allows divers to carry around documentation 'proving' they can dive, was not an organization that I was affiliated with (I remedied this problem in Thailand, but I'll get to that later), so no diving for me.  Still, the dive site was supposed to be so spectacular that even a snorkeler would have an amazing time.

So we got to the dive shop the day of the adventure, and I inquired as to the visibility under water.  Since it was raining and the sea looked particularly choppy, visibility would absolutely be reduced from it's normal levels.  The response in the shop was "this is Poor Knight's Island.  The rain won't affect anything.  It'll be spectacular."  That all turned out to be a giant load of BS.  Anyway, since it was a cold water dive, we were outfitted with massive neoprene suits.

Super-duper neoprene suits

These suits also gave us incredible bouyancy, so we couldn't even do any free-diving down a few more meters to see some of the 'incredible' sea life.  Saw a couple cool corals/sponges, but we really couldn't see much else and mostly entertained ourselves by throwing dead jelly-like creatures at each other, which all floated to the surface in disgusting clumps.

So we left a bit disappointed and returned to the Homer.  A few hours later I realized I had forgotten my bathing suit on the dive boat.  Replacement board shorts in NZ cost 90-100NZD.  Not only am I on a traveler's budget, but 100 bucks for a men's bathing suit is ridiculous.  I used boxers from then on.
We drove down to Wellington, passing a few beautiful landscapes along the way, such as Lake Taupo.

Me at Lake Taupo

In Wellington, we purchased ferry tickets across the Cook Straight.  We only had something like 8 hours in Wellington, but figured we'd stop in for a few days on our way back.  I quite enjoyed Wellington while we were there.  We got some internet at a local internet cafe and all met up at the local Nomad's Hostel (the same Hostel chain we stayed in when we were in Auckland).  They were very kind and allowed us to crash in their common areas and use their kitchen while waiting for our ferry.

Colin and I wandered around and saw a deal for some steaks.  Deciding we wanted some meat, we stopped in and got ourselves some beer and a nice pepper steak, enjoying ourselves enough to forget about the hit on our wallets.  Satiated, happy, and lightly buzzed, we went back to Nomad's to discover that the Brians had prepared one gigantic meal for us.  Pasta, veggies, chicken, the works.  We couldn't bring ourselves to admit that we'd just eaten, considering the obvious effort they had put in to making a nice meal for us.  We ate two dinners.  I spent the next 5 hours uncomfortably digesting, but our second dinner was also delicious.

Our ferry was at 3am, so after parking the car in the cargo area, we grabbed our pillows and sleeping bags and walked upstairs to passenger quarters.  Once there, we instantly passed out.  We were awakened by a couple of deckhands turning on all the lights and yelling we were docking.  We rubbed our eyes, yawned, and groggily headed to our van.

Colin and I split the drive, as usual, down to Christchurch.  As it turned out Christchuch quickly became my absolute favorite city in New Zealand.  We knew we were going to spend a little extra time in ChCh because Thanksgiving was fast-approaching.  For our first few days there, we toured the city, taking in the sights, the culture, and searching for a suitable place to have a Thanksgiving celebration.

Christchurch was one of my favorite destinations for a few reasons.  Despite being the second-largest city in NZ, it has a small, comfortable feel to it, much like Ann Arbor.  The Kiwis living there also lived up to the reputation New Zealanders have of being some of the nicest people in the world.  For example, while stopped at a red light on a bus, the bus driver got out of his seat, walked back to us, and explained where we should get off to see certain sights.  Would that sort of kindness to strangers ever be seen on a bus in the States?  Yeah right.  The nicest thing you'll get out of a bus driver back home is probably a fart.

Here's come ChCh for ya:

The main church in the center of town...figured they call the place Christchurch for a reason

Brian Veber found us an awesome place to have Thanksgiving dinner--a little cottage-type house in a complex that looked like Camelot.

Camelot

So the day before Thanksgiving, Colin and I walked out to Wicked Company HQ (the company we were renting our van from) to try to see if we could get anyone else on the insurance so we wouldn't always be the ones doing the driving.  Either the place burnt down or was destroyed during the ChCh earthquake that had recently happened.  Either way, we knew we'd contnue to do the driving.

Earthquake damage

On the walk back, we decided to grab a beer and found a place called Street Side Cafe, which was connected to the Holiday Inn.  It looked a bit swanky, almost like a martini bar.  But still, we wandered in to see if they had a happy hour or some beer deals.  As it turned out, they had the best deal in town.  Side Street was about to become a hot spot for us.  Colin and I had a few beers while sitting and watching India beat up on New Zealand in a cricket match, all the while Colin teaching me the ins and outs of the sport.  He also taught me about the Ashes Test match which was about to begin.  The Ashes is a series between England and Australia, best of 5 test matches.  One test match is 5 days long.  So yes, that's 25 days of cricket.  I couldn't understand how something could hold anyone's attention for that amount of time, until Colin explained that I had to think of it more like a war than a battle.  After watching two test matches in New Zealand, I actually grew to understand and even enjoy watching cricket.

On Thanksgiving day, we moved into our little cottage and began cooking.  One of Colin's friends, named Meredith, from Kerikeri expressed interest in meeting up with us and taking Aurora's spot in the Homer, so I drove out to the airport with Colin to pick her up.  In addition, two of Blove's friends from back home, named Matt and Lindsey also happened to be in Christchurch, so they joined us for dinner as well.  In a surprising development, it also turned out that Aurora was in Christchurch as well, so we had quite a group for the evening's festivities.

The Ashes first test match began in Brisbane, Australia and took over Colin and Meredith's interest for the entire day.  As Colin explained, this was England's best cricket team in over 15 years, which was fortunate because Australia had one of the weakest teams they had fielded in recent memory.  Australia had beaten up on England for the better part of the last 20 years, so he was excited to see England take back the Ashes trophy.  That first day, England completely choked and got bowled out for a dangerously low amount of runs.  One of the Australian bowlers even had a hat trick (3 bowls(pitches), 3 outs), which had only happened like 3 times in the last century.  We all got into the series and watched England fight back over the next 4 days to eventually draw.

Back to Thanksgiving: so we all took turns preparing some part of the meal (I was on asparagus detail), and went outside from time to time to throw around a football.  It was somewhat unfortunate that we didn't get to watch any NFL games, without which it really doesn't feel like thanksgiving.

After over-eating like any good American, Blove had a tradition he needed to take care of.  Apparently every year he eats an entire jello mold with his hands behind his back, and his family bets on how long it will take him to finish.  So we made a jello mold and had him attempt.  It was one of the funnier T-day traditions I've ever witnessed.

We stayed in ChCh for another day or two, exploring a bit more.  I bought myself an AllBlacks jersey (NZ rugby team), and Blove bought himself some rugby shorts.  Upon a recommendation, we heard some of the beaches 40 or so minutes outside the city were ssupposedly spectacular.  So the Brians and I drove out to check them out (I can't remember why Colin and Meredith didn't join, I can only assume it was cricket-related).  They were absolutely gorgeous, and we spent a while throwing a football around while other beach-goers stared at us as if we were playing some alien sport.

A cool photo of the beach area

After a good night's sleep at our camp ground, we headed off for Dunedin.

I promise I'll try to do better updating this blog.  Gotta get caught up....I apologize to everyone reading!!

Cape Reinga/Matamata

Our time up north near Cape Reinga made some of my best memories of the trip.  Our campsite was stunningly beautiful.  Our tents were set up on a hill overlooking a massive inlet in a giant S-shape.  With cliffs surrounding us, it was almost as if we had this massive private beach to ourselves.  There were very few other people there.

The beach we camped on just south of Cape Reinga

One of the other things that made it amazing was a football.  Yes, a good ol’ american pigskin.  We figured that if we were going to be driving around the country for a month, it’d be nice to have a football or a baseball or something to throw around.  Unfortunately, football is not a sport the Kiwis are familiar with, unless you’re referring to the sport (soccer) that every American child plays and quits before age 10.  As the comedian Daniel Tosh said, “football is played by 300 pound behemoths manhandling each other for eight seconds at a time, not 150 pound fairies lightly jogging for three hours.  Or however long your game is.”  Luckily, at some random sporting goods store, we encountered a Nike football.

The Englishman we were traveling with, Colin, wanted to learn how to play, so we spent some time teaching him how to throw a ball.  He eventually got pretty good at it, although his forte was absolutely place-kicking, as he is a very solid soccer player.  Now when you put the competitiveness and egos of myself, Blove, Colin and Veber together, add football and a little beer, what do you get?  Epic beach football game.  Me and Veber vs. Colin and Blove.

To win, a team had to score 52 points.  The game started off with the good guys jumping out to a 21 point lead.  Out of nowhere, the bad guys score 27 unanswered points.  After a couple more drives, the score stood 48 - 36 in favor of the bad guys.  We begin a drive at the 10 and fumble just past mid-field.  Fumble recovered by the bad guys.  Colin ran a fly route and Blove hit him in stride.  Colin tripped up in the sand upon the completion of the pass and Veber downed him at the 10 for first and goal.  First play, Veber blocks a pass right at the line of scrimmage from his tremendous height advantage over Colin.  Second play: Blove ran a quick out but the ball was thrown a little ahead of him and he made the dive in perfect timing with his defender, yours truly.  I got a hand on it; pass broken up.  You stay away from my goal line.  Blove then took the job of QB and threw a bullet to Colin in the endzone.  Unfortunately, the Englishman couldn’t hold on, and the ball slipped through his fingers (although to his credit, it was a difficult catch to make).  After a 4th down sack, Veber and I took over.

We switched to a West-coast offense and drove down the field for a quick score.  Go for two.  I loft up a pass in the corner and Veber made a spectacular one-handed catch over Blove.  48-44.  Next possession we forced a three-and-out.  Blove had an amazing punt and drove the ball out of the endzone.  We have the potential game winning drive on the 20.  Blove played some exceptional pass coverage and we found ourselves 4th and 5 on our own 45.  I ran a quick 5-and-out and Veber hit me right between the numbers for a first down.  One more solid long-yardage completion later we found ourselves at the goal line.  After a nifty piece of running by both QB and WR, Veber hit me in the endzone for the TD; 50-48 in favor of the good guys.  We decided to go for 2 and the win (obviously).  Veber threw a bullet right at (what would be) the press-box side of the endzone, perfectly out of the reach of the defender, Blove.  I made a diving grab, ensuring to get a foot down in-bounds, BOOM.  After further review, the sand provided ‘incontrovertible visual evidence’ that I had, in fact, landed in the endzone.  And so the grueling, 95 degree, sun-scorching, sandy, sweaty game came to an end.

Blove teaching Colin to placekick

The losers.

WINNERS

After the game, we headed straight into the ocean for a little cool-down.  The water was freezing cold, so needless to say, we cooled down pretty quickly.  We then engaged in a series of bets on who could body surf the furthest in the icy water.  Blove and I tied, which neither of us was happy about, but Veber lost so he owed a few rounds of beer.  That’s usually how our betting goes, anyway.  It keeps things simple.

“Yo dude, you wanna make this interesting?”
“Sure.  Cash or beer?”

The next day we headed out to Cape Reinga, where the Pacific and Tasman sea meet.  From there we could see some stunning views, including 90-mile beach, impressive cliffs, and crashing waves.

Some of the steep bluffs on Cape Reinga

Veber overlooking the cliffs out to the sea

In order to keep our backpacks lighter and smaller, we opted for a sleeping bag liner, rather than an actual sleeping bag.  They collapse to about the size of a large beer can and do actually provide warmth.  Up until NZ, we had used them in hostels where we had to pay for sheets or else used them in lieu of sheets when staying in a hostel of questionable cleanliness.  In NZ, this turned out to be quite a mistake.  The temperature dropped drastically at night.  I slept in a t-shirt, a long-sleeve t-shirt, a sweater, winter hat, long pants, thick socks, and gloves, burrowed in my very thin bag liner, and all on top of my Thermarest.  I spent the entire night shivering, sleeping what felt like moments at a time, waking up to warm up some numb part of my body, then trying to go back to sleep.  Eventually around 5-5:30 AM, the temperature would warm up enough to sleep.  Then around 7 the sun would be shining directly on the U.S.S. Topenga, turning it into a damn sauna.  At this point, I would have to strip down to my boxers, lest I sweat through everything.  I then usually got another 30 minutes of sleep before the heat was unbearable and I’d emerge from the tent to start the day.  After Cape Reinga (which I firmly believe were the coldest nights I’ve ever endured in my life), we all went out and got sleeping bags.  I’m not sure if things warmed up as we headed south, or if the cheapo sleeping bag provided unbelievable warmth, but I slept comfortably for the rest of my nights in NZ.

After Cape Reinga, we headed out to Matamata, where Lord of the Rings was filmed.  They are currently set to film The Hobbit on the same location, so all of Hobbiton and Bag-End had been re-built for the film.  We toured the set for a bit and took a bunch of photos.  I’d post them, but I’m pretty sure I’d be violating some kind of copyright law.  Since I don’t want to get sued by New Line/whoever is making it (I can’t recall of the top of my head), I won’t post any of those photos.  But having said that, it seems strange that they’d let us on set to tour it and take photos in the first place. We did get a free sheep-shearing show though. Awesome!!!!!1!!1!1!

The next day, our Norwegian travel companion, Aurora, informed us that she would no longer be traveling with us.  Her time on NZ was a bit more limited than ours was, so she decided to go solo and see what she wanted to in her remaining time.  So we had to press on in our Homer van, now only carrying four. The last thing we all did together was going to a redwood forest before dropping Aurora off.

Redwoods

Me and Aurora

More to come...

New Zealand - Auckland to Cape Reinga

Welcome to my new location!  I got fed up with Tumblr, so I moved to blogger.  It's a much better and easier way for me to do things.  Not to mention, it's easier for me to upload photos, so this blog will look a whole lot better.

Having said that, I apologize for my lack of posting.  I've been crunching to get my law school applications in on time, and thought that if I were writing for the blog, I should probably be doing application work instead.  Now that the applications are nearing completion, it's time to catch everyone up!  I spent a month in New Zealand which was absolutely incredible.  I'm now sitting next to a fish market in Bangkok where I am actually picking up some wifi.

So, here's how New Zealand was:

We spent a couple of days in Auckland waiting for our friend Colin to arrive.  Once he did, we rented a minivan and prepared to head out.  The night before we were set to depart, we met a Norwegian girl named Aurora in the lobby of our hostel.  She accompanied us on a barcrawl and after a few drinks, decided she would be our fifth member for the trip.  Seeing as New Zealand was very expensive, we were thrilled to have her join to help us pay for food/gas/blah blah.

We rolled out of bed the next day, and Colin and I headed out to pick up our minivan.  Upon arrival, we were told we were going to be spending the next month driving around in ‘The Homer’

It took much longer than expected to get everything sorted out, so by the time we picked up Blove, Veber, and Aurora from our hostel, picked up food and other last-minute supplies, the sun was beginning to set.  So our hopes to get out on the road during the day quickly vanished.  It was about this time that we realized that the van would not sleep 5 people.  As a matter of fact, it would barely sleep one.  We stopped at a shopping area and spread out to find a tent.  Colin and I found a blue and green piece of crap tent that actually ended up working out well.  The other three returned with a 1940’s era French Army tent they got on discount at a surplus store.

HMS Aurora on the Left, USS Topenga on the right

We drove out with a road map and a brochure saying where campsites were located.  After driving for a bit, we ended up in the Bay of Islands.  The main hut at the entrance to the campsite was closed and the lights were off.  The gate for our van to enter was closed.  We had no idea what to do or where to go.  Having a lack of options and exhausted from the drive, we parked out van in front of the gate and set up two tents on the grassy side opposite.  We then had a couple of beers, lit a couple of tiki torches, and drew straws for who slept where.  Blove and I got the blue and green POS that was nicknamed ‘U.S.S. Topenga,’ Colin and Aurora slept in the Army tent, which henceforth was known as the ‘H.M.S. Aurora,’ and Veber slept in the Homer.  I stayed awake for a while looking at the stars, which were as brilliant as I’ve ever seen them.  Unfortunately, there was never a night with a sky quite like that first night again.  It was amazing again when we were in Fjordland National Park, but it was never as clear and cloudless as that first night.  

We awoke the next day to find ourselves on a gorgeous beach with small mountains surrounding us.  The Dept. of Conservation (DOC) rangers that ran the campsite were very nice, and did not mind us blocking the gateway.  So, wanting to stay another day to explore the area, we moved to a better area of the campsite, right on the water, and set the tents back up.

Veber and I went on a hike to explore the area, while the others entertained themselves swimming or messing around.  Here are some of the photos from our hike:

The Bay of Islands

View to the Pacific Ocean

That night, we had a proper dinner cooked by Brian Love and Brian Veber, which henceforth became known as ‘B & B Productions.’  For the rest of the trip, Colin and I did the navigating and driving, and B & B cooked the meals

B&B are doin' the cooking, while I'm in the foreground, loving my job

The amazing sunset we got from our campsite just after dinner

We spent the next few days in that Bay of Islands area, mostly in Kerikeri and Russell, changing campsites a few times and enjoying our honeymoon-like phase of beginning this fantastic road trip.

Afterwards, we headed north to a campsite near Cape Reinga, on the northern tip of the North Island of New Zealand.  I’ll continue my New Zealand story with a post soon...