Today Birch went Zorbing (I didn't go - way too expensive). Those of you who don't know what Zorbing is it's pretty much a big ball strapped into another huge ball. You climb into the smaller ball along with water and get rolled down a hill. Birch went down once strapped into the smaller ball so he actually went upside down on the steep track. He went two more times not strapped in with water down a zig-zag track. He said that was the best.
Tommorow we leave for Australia! I've had such a great time in NZ, but my favorites were Opononi and the Bay Of Islands. The only thing I'm sad about in New Zealand is that we did neither of the activities I wanted to do (Whananui River Journey and Tangoriro Crossing). We did do Ninety Mile Beach, but that was the one I least wanted to do. Also I missed Cocoa's Birthday and Halloween.
Happy Halloween,
Allie!
P.S. What are you dressing up as? Or, what did you dress up as?
Last night we saw what Birch and I call bacon and egg mudflats. I don't know a lot about the scientific side, but I heard mom mention that the earth underneath is 300 degrees. The mud bubbles and boils and burps, splattering all over. Some explode going up high, some go to the sides. The boardwalk fence is caked with dried mud, which means that some go really, really far and you better be careful.
Today we decided to explore the Wai-o-tapu, a place where the minerals come into a pool and form various colours . . .
We are in a town called Napier. The city has a very sad history. In 1930 there was an earthquake that lasted about 3 minutes. It may not sound like a lot but imagine the ground shaking for that amount of time. It would seem like forever. Houses crumbled and over 1000 people died. The harbour sucked out to sea and never came back, leaving something crazy like 5000 acres of land behind. What wasn't turned to rubble was soon destroyed by a fire lasting two days. Lot of people died from that as well . . .
We arrived in New Zealand! The plane ride was long, but surprisingly enjoying. Renting a camper-van, we drove up the Northland cape from Auckland and stopped at an Auckland museum, learning about Maori culture and the North Island environment and wild life. My favorite part was a Moa, a three metres tall osytrige, but it looked more half giraffe and half lama, so we call it a Gelama. In that first day of driving I counted 224 sheep, even missing some! We traveled up to Waipu Cove, a wonderful beach with lots of shells. From there you could see Hen & Chicken Islands.
After long hours of driving farther up the cape, we came to the Bay of Islands. We stopped to have lunch, then took a hike on a path beside the shoreline. The path was carved out of red clay. It was crumbly and Mom fell once, but she's the adventurous kind and just shook it off. Birch found a walking stick made out of bamboo . . .
A few days ago a friend of my Mom's came over for lunch. We talked about our world trip, and he gave us some tips on Australia, New Zealand and Fiji (which we are not going to).
New Zealand: He said New Zealand was one of the best places he'd gone. The people were friendly and it was absolutely safe.
Australia: Same as New Zealand, Australia has very friendly people. My Mom and Dad were thinking of renting a car for the month we're there, but he said it would actually cost less to buy one, then sell it. If we need to buy just go to a nearby airport and there'll be a lot of hitch-hikers selling their cars. Of course this isn't necessarily true, but oh well.
He said, when we asked, that we weren't going to be eating kangaroo. Mom explained it like someone shooting a rabbit on Bowen Island then cooking it at a local restaurant. Some eat it, some don't.
He did say, though, that we would be seeing a lot of sheep on our menus. Once we were onto the sheep subject, he started telling us about the sheep farms. The shepherd would just point in different directions and different sheep dogs would run off, herding the sheep toward the barn. Then you would go in and learn how to sheer them (shave their fluff off and make wool). We would visit a sheep farm, but our family allergies would act up like crazy, and there are plenty of other things to do.
Fiji: My Mom had a bad feeling about Fiji from the start. Birch really wanted to go, but Mom refused, and we decided to go to Australia and NZ instead. When our friend described Fiji the first time he went,he said it was beautiful. But the second time he traveled there, apparently it was horrible. There were thieves everywhere and at night there would be bars on all the store windows. Don't get me wrong, Fiji is a beautiful place and has most likely changed since he visited there. But just to be safe, it's good we avoided it.
I researched a lot on New Zealand, 'cause that's where we're going first. I picked three special places and presented them in front of my family. They are also the only ones I like from the North Island (we're not going to the South Island).
First there is The Ninety Mile Beach. A golden beach going along the cape, but the cheap thing is it's only sixty-four miles. But that is still a long, long beach. "Sixty-four miles of rich white sand and blue twinkling sea." That still sounds good, doesn't it?
Second there is The Whanganui River Journey, a two day canoe trip through the wilderness of New Zealand. I've never been good at canoeing, so now's the time to get better at it. At the end of the journey there are really great campsites, called the DOC (Department Of Conservation). We'll have a watery time (and this time we won't get a tippy canoe, RIGHT DAD?).
Last of all is the Tangariro Crossing, a one day hike through three volcanoes. There are turquoise lakes at the bases of the volcanoes, and man, we're talking TURQUOISE. It's where Mount Doom was filmed in Lord Of The Rings, but trust me, they make it look way, way uglier in the movie. Unfortunately, we're not allowed to go swimming in the lakes, and I guess it should be obvious, but it's also tempting.
We land in Auckland and rent a car. Driving around the cape to The Ninety Mile Beach, then circling back to Auckland and down to the centre of the North Island. From there we'll go to the Whanganui River Journey, Tangariro Crossing and Birch has insisted on Zorbing (if you don't know what it is, search zorb) which is luckily in the area. At the end of our New Zealand extravaganza, we back-track to Auckland and fly out from there.
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