It's the eve of our departure from Sydney as we start our Oz Experience coach tour tommorrow at 6am! I've had so much fun over the past few days and the weather has been amazing. We took the overnight Greyhound from Melbourne on the 21st at 8pm and arrived in Sydney in the early morning. I got very little sleep on the coach and as it was raining decided not to do the walking tour of the city although Ben said it was brilliant and recommended it to others who joined out dorm today. We just had a quiet night, planning our route up the east coast and heading to bed. The next morning, greeted by much better weather and after a long-overdue 'sleep-in' (until 9:30am! -trust me in comparison to some days it was like waking up half-way through the day haha!), we headed out into the city around midday and went to the Australian museum which had some interesting exhibitions on the history and culture of Aboriginial Australians, and took a look round Chinatown, Darling Harbour and Paddy's Market. Sydney is such a bustling city and seems very business orientated, but Darling Harbour is a beautiful oasis of calm within the metropolis and full of cool cafes, restaurants and bars. In the evening we headed up to the Opera House and the main Harbour before returning to the city and visting the uber-swanky 'Orbit Bar' located 47 floors above the city in Australian Square. At 9$AUS for a bottle of beer we nursed just the one drink but took in the amazing nightime views of the city as the bar revolved! it took me a while to be convinced that we were actually moving as it felt like the windows were but not us! Thursday brought us the best weather we've had in Sydney and we decided to head down to Bondi Beach - it's beautiful turquiose water and the clear blue-skies well lived up to the beach's reputation. The sea was pretty rough - great for surfing, something of an experience to swim in! Despite what I thought was a zealous commitment to applying suncream, factor 50+ no less, apparently I didn't apply it quite evenly enough and have recieved some interesting sunburn marks inclusing one red foot and a U-shaped pink streak on my torso (I think being engrossed in Wolf Hall didn't help matters and tbh I have resolved myself to the fact that I am perhaps far too English to tan at all! Haha!). That night we headed out to sample some of Sydney's nightlife. During some rain-soaked lapse in judgement the first day we arrived in the city I allowed Ben to decide the plan and convince me to go on the 'OZ Party Bus'. 30$AUS bought us a tour of the city attending 5 different bars with a 'free drink' at each bar. It was so bad it was funny, the organisers insisted we stand up the whole time on the bus as they blared out chart-music for the whole of the city to hear in what was rather 'enforced fun' for this 22 coming on 40 year-old. We had a good time all the same - largely laughing at the ridulousness of the situation and some of the people (who were for the most part 18/19years old and some of whom seem never to have graced a club before), which was made easier after practically downing a 'Thai Bucket' at the second bar. Ben claims that the evening was all the more funny because quote 'it was everything I [Michael] stand against' and my face when I first saw the bus was 'priceless'! I ended the night checking out Oxford Street - Sydeny's answer to Soho or Canal Street - which was pretty cool and quite busy with Mardi Gras just round the corner. I woke up quite late this morning and headed out to get some lunch from MacDonald's -perfect hangover food- and Ben went to the Barrack's Museum whilst I looked around the rest of the city - too bleary-eyed to take in anything too intellectual! So it's an early night and up early tomorrow!
I can hardly believe we're leaving our second Australian city already! We head up to Byron Bay next and then to Brisbane to stay with some of Ben's friends - and hopefully save some money, there's too much fun to be had in this country and it costs too much haha!
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Postscript
Due to our combined idiocy we managed to miss our bus this morning (26th Feb) thinking it came at 7am when it came at 6am - luckily we managed to book on the bus tomorrow and secured another night at the hostel we've been staying in for the last few nights! We decided to take the opportunity to go and see the legendary Toronga Zoo - and clapped along to the impressive free flight bird show and the seal show!
Friday, 25 February 2011
Tuesday, 22 February 2011
A note on Hostels
So was woken up last night by the sound of one man snoring like in a cartoon and a couple having sex in the bottom bunk adjacent to my own bunk (luckily I was on the top bunk delicate reader and spared anything too scarring!). As I rested there trying my hardest to fall back asleep as the couple barely concealed their groans of ecstasy and the bed squealed like an excitable teenage girl with every thrust I was inspired to comment on the hostels that we have stayed at.
They have been relatively diverse in the little amount of time we have actually been out here and varied from the professional YHAs and Base to the more 'hippy' and boho hostels. My preference is probably somewhere in between. The professional ones are often very nice - usually cleaner and with more facilities, but are often more expensive and often have stupid rules. On the whole the YHAs are good (Base tend to be party hostels for 18/19yr olds with whom I have very little energy to engage with and can be a bit of a pain if you've got to leave early in the morning, or so we're told. The Base we stayed in at Queenstown was very good and pretty quiet) but our first night in Melbourne was spent in a new more professional hostel called Space. It was being renovated from an older hostel and made more modern. The renovation works themselves didn't bother me, we had to be up early anyway and the lifts still worked. What was annoying was the strict atmosphere and attitude of the staff. You needed your key card to get in everywhere - including the communal showers, toilets and kitchen. Plus there was no real communal area, just big, flash cinema-like TV room which was good only for watching films and a kitchen not big enough to cater for four floors (it only had three hob-rings) and for which you had to give deposit to get a box with plates and cutlery etc! The YHA in Wellington was probably on the better side of the uber-professional hostels - and though we only stayed one night had lots of amenities including a huge kitchen and communal area and was in a good location.
On the other side, the more 'boho' hostels can be cheaper and often - like this one Asylum in Sydney - offer more for free. We have free use of internet here and even the opportunity for a free meal (not the biggest you've ever seen but still) and a free breakfast of sorts (just cornflakes but it's better than nothing). The only problem is they tend to be a little dirtier than the professional ones and often have more 'long-termers' - those who have come out to work for a year or two as they travel. Whilst everyone seems very nice, they often know each other well already and have a different outlook on the traveling experience to those of us lucky enough to do a 5 month tour - as in my case - of pure traveling. In truth they are probably less 'touristy' than myself, but when you're in a place for under a week you need to see the sights! They also tend to be about the hostel a lot more - sleeping during the day etc - and indeed often in need to relieve their carnal passions. Presumably living communally long-term reduces your inhibitions and prudishness - though largely it seems the done thing to book a private room for such a night if you are a couple. Though I have heard some worse stories of sounds in the night... On the whole they're more relaxed but this can have it's disadvantages when you need to check in early and they are less than prompt about sorting out the rooms or making sure people haven't out-stayed their booking.
On the whole my favorite hostels have managed a good balance. These have funnily enough both been based in former guest-houses of sorts. The first was Noah's Ark in Greymouth, New Zealand. There isn't a whole lot to Greymouth in honesty - hence why we took the opportunity for the brewery tour - but this hostel was great. Based in a former guest-house it was more chilled-out than some YHAs and more professional hostels having something of an atmosphere and 30 minutes free wireless internet use which is always a boon for a Facebook-addict like myself. To be fair the YHA at Taupo, New Zealand was good too and full of people doing a similar sort of trip to our own - so easy to get to know people. The other great hostel was Home at the Mansion in Melbourne. It's got a reasonable location for those who aren't too lazy to walk into town (or indeed aren't as skint flint as myself) but near to the free circle-route tram which takes you to which ever side of the centre you need to be at. (In honesty we avoided paying on any trams - free or otherwise in Melbourne, though you are taking a risk as they have plain-clothed inspectors about apparently...) The hostel was similar to Noah's Ark but it (and the city/the country) was livelier. There were a mix of long-termers and passers-through and it was relaxed and clean at the same time!
Anyway Ben's noted that I've chatted on for quite long enough now about hostels! Hoping for a less embarrassing night tonight, the first night it was amusing i;m not so sure about the second, third and fourth...
They have been relatively diverse in the little amount of time we have actually been out here and varied from the professional YHAs and Base to the more 'hippy' and boho hostels. My preference is probably somewhere in between. The professional ones are often very nice - usually cleaner and with more facilities, but are often more expensive and often have stupid rules. On the whole the YHAs are good (Base tend to be party hostels for 18/19yr olds with whom I have very little energy to engage with and can be a bit of a pain if you've got to leave early in the morning, or so we're told. The Base we stayed in at Queenstown was very good and pretty quiet) but our first night in Melbourne was spent in a new more professional hostel called Space. It was being renovated from an older hostel and made more modern. The renovation works themselves didn't bother me, we had to be up early anyway and the lifts still worked. What was annoying was the strict atmosphere and attitude of the staff. You needed your key card to get in everywhere - including the communal showers, toilets and kitchen. Plus there was no real communal area, just big, flash cinema-like TV room which was good only for watching films and a kitchen not big enough to cater for four floors (it only had three hob-rings) and for which you had to give deposit to get a box with plates and cutlery etc! The YHA in Wellington was probably on the better side of the uber-professional hostels - and though we only stayed one night had lots of amenities including a huge kitchen and communal area and was in a good location.
On the other side, the more 'boho' hostels can be cheaper and often - like this one Asylum in Sydney - offer more for free. We have free use of internet here and even the opportunity for a free meal (not the biggest you've ever seen but still) and a free breakfast of sorts (just cornflakes but it's better than nothing). The only problem is they tend to be a little dirtier than the professional ones and often have more 'long-termers' - those who have come out to work for a year or two as they travel. Whilst everyone seems very nice, they often know each other well already and have a different outlook on the traveling experience to those of us lucky enough to do a 5 month tour - as in my case - of pure traveling. In truth they are probably less 'touristy' than myself, but when you're in a place for under a week you need to see the sights! They also tend to be about the hostel a lot more - sleeping during the day etc - and indeed often in need to relieve their carnal passions. Presumably living communally long-term reduces your inhibitions and prudishness - though largely it seems the done thing to book a private room for such a night if you are a couple. Though I have heard some worse stories of sounds in the night... On the whole they're more relaxed but this can have it's disadvantages when you need to check in early and they are less than prompt about sorting out the rooms or making sure people haven't out-stayed their booking.
On the whole my favorite hostels have managed a good balance. These have funnily enough both been based in former guest-houses of sorts. The first was Noah's Ark in Greymouth, New Zealand. There isn't a whole lot to Greymouth in honesty - hence why we took the opportunity for the brewery tour - but this hostel was great. Based in a former guest-house it was more chilled-out than some YHAs and more professional hostels having something of an atmosphere and 30 minutes free wireless internet use which is always a boon for a Facebook-addict like myself. To be fair the YHA at Taupo, New Zealand was good too and full of people doing a similar sort of trip to our own - so easy to get to know people. The other great hostel was Home at the Mansion in Melbourne. It's got a reasonable location for those who aren't too lazy to walk into town (or indeed aren't as skint flint as myself) but near to the free circle-route tram which takes you to which ever side of the centre you need to be at. (In honesty we avoided paying on any trams - free or otherwise in Melbourne, though you are taking a risk as they have plain-clothed inspectors about apparently...) The hostel was similar to Noah's Ark but it (and the city/the country) was livelier. There were a mix of long-termers and passers-through and it was relaxed and clean at the same time!
Anyway Ben's noted that I've chatted on for quite long enough now about hostels! Hoping for a less embarrassing night tonight, the first night it was amusing i;m not so sure about the second, third and fourth...
Sunday, 20 February 2011
Australia
After a 3hr flight - where I watched Cemetary Junction for the first time and Baz Lurhman's Romeo and Juliet for the umteenth - we arrived in Melbourne at about 8am local time and fad to occupy ourselves without falling asleep. First job was to locate the US consulate which took next to no time compared to the waiting around Ben had to endure whilst he was there sorting his visa for camp! After 2hrs we finally got on a tram to get to our hostel - only to be told we had booked the wrong dates -a nightmare considering how tired we were! Luckily the girl on the desk was really nice and found us a place for the night. We stayed at Space in the city which was being done up. It'll be a really professional hostel when it's finished but wasn't much to my liking because you had to hire kitchen materials, there were four hob rings to service 4 floors in a tiny kitchen, no real communal area and you needed your card key to get into everywhere including the bathrooms. So we relocated to 'Home at the Mansion' for the next two nights - a much nicer hostel and the one we had intended to spend 4 nights at! The second night in Melbourne we went to an Aussie Rules match. Not being a great lover of football in the UK I had next to no idea what was going on! In my defence even Ben though the scoring was a bit fucked up! Haha! Our third day was spent on a tour of the Great Ocean Road - built by out-of-work ex-servicemen from WWI. It was miles of stunning ocean scenery and we got to see some Koalas and feed some parrots. The trip also took us to the Twelve Apostles, Loch Ard Gorge Beach and London Bridge - all eroded from the land and formed by the sea. Unfortunately it was too rainy to swim but we had a good time chatting to people on the bus. It's a bit like freshers' week travelling - you ask and answer the sane questions all the time - name, nationality, time spent travelling so far, countries visited and visiting - but it makes for easy ice-breakers!
Our fourth night we spent in St Kilda and had a few drinks in a bar by the beach! I am writing at the moment fro
a Maccy-D's at St Kilda - our 'beach day' on hiatus until the weather clears - Victoria has crazy changeable weather so we're hoping fir blue skies later - wish us luck!
Our fourth night we spent in St Kilda and had a few drinks in a bar by the beach! I am writing at the moment fro
a Maccy-D's at St Kilda - our 'beach day' on hiatus until the weather clears - Victoria has crazy changeable weather so we're hoping fir blue skies later - wish us luck!
Monday, 14 February 2011
Ok so finally for a proper round-up of what we've been doing in New Zealand - my blogging skills are appauling so this is all coming to you from Melbourne - or more specifically vey windy and cloudy St Kilda's!
We started in Auckland arriving at about 2pm after something approaching 30hrs of travelling, Heathrow-Dubai, Dubai-Brisbane, Brisbane-Auckland. It was one of the bizarrest experiences of my life and I guess is comparable to pulling and all-nighter with an essay in thw way that it messes with your comprehension of time. Sleep is difficult at best and there are a whole lot of movies to keep you occupied anyway so whose sleeping? We arrived in the middle of the day to Dubai airport but it felt like it should ahve been the early hours of the morning! Even Emirates' attempts to structure your flight via meals (which as good as they are with Emirates get tiresome after your fifth aeroplane meal-on-wheels) and by simulating dawn. Needless to say we were fighting jet-lag when we arrived, grabbed a quick pub dinner in Auckland and headed to bed at about 10pm practically dragging our heavy heads along the street to our hostel.
We awoke the next morining and decided to get the bus that day to Rotorua, having onyl 17 days in total in new Zealnd and keen to get moving. We arrived in town after a quick stop off at the Hobbtion film set and took a look around befroe the 'Maori Culutral Experience' that we had booked ourselves on started. The town stinks of rotten eggs because of all the sulphur from the geo-thermal activity but the govenrmet gardens were beautiful. The Maori Cultural Experience was fun, we had a look round a mocked-up tribal forest clearing and they took us through element of theri culture befroe putting on dinner and a show. It was something like the Maori version of The Osmonds performing in Las Vegas, but the dinner was great -all cooked in an underground oven! We were pretty knackered still so headed to bed, ready for another early morning getting the bus to Taupo.
On the way to Taupo we stopped at Wai-O-Tapu 'Geothermal Wonderland' - the colours of the water and the craters were pretty impressive (the Devil's Inkpots with their fluro-green tint) but the smell of rotten eggs meant we chose the shorter walk. We also stopped at Huka Falls to check out the whitewater rapids there and Ben booked his sky-dive. Taupo wa sa beutiful little town and because Wellington was all booked up at the weekend with the Rugby Sevens we decided to spend three nights there. Ben's skydive was cancelled due to bad weather so we grabbed something to eat and headed out to Mulligan's irish Bar in town - being the stereotypical british tourists we are and took the Canadian girl we were sharing a dorm with along too. She was very nice but we managed to draw out the dormant bitch in her as we gossiped about people on the bus! The next day the three of us headed down to the lake to take a boat tour of the Maori carvings. They were pretty impressive and though they were modern carvings - done by young Maoris in the 1970s as a gift to the city, the fact that they managed tocarve so intricately with abseiling equipment and later scaffolding secured into the rocks below the water quite amazing! That afternoon we walked up to the hotpools and I managed to get heat rash from them but they were pretty relaxing all the same! We had an early night as we were up early the next morning to attempt the Tongiriro Crossing - a 18.5pm hike up a volcanic ridge. It rained pretty much the whole time and yet both Ben and I managed to get sunburnt hands and noses having presumed that the fog would protect us! It did not. The views were still spectacular and we felt all the more advanturous for having made it through! The landscape was as crazy as ever, from mountainous wetland, to black sand at the top, geothermal pools, through Yorkshire Moors type scrubland and finishing in rainforest - it felt like we had seethe greaterpart if the world, as due our legs!
Still another early-ish start was planned as we moved on to National Park the next day. We declined to do anything too adventurous at the park as we had stopped off in Waitomo and done some black-water rafting through the gliwworm caves there - such a cool experience if a bit daunting when you're forced to fall backwards down an underground waterfall! My reservations of 'I don't think I can do this' was met with the reply 'that's what the girls say!'
After a long coach journey the next day we arrived into a very wet Wellington and took a quick look around the Te Papa museum before going to bed ready for the ferry to the south island the next day. On the ferry we met up with a couple of girls from the bus and begin disecting the characters of our fellow travellers! We jumped off the ferry at Picton and straight on the bus to Nelson with our new driver 'Scott' who for Gilmore Girls fans looked just like Kurt! At Nelson we checked out the Cathedral, had a BBQ at our hostel - which was nice though full of people off their faces on pills - and then climbed the hill to get to the top where the official 'Centre of New Zealand' was! We finished the night discussing French and English stereotypes with the parisiennes sharing our dorm - they fad less than nice things to say about English girls :-S
On the coach again the next day we arrived at Greymouth and went on a brewery tour with the two girls from the ferry - Laura and Kayleigh. To be honest the Monteith's tour wasn't up to much but the meal that was included was amazing - including a New Zealand lamb steak. We also managed to make our own fun getting photos of 'Proud Mary' perhaps the most stereotypical American ever! On the bus again the next day we arrived at Franz Josef at around midday and did a half-day glacier hike. The views were amazing and we get some good photos praising around on the glacier!
After we left Franz Josef we had a long ride to Queenstown - the adventure capital of the world - but ad we arrived late in the day and wanted to get round to Christchurch ready for our flight we settled for a Fergburger - the biggest burger I have ever eaten and a night sipping tea-pot cocktails at World' Bar - including our favourite the 'Ginja Ninja'! The next morning we left Laura and Kayleigh and travelled onto Dundin - the south island's 'Scottish City'. We checked out the 'First Church of Otago' to see the efforts of my co-religionists the Scots Presbyterians (who unlike the unscrupulous Anglicans in Melbourne didn't try to guilt you into a donation - knowing poor backpackers when they saw them ;) haha!) then went to thus small art-house cinema to see 'Glorious 39'. The screen we watched it in had only 8 seats - eat your indie-istanbul hearts out Cornerhouse and Showroom! - so was an intimate viewing but a great film which I'd recommend! Oh earlier thatday we'd walked miles to the supposed 'steepest street in the world'.it rained the whole way and the street was so mundane words cannot express! Un.im.pressed. Not least as the bus stopped there the next day! Fuming - I refused to leave the coach haha!
The next day we travelled to Lake Tekapo. It was raining so we decided against activities which would only leave us with wet clothes fir the next day. I thought it was boring though Ben liked it. We had a drinks that night at the one bar in town before getting up the next day for Christchurch.
Christchurch is one of the most beautiful cities I've ever visited and we checked out the botanical gardens, the cathedral and the museum over three days - over which it was nice to relax and stick in one place for a bit! The beautiful weather helped too! We met back up with Laura for a meal and a drink before spending the night in Christchurch Airport - not a great night's sleep but our flight was at 6am to Melbourne so it had to be done!
We started in Auckland arriving at about 2pm after something approaching 30hrs of travelling, Heathrow-Dubai, Dubai-Brisbane, Brisbane-Auckland. It was one of the bizarrest experiences of my life and I guess is comparable to pulling and all-nighter with an essay in thw way that it messes with your comprehension of time. Sleep is difficult at best and there are a whole lot of movies to keep you occupied anyway so whose sleeping? We arrived in the middle of the day to Dubai airport but it felt like it should ahve been the early hours of the morning! Even Emirates' attempts to structure your flight via meals (which as good as they are with Emirates get tiresome after your fifth aeroplane meal-on-wheels) and by simulating dawn. Needless to say we were fighting jet-lag when we arrived, grabbed a quick pub dinner in Auckland and headed to bed at about 10pm practically dragging our heavy heads along the street to our hostel.
We awoke the next morining and decided to get the bus that day to Rotorua, having onyl 17 days in total in new Zealnd and keen to get moving. We arrived in town after a quick stop off at the Hobbtion film set and took a look around befroe the 'Maori Culutral Experience' that we had booked ourselves on started. The town stinks of rotten eggs because of all the sulphur from the geo-thermal activity but the govenrmet gardens were beautiful. The Maori Cultural Experience was fun, we had a look round a mocked-up tribal forest clearing and they took us through element of theri culture befroe putting on dinner and a show. It was something like the Maori version of The Osmonds performing in Las Vegas, but the dinner was great -all cooked in an underground oven! We were pretty knackered still so headed to bed, ready for another early morning getting the bus to Taupo.
On the way to Taupo we stopped at Wai-O-Tapu 'Geothermal Wonderland' - the colours of the water and the craters were pretty impressive (the Devil's Inkpots with their fluro-green tint) but the smell of rotten eggs meant we chose the shorter walk. We also stopped at Huka Falls to check out the whitewater rapids there and Ben booked his sky-dive. Taupo wa sa beutiful little town and because Wellington was all booked up at the weekend with the Rugby Sevens we decided to spend three nights there. Ben's skydive was cancelled due to bad weather so we grabbed something to eat and headed out to Mulligan's irish Bar in town - being the stereotypical british tourists we are and took the Canadian girl we were sharing a dorm with along too. She was very nice but we managed to draw out the dormant bitch in her as we gossiped about people on the bus! The next day the three of us headed down to the lake to take a boat tour of the Maori carvings. They were pretty impressive and though they were modern carvings - done by young Maoris in the 1970s as a gift to the city, the fact that they managed tocarve so intricately with abseiling equipment and later scaffolding secured into the rocks below the water quite amazing! That afternoon we walked up to the hotpools and I managed to get heat rash from them but they were pretty relaxing all the same! We had an early night as we were up early the next morning to attempt the Tongiriro Crossing - a 18.5pm hike up a volcanic ridge. It rained pretty much the whole time and yet both Ben and I managed to get sunburnt hands and noses having presumed that the fog would protect us! It did not. The views were still spectacular and we felt all the more advanturous for having made it through! The landscape was as crazy as ever, from mountainous wetland, to black sand at the top, geothermal pools, through Yorkshire Moors type scrubland and finishing in rainforest - it felt like we had seethe greaterpart if the world, as due our legs!
Still another early-ish start was planned as we moved on to National Park the next day. We declined to do anything too adventurous at the park as we had stopped off in Waitomo and done some black-water rafting through the gliwworm caves there - such a cool experience if a bit daunting when you're forced to fall backwards down an underground waterfall! My reservations of 'I don't think I can do this' was met with the reply 'that's what the girls say!'
After a long coach journey the next day we arrived into a very wet Wellington and took a quick look around the Te Papa museum before going to bed ready for the ferry to the south island the next day. On the ferry we met up with a couple of girls from the bus and begin disecting the characters of our fellow travellers! We jumped off the ferry at Picton and straight on the bus to Nelson with our new driver 'Scott' who for Gilmore Girls fans looked just like Kurt! At Nelson we checked out the Cathedral, had a BBQ at our hostel - which was nice though full of people off their faces on pills - and then climbed the hill to get to the top where the official 'Centre of New Zealand' was! We finished the night discussing French and English stereotypes with the parisiennes sharing our dorm - they fad less than nice things to say about English girls :-S
On the coach again the next day we arrived at Greymouth and went on a brewery tour with the two girls from the ferry - Laura and Kayleigh. To be honest the Monteith's tour wasn't up to much but the meal that was included was amazing - including a New Zealand lamb steak. We also managed to make our own fun getting photos of 'Proud Mary' perhaps the most stereotypical American ever! On the bus again the next day we arrived at Franz Josef at around midday and did a half-day glacier hike. The views were amazing and we get some good photos praising around on the glacier!
After we left Franz Josef we had a long ride to Queenstown - the adventure capital of the world - but ad we arrived late in the day and wanted to get round to Christchurch ready for our flight we settled for a Fergburger - the biggest burger I have ever eaten and a night sipping tea-pot cocktails at World' Bar - including our favourite the 'Ginja Ninja'! The next morning we left Laura and Kayleigh and travelled onto Dundin - the south island's 'Scottish City'. We checked out the 'First Church of Otago' to see the efforts of my co-religionists the Scots Presbyterians (who unlike the unscrupulous Anglicans in Melbourne didn't try to guilt you into a donation - knowing poor backpackers when they saw them ;) haha!) then went to thus small art-house cinema to see 'Glorious 39'. The screen we watched it in had only 8 seats - eat your indie-istanbul hearts out Cornerhouse and Showroom! - so was an intimate viewing but a great film which I'd recommend! Oh earlier thatday we'd walked miles to the supposed 'steepest street in the world'.it rained the whole way and the street was so mundane words cannot express! Un.im.pressed. Not least as the bus stopped there the next day! Fuming - I refused to leave the coach haha!
The next day we travelled to Lake Tekapo. It was raining so we decided against activities which would only leave us with wet clothes fir the next day. I thought it was boring though Ben liked it. We had a drinks that night at the one bar in town before getting up the next day for Christchurch.
Christchurch is one of the most beautiful cities I've ever visited and we checked out the botanical gardens, the cathedral and the museum over three days - over which it was nice to relax and stick in one place for a bit! The beautiful weather helped too! We met back up with Laura for a meal and a drink before spending the night in Christchurch Airport - not a great night's sleep but our flight was at 6am to Melbourne so it had to be done!
Sunday, 6 February 2011
First impressions
I've been in New Zealand for about 7 days now and this is my first post so as you can tell I'm somewhat behind - largely because we've been rushing around the country so fast to make our flight from Christchurch on the 17th at 6am! We actually spent three nights in Taupo but between the 18.5km Tongariro crossing and the other activities I've had no time to myself. We arrived in Wellington at 3.30pm and are leaving tomorrow at 7.10am - 6 months of 12noon starts have not prepared me well. So far New Zealand is proving a very beautiful country if a little bizzare. The landscape looks like the bastard child of the English countryside and the African savannah, and there seems to be no one here. About one third of the population lives in Auckland apparently but we found it rather sparsely populated - it is their summer holidays but still! The people are so friendly - most of the population are employed in tourism or farming and it shows. The weather is so changeable and goes from torrential rain to blistering sun in a matter of hours - and I got sunburnt in the rain, my English colouring a ripe victim for the hole in the O-Zone layer! Otherwise it's been so much fun so far and I will update with more specific info as and when I can!
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