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Archive for July, 2008

On another rainy winter’s day we decided to visit Auckland’s museum and spend a few hours investigating the displays.  The three story museum is in the grounds of the Auckland domain (a free parkland situated on the east side of Auckland central) and combines the Auckland museum with the Auckland War Memorial Museum.

The ground floor is devoted to Māori and Pacific Island artefacts.  The largest display is a waka (war canoe) from 1830.  The second floor is devoted to various displays; Volcano (Including an earthquake simulation room!), Land, Water, Animals (Including the famous Kiwi bird!).  The third floor is devoted to wars within New Zealand as well as New Zealand’s participation in overseas conflicts.

More images available in the gallery HERE

We spent this morning looking for a campervans and thought we’d go visit a backpacker campervan market.  These markets allow backpackers to sell vehicles before they leave.

I’ve always been against buying from markets like this as there is no way of knowing how many owners have perviously abused the van!

We’d hoped the visit would give us an idea on the type of vans available…however we were shocked at the quality on offer!  Although the price range was low, typically $2-3000 (about £750-1200), the standard of vans on offer was very poor!  Badly rusted Toyota’s with over 300,000km on the clock aren’t worth the hastle of ownership!

The search continues with an increased budget….!

Well I’ve been in New Zealand nearly 3 weeks now and have seen some of the great white water on offer so decided it was time to start reading up on kayaking down-under!

I’ve brought most of my paddling kit with me, bar the obvious kayak and paddle (don’t think Air New Zealand would have taken that along with all the other kit I brought for the year!!), so will have to investigate buying a second hand creek boat.  Fortunately there are lots of shops dotted around New Zealand who have various white water kayaks available so I will go and investigate what they have to offer soon!

I purchased the guidebook to New Zealand white water as soon as possible and have already identified several grade 3/4 rivers I want to go paddle!  The NZ kayak website is very helpful when combined with the guidebook:  http://rivers.org.nz.  So now it’s a case of checking what’s available to paddle (it’s currently winter here so should be some good water levels!) and joining up with some local paddlers.  Watch this space…

I have recently installed and set up an interactive travel map to work alongside the blog and gallery.  It allows specific locations around the world to be “tagged” and linked back to blog posts and gallery images.  In time I hope to have a map covered in markers, but for now there are only a few markers of our adventures in New Zealand.

You can view the interactive travel map on the travelling menu or by clicking HERE

Over a long 5 day weekend in July we decided to hire a campervan and head south to the Tongariro National Park for a skiing trip.  After picking the van up on Friday morning we left Auckland on State Highway 1 heading south.  After the chaos of Auckland city traffic, the roads soon calmed down to almost country driving!  It would be about 200 miles in total but close to 5 hours driving so we headed to the national park with a couple of stops.  With sunset about 5pm at the moment we arrived in Whakapapa holiday park approximately 6pm.

Whakapapa (pronounced Fa-ka-pa-pa) is on the northern side of Mount Ruapehu in New Zealand’s Tongariro National Park.  Mount Ruapehu itself is one of the world’s most active volcanoes and the largest active volcano in New Zealand. It is the highest point in the North Island and includes three major peaks: Tahurangi (2,797 m), Te Heuheu (2,755 m) and Paretetaitonga (2,751 m).

The holiday park itself is set up perfectly for campervans with secluded parking bays each containing electric hook-up and water supplies.  For $34 (approximately £12) a night for 2 people it gives you access fantastic kitchen and shower facilities.

On Saturday we drove up the rest of the mountain to its peak and the Whakapapa Ski fields.  We signed up for a 3 day beginner “rocket” pass which would give us a good introduction to skiing alongside lift passes to the whole mountain and private 1:1 lessons.  After getting used to stopping and turning (and the occasional falling over!) we called it a day after nearly 3 hours due to the weather – some of the worst rain experienced in years apparently!  The afternoon was spend in Ohakune, a small village on the other side of the mountain, trying to stay dry and stock up on supplies!

Due to the non-stop rain we decided to save our ski passes for another, dryer, weekend.  On Sunday we headed to Lake Taupo to do some sight seeing.  Lake Taupo region is home to New Zealand’s largest fresh water lake, fascinating geothermal areas and the famous Huka Falls.

After viewing the lake, which is more like a sea due to its size, we headed on to see the Huka Falls.  The Huka Falls are a set of waterfalls on the Waikato River that drains Lake Taupo.  The Waikato River narrows from roughly 100 metres across into a narrow canyon only 15 metres across. The volume of water flowing through often approaches 220,000 litres per second.  At the top of the falls is a set of small waterfalls dropping over about 8 metres. The most impressive, final stage of the falls is an 11 metre drop.

After viewing Huka falls we headed on to the Geothermal pools at “Craters of the Moon”.  Craters of the Moon is an active geothermal field. The terrain is filled with exposed steam vents and is constantly shifting, collapsing and reforming.

On Monday we decided that, due to the weather, we would head north again towards Hamilton, New Zealand’s largest inland city.  After taking the scenic back roads we decided to spend the night at the Waingaro holiday park.  Slightly out of the way, we’d read in the guidebook that the thermal pools were worth visiting.  So, shortly after arriving, we headed down for a sunset swim in the thermal pools.  It was slightly weird to be swimming after dark and in winter but the pools were extremely hot!

More images available in the gallery HERE

On Wednesday 16th July we decided to explore Auckland and visit one of the quieter suburbs across the harbour – Devonport.

Devonport is a short ferry ride from Auckland ferry terminal which gave us a good chance to see the Auckland skyline from a distance.  Unfortunately the weather wasn’t fantastic, but despite the overcast day we had a great view of the city.

Devonport is a trendy suburb part of the city but yet separated from the ‘hustle and busty’ of the city centre.  After walking down the main high street we set about climbing Mount Victoria, another extinct volcano.  This provided excellent views of Auckland and the surrounding waters and islands.  A short distance away was a climb up the North Shore volcano where the World War 2 tunnels and guns are still in place.  After a 2 hour trek up two volcano’s we headed back to the ferry along the beach with the Auckland skyscrapers as a backdrop.

More images available in the gallery HERE

After a week of searching for somewhere to live for the year, we finally found a suitable flat.  There were limited options within Auckland city with most apartments out of our price range.  The ones within our range were tiny and situated in massive apartment buildings.

Fortunately we were lucky to view an apartment in the Guardian building on Queen Street.  These properties don’t come up very often so we were quite lucky when we spotted it! The apartment is situated right in the centre of town (next to my three favourite shops: Rip Curl, Billabong and Quicksilver!) and is the Mayfair square on New Zealand Monopoly!

Having signed the tenancy agreement last week, we moved in on Saturday 12th July.

Our new address for the year is:

The Guardian Building
Apartment 511
105 Queen Street
Auckland 1010
New Zealand

More images available in the gallery HERE

On a rainy Saturday we visited Mount Eden to gain a view of our new city of Auckland.  Normally you can see for about 50miles and take in sights such as the Great Barrier Island – Unfortunately the weather wasn’t on our side and we could barely see the Auckland harbour bridge!

We were fortunate though to have climbed our first New Zealand Volcano and get a view of Auckland and its suburbs.

More images available in the gallery HERE

The hassle of dealing with lots of different currencies on our travels means we voted to get a New Zealand bank account to help us out where we will be spending most of our time.  The National Bank (similar to the UK’s Lloyds Bank) seemed a good choice as it has the most branches throughout the country and as all ATM’s charge a fee it made more sense!

The other bonus of the account is that they offer personalised debit cards!  So, after a bit of editing with one of my favourite kayaking images, I created my new card!

(Obviously the details on the card are a computer generated sample!!)

Having arrived at Auckland airport at 6am we took a taxi ride for the 20km trip to the city centre.  Even though it was raining it was still warm (about 18 degrees) which is pretty good considering this is there winter!  We had arranged to leave our bags at Empire Apartments in the city, which is where we had booked in for 3 nights, but we couldn’t officially check-in until 2pm!  This meant we had 8 hours to tour the city before we could finally get into a bed!

We wondered into Auckland for our first look of the city and were instantly impressed with Queen Street (the main street through the city centre) mainly because there were Quiksilver, Billabong and RipCurl shops within about 10m of each other!  Auckland itself seems a nice clean city with lots going on…even at 8am on a Sunday!  We had a look at the harbour and the main shopping district before heading to a coffee shop for a rest (and to avoid some of the rain!).  We then wondered up to Sky Tower (the tallest building in the southern hemisphere) an impressive building in its own right but, if you are stupid enough, you can base jump off the observation deck!!  I’ll have to get a video of this as its just bonkers!

We had a look round the rest of the city on a free bus before getting some lunch and then heading back to our accommodation.  Within about 10 minutes we were fast asleep!!  It will take a while to adjust our sleeping patterns and get over the jetlag but tomorrow will be a busy day…we have to find a flat to live in for the year.

More images available in the gallery HERE