(To see photo captions, hover over each photo and/or left click)
I can’t count the number of times in New Zealand I’ve exclaimed, “Wow! This is amazing/awesome/gorgeous/spectacular/breathtaking, etc…”. New Zealand is ridiculously beautiful.
Doug’s cousin Ben and his wife Francesca study and live in Hamilton, New Zealand, and were more than happy to break away from their studies to hike the Tararewa Falls with us. Picture deep pools of clear blue green water, gushing falls, whirlpools swirling and gurgling, and a ridiculously powerful waterfall pushing straight through the middle of a cliff, complete with a rainbow at the bottom. It is one of New Zealand’s many underground waterways, causing audible rumbling along much of the hike. Pretty amazing “if you like that sort of thing”, as Doug often remarks.
So, Rotorua…. Smelly, adventurous, and popular (called “RotoVegas” by locals). Here are some pics from our time enjoying sulfur pools, mud baths, geyser eruptions, and soaring above the rainforests on zip-lines. In case you’re interested, the green is colloidal sulphur/ferrous salts, orange is antimony, purple is manganese oxide, white is silica, yellow-primrose is sulphur, red-brown is iron oxide, and black is sulphur and carbon. It all smells like rotten egg to me.
Next, Lake Taupo, where we had an awesome afternoon mountain biking 20km on the K2K trail www.fourbexperience.com. The mountainous turns and gullies were thrilling (at times too much so). The rain kept us from doing a lot in Taupo, but hot springs are good in all weather.
In South Taupo we all set out to hike the stunning, famous Tarangire Crossing, which includes “Mt Doom” from the Lord of the Rings movies. Doug completed it (in spite of knee deep snow for an hour at the top), but due to some mild stomach pain the rest of us did just a couple hours.
Remember my mentioning how friendly people are in New Zealand? Well, the inn owner Ed who introduced us to his friend Stephanie then introduced us to two friends of hers. We arranged to visit with Raylene, Nic, Erin and Megan Wood in their home town Taumarunui. We showed up at their local high school on a friday night where they were all volunteering at the spring gala. It was small town, homegrown fun, with tables selling food to support clubs, an electric “bucking bronco” (which everyone fell from, including Ella and Helen), and a haunted house (the line for which was always long–and it was scary!). They welcomed us for the weekend, where we got to enjoy a real home with their jack russell Axle, and their french bulldog Holly. Eager to earn our keep, we did some gardening and yard work on Saturday.
Doug also got two afternoons of disc golf with a few pros (including a man who won a world championship, and one who won the spirit award in Vancouver at different world competition). Doug now has many people to contact in NZ and Australia to have a game of disc golf!
After saying good-byes to our new friends, we went just down the road to be welcomed by our next warm hosts, Suzanne and Colin Mikkelson. They own a 50 acre farm on the Wanganui River, where they raise some cattle and have 3 horses, and a large comfortable home. We were treated like old friends, and were in the lap of family for a bit with her daughter, son-in-law, and two granddaughters at dinner. Again eager to earn our keep, we did some yard work at her farm (which didn’t make up for the several delicious meals Suzanne made for us, but did make us feel better about staying there!).
After getting some great advice from Suzanne and Colin on wonderful places to visit next, we drove south to Opunake, near New Plymouth, where the breathtaking Mount Taranaki welcomed us. Our first evening we went to a quaint old local movie theater (Everyone’s Theater) to view the “The Bentley Effect”, an award winning Australian documentary about the power of people uprising against big industry, in this case, drilling/fracking. It’s an inspiring film for anyone interested in people organizing for a common cause. www.thebentleyeffect.com
After a pleasant evening at the Pihama Lavender farm Airbnb, we climbed the Fanthom Peak to near the top of Mount Taranaki (the winds were too strong and ice too dangerous at the top to complete). The trail starts in a goblin forest, then on to interesting bush, scrub, and up a scree slope to snow.
We were eager to get to Wellington, having heard so many positive things about this artsy harbor town. It didn’t disappoint, with it’s interesting architecture built into the hillsides, multiple museums, galleries, and restaurants. We had just a taste of its charm, enjoying the fabulous Te Papa Museum, Zealandia Eco-Sanctuary, the Botanical Garden, and visiting Hobbit Hideout. Peter Jackson, who created the Lord of the Rings and Hobbit movies, is a native of NZ and has a large presence here. We’ve been at two of the sites filming has occurred, and are eager to see the movies again.
Below are a few of the giant (3 times actual size) human figures featured in the Gallipoli Exhibit at the Te Papa Museum in Wellington.
In Wellington we became fast friends with our amazing Airbnb hostess Virginia, her husband Tony, and their dogs Winnie and Buster, who all made us feel totally at home.
Stay tuned for the South Island! Cheers!
Strout Family Year of Travel 