Milford Sound

At some point I will sum up the trip, and give general tips, and I may make the point that combining New Zealand and Australia may not be the wisest idea. Sure, they are in the same general area, but they are different enough to have quite different weather patterns. If we had gone later, Australia would have been too hot, at least in parts. However, waiting another month or so might have been good for the New Zealand side of things.

Milford Sound is so beautiful that Rudyard Kipling called it the eighth wonder of the world. Mitre Peak is considered to be exquisitely shaped. The Maori say that the creators of the area had been practicing making all the other mountains and lakes, but this area was the last they created and was perfect.

We never saw Mitre Peak. The clouds never lifted enough for it to become visible. As you can see from these pictures, it was quite cloudy and foggy, and there was intermittent rain. Many things were hidden from view. As it was, we were lucky. Our initial plan was to kayak on the sound, but we started to have doubts about this being the right place to learn how to kayak, so we changed to a boat tour. If we had kayaked, we would have been nearly drowned by the rain, plus having a good chance of drowning ourselves anyway, so that worked out.

The reason we wanted to kayak is because tourism sites will frequently show pictures of dolphins swimming among kayakers (actually, there may only be one picture that gets shared), and you think, oh my gosh, what an amazing experience. It would be, but it also has kind of caused this myth to develop that the Sound is full of dolphins and you will definitely see them if you go. That is not true. Chris (who has kayaked with dolphins), says he sees them about every fourth trip. That is not bad odds at all, but you need to have expectations set appropriately. The only wildlife we saw on the cruise itself was a single seal.

That should in no way be seen as a criticism of the trip. It was not what we expected, but it was still beautiful. Often the fog made it eerily beautiful.

We got on the bus in Te Anau, but there were only five of us there (us three and a couple on their honeymoon). Everyone else had started in Queensland, and then returned there, which must have added four hours to their trip. I'm glad we did it that way. The downside is there was not much choice of seats left. I did not end up near my sisters, though we saw each other on stops.

There are several points of interest along the way. I think there normal plan is to do all the stops on the way when everyone is fresh, and then go straight back on the return trip. Some of the scenic viewpoints were so fogged in on the way, that we made a few extra stops on the way back. Again, I kind of liked it. That picture of the kea on the branch up above is one of my favorites. It's like something out of another world.

We saw many kea. We learned a bit more about the birds. One thing to know is that they are inveterate thieves. They will steal food of course (which is not healthy for them, but they'll still do it), but they will also go for shiny objects. So, you can shake your keys to attract them, but do not let them grab your keys, or you have just stranded yourself.

Some of the stops include Knob Flats, where you have glacier deposits, and the cataract, where the running water has carved twisted, fantastic patterns.

There are mountains between Te Anau and Milford Sound. There is dense vegetation below, but the timberline is fairly low, so you have trees, and then an abrupt stop to where it is almost all bare rock. I am probably not describing this well, but there are two related things that I want to describe. One is that at the upper levels there is nothing to absorb rain, so during rain waterfalls show up everywhere. That is unless it is windy, in which case the wind blows the water streams into the air, so you just have a valley full of misty bridal veils.

The other point of this is that apparently even the lower vegetation is not rooted very deep, so when a slide is triggered, it really clears everything away. We passed a recent slide, and one that had been there for a while, and I took pictures, but they just did not do it justice. There's a link to the main photo site if you want to take a look, but it just does not capture the scope.

You don't go completely over the mountains, as you pass through the Homer tunnel. This was another case of not being able to take an adequate picture. I wanted to convey how small it looks. And really, I guess it is not that small, because our driver told us that the bus could pass a car, though it is a bit touchy, and certainly two cars can pass each other. If two buses enter from opposite ends, someone will need to back up. (Once you emerge, you start going down steeply winding roads, and we actually did pass an accident, though we managed to get down safely).

I have mentioned before how having a guide with a personal connection can make a difference, and also how we had a certain amount of luck with our timing, like with the takahe and the echidna. We kind of hit the motherload here.

Our driver was Sam, and since he was a broadly built redhead, he can introduce himself as Samwise Gamgee and it seems reasonable, though he would be a bit tall for a Hobbit. He was holding a baby during the layover in Te Anau, and he said it was his baby, but then she was being held by a woman in the middle of the bus, so I thought it had been a joke. Then she was being passed around among a few other passengers, and she did get brought up to the front, and I thought, okay, she is his, and the passengers are all helping, which is nice. Will I get a turn?

In reality, yes, she was his baby, but also riding along was Sam's wife (the child's mother), and both sets of grandparents. That's kind of a sweet thing to have happen anyway, but also, the wife's parents had raised their family in the area, and had gone camping in Fiordland many times. Her father told stories about the area, and we got to see pictures of floods and avalanches that had occurred.

Sam's father told us he was one of the few births resulting directly from the Homer tunnel. The tunnel was a public works project started during the depression in 1935 (that was not just the US, much like the current financial hardships are not just us). His father and his uncle worked on the tunnel, his uncle bringing his father along on days off, allowing his father and mother to meet. Anyway, it all just added some extra color, and the baby was cute.

One other possible useful tidbit. Trekking is a very popular activity in New Zealand in general, and specifically in the Fiordland Area. You would think that the Milford track would be the big one, but the heavily recommended one is Kepler. Probably worth checking out.

http://www.kiwidiscovery.com/index.cfm/milford
http://www.fiordland.org.nz/
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Homer_Tunnel
http://www.newzealandnz.co.nz/great-walks/
http://harristravel.shutterfly.com/700

Te Anau

Te Anau is the closest town to Milford Sound. It's not even that close (about 75 miles) but staying anywhere closer means camping, or possibly staying on a boat, so Te Anau gets a lot of its traffic from that. I suppose there are hotels, but it mainly vacation homes and rentals.

We had driven in the night before, and were going to catch a bus to Milford Sound for a boat cruise. We did not need to meet the bus until 11 (I think), so Chris wanted to show us the area around the lake.

This gave us a chance to view many native plants and scenery, but there were a few other enrichments. At one end of the trail there was a rehabilitation area for different birds. Most of them were species that we had seen at Rainbow Springs, but this was another view of them. We saw our beloved kea again, but I took so many kea pictures on the way to Milford Sound that I am holding off on that. Instead I have a picture of a kaka. (Most New Zealand bird names are taken from the way their calls sound: ke-a, ka-ka, more-pork. Of course, translating bird calls into human phonetics is open to wide interpretation.)

Probably the most interesting bird we saw was a takahe. This bird is highly endangered. It looks rather similar to the pukeko, but we found a sign that listed the differences between the two birds. Probably the best indication is that if you are seeing it in the wild, and not in a pen labeled takahe, then it is a pukeko. Takahe are just too rare.

Even with one in captivity, we were lucky to see it. Since the focus of this place was rehabilitation and then release, as opposed to display, the bird has plenty of places to hide and often chooses to do so, which is completely allowed. Chris had been there twice before without seeing it.

For some reason, for our visit the bird was running up and down the hill. I suspect it was some kind of pre-nesting behavior. I did not get great pictures due to the constant movement, but I do have one up here, as well as a picture of the giant takahe statue in the middle of town.

Looking at the photos, you can see the gorgeous scenery, and also how marshy and wet everything is. I liked the way that the water came right up to the trail, but it was not merely that. In addition, the grass was quite wet, and the area was fairly hilly.

Maria was still sporting a wound on the back of her heel, making anything other than flip-flops too painful to wear. Things were not quite as steep as Hobbiton, but evidently it was more treacherous, or the fact of it being milder lulled her into a false sense of security. She did a really spectacular slip, getting mud all over and around her pants.

Chris was amazed at how ladylike she was over it, not swearing at all. He has no idea exactly how miraculous that was, but it was the calming spell of the South Island (and the Scottish tour guide).

Not to worry. Chris ran ahead to get the vehicle back, and we rushed back to give her a chance to change before boarding the bus. He did not ask for it, but I took one of my handy emergency ponchos as we wrapped her in it, protecting the car interior.

I said there were two enrichments. At the far end of the trail (at least as far as we went, but you can keep going quite a ways) there are the bird pens. At the near end there is something like a discovery center. They have displays of plants and minerals, and information on the history and ecology of the area, including native lore.

We were able to pick up quite a bit of information here, and it also started one of the strangest odysseys of our trip. They have this series of educational children's books featuring native creatures learning things or resolving issues. Maria noticed one in particular, 5 Kiwi in a Kombi (this appears to be what Kiwis call a VW bus), that she felt was perfect to take back to her kindergarten class.

Maria asked me to buy it for her, but I had left my wallet in the car, and did not want to go get it. I said it was clearly a common book, as part of this series, so we would just buy it somewhere else. Well, let me tell you, we looked in every bookstore we encountered across New Zealand, including three in Queenstown and five in the Auckland airport. We saw many books in the series, but not that one. Eventually Chris needed to order it for her and forward it to the States when it arrived. Crazy.

http://www.fiordland.org.nz/Explore-Fiordland/Places-to-visit/Te-Anau.asp
http://harristravel.shutterfly.com/700

The turning point

One of my favorite sites has been Television Without Pity, and one of my favorite recappers was Miss Alli (there have been a lot of changes now). Anyway, she would do the recaps of The Amazing Race, and she coined a term: Killer Fatigue Syndrome. She would use it to explain how people who had been good racers and good human beings would just start falling apart at some point. We may have been feeling this a little bit.

There had been many good moments on the trip, but there had also been disappointments, and frustrations, and things that went wrong. Certainly, there was some accumulated tiredness. After all, we had planned a very ambitious trip, being gone for a month and having activities or travel on every day, but when you are flying halfway around the world, you want to make the most of it.

Even though we had loved Tasmania, the stolen wallet made for some problems, and then after leaving there we had our issues with Southern Australia, and Julie and Maria were already talking about changing the flights and going home early. We made it out of Melbourne, and we had some good times on the North Island, but there was also getting soaked and stung in the Bay of Islands, being left behind by shuttles and getting catcalls in Auckland, and getting soaked again (differently) in Rotorua. Things were just starting to build up, and they were really skeptical about whether the South Island would be worth it.

That day did not start out auspiciously. There was a surprise airport fee, then a new change in the flight itinerary where we had to go through Christchurch before reaching Queenstown, and due to a grouchy old lady who seemed to have an issue with her seat on the already crowded plane, we arrived in Queenstown quite late.

Still, this was going to be the stop where we were met by a personal guide holding a sign with our name, and then we had rides and lodging all set. We got of the plane, and there was no sign saying Harris. We went to baggage claim--still nothing. The airport emptied out, and there was no one there.

I had been mostly responsible for creating the entire trip itinerary, so any time my sisters were not having a good time I felt guilty, and possibly hurt. Now they were really irritated, sure we were stood up, and would we really feel safe leaving the airport with some stranger anyway? It was not looking good.

It started to get worse as I realized that the paper I had saved only had email and web information, but no phone number. I had not really been thinking about phoning, because we didn't have cell phone access, and after all, he was going to be there, but there are times when it can be important.

I asked at the desk of another tourism company, and they had never heard of Back to Nature Tours. We asked for a phone book, and they didn't have one, but we found one somewhere else. There was no number. (I think the issue here is that we were in Queenstown and Back to Nature is based in Dunedin.)

Fortunately, they felt bad for us, and the started up the computer so we could get the phone number off of the web site. Armed with a small amount of change, I went to the pay phone, and I got a hold of someone. Chris was in town, but because the flight was late he had gone somewhere, and she wasn't sure, but she gave me his cell phone number. I called that, and it was busy, but I was sure the office was calling him, and if I just waited and tried again, he would answer. I paused, dialed again, and before it could connect a man walked around the corner and asked if I was Gina. Saved! Chris had been told that the flight was canceled, so was really unsure what to do, but he had been in the airport.

Even though I considered this to be a good development, I was worried about my sisters. They were in a foul mood, had just been talking about not trusting the guy anyway, and really wanted to go home. As we loaded into his rental, I was very concerned about how things might go. I was missing one completely important factor though. Chris was a delightful male with a Scottish accent.

Chris has lived in Louisiana, Scotland, and New Zealand, but listening to him it is the Scottish element that you notice, and indeed, all of his family is there. Our captain at the Great Barrier Reef, Gordo, was also Scottish, but at the time we were just thinking about how wonderful guys who flirt can be, and not giving enough credit to the Scottishness, which is extra wonderful.

My sisters were completely won over. Not only was there the accent, but Chris was smart, with a sly sense of humor, had a great knowledge of the area, and could converse well. He was a nice guy too, and I don't think that was just because he was paid to be so.

Therefore, even though we encountered more rain, cold showers, long restaurant waits, getting lost, and falling in mud (all or most of which shall be recounted), they never complained to him, or even very much to me, and it was a wonderful last leg of our trip.

I must give some credit to the South Island itself. It is such a beautiful place, and even the air you breathe is wonderful. I guess it is just very pristine. Everywhere we looked was so beautiful. There were mountains everywhere, and water. We drove from the airport to Te Anau that night, and halfway there we had Lake Wakitipu on one side, which seemed to go on forever, and then just as it ended Lake Te Anau popped up on the other side. Plus there were lambs everywhere, running around wagging their tails. So, really, we should have been able to enjoy it with or without Chris.

That being said, it does not hurt to have an intelligent, humorous guide along, and that goes double if he's Scottish.

Tamaki Maori Village

The first thing that I need to do is apologize for the photo quality. Everything was coming out blurry that night. The temperature was a bit cooler, and certainly people kept moving, but I'm not sure that's a good explanation. I might just be better with nature photography.

Obviously if we were going to New Zealand, we had to go to a Maori feast. There are several options everywhere you go. In Rotorua, there are at least three. We had booked with Tamaki Maori Village in advance, if for no other reason than that I found information on them first, and they fit into our itinerary. The mean bus driver said Mitai was the one to go to, but he was mean, so what does he know. I don't really know anything about Mitai or Te Puia, so I'm just going to tell you how our experience went.

We had a pickup at our hotel and were taken to a central location where we were divided into tribes and loaded onto buses. To get you into the experience, you become a tribe journeying to the village. On the bus we picked a chief and we talked about rowing. (Talking does not sound as interactive as it was, but we were not actually rowing, so that's what I'm going to have to call it.) Also, protocol was explained for the process of being challenged and entering the village.

There were five buses, therefore five chiefs, so they stood out front while the rest of us stood behind and around them. Warriors came and issued the challenge, then, satisfied that we came in peace, we were allowed to enter the village.

This is probably a good time to explain the background. Tamaki Maori Village was started by the Tamaki brothers. Their goal was to get people out of the cities into a real village setting, which is why we had the bus ride (you can get the feast and show at hotel theaters). They couldn't find investors, so they sold their motorcycles (which they loved) to get up some funds, and built it up. My understanding is that it has been successful enough that the motorcycles have been replaced.

So when you get to the village, there are traditional structures set up, and demonstrations of weaving and food preparation and warrior training. There is time to look around and ask questions, and get photos with the cast members. This is the only real time to do that, as they disappear after the show.

The show was okay. I think it was more exciting at the Polynesian Cultural Center in Hawaii, but maybe this is more accurate. The PCC does have a bigger cast and a bigger space, but then they are throwing in other dances too, and this was all Maori, and only Maori.

After the show we went in to dinner. It was a buffet, and it would be reasonable to wonder what all was served, but I'm not sure I remember everything. I think there was lamb, chicken, and fish for meat. There were definitely carrots and sweet potatoes (which they call kumara). I think there were regular potatoes too, and different kinds of breads. It was good. The wait staff were fun, and there was a lot of good-natured joking and teasing (like making a special point of finding the Australians and British to show them where the bar was).

We had fairly good interactions with people. On the bus to Waitomo, we were with some Americans who were just know-it-alls, and complainers. One woman had been held up in customs because she forgot she had an apple in her pack, and it cost her 200 NZD. The man in the other couple spent a lot of time talking about whom he would complain to, and how he was going to complain everywhere to punish Qantas for a reservation issue he had, even though based on what he said it was at least partially his ignorance that caused it.

We did have some Americans at our table, but they were fine. Overall it was a very international group. In addition to the British and Australians (who did not seem to be drunkards), there were people from Fiji, and Taiwan, I think--lots of places that I don't remember. Everyone was pretty friendly.

It also gave us a chance to realize how lucky we were. We found people who had completely missed the cave tour because the rain kept coming, and people who had to spend an extra night in Queenstown because of snow, and who never got to see a kiwi despite spending a lot of money to do so. Yes, we had our issues in southern Australia and other places, but really we were doing okay. We had been able to see a lot and there was more on the way.

Also, we got a huge ovation on the way back. They have already done all the educating on the way out, so on the way back they have people give introductions, and sing. They skipped a few to get to us, because we were the only Americans on the bus and they thought we would be interesting (it was the chief's idea). I gave our names and origins, and said, "Just because people usually want to know, let me say that we are all voting for Obama" and they erupted into applause.

When that died down I had no idea what to sing, but the driver interjected and started us on "She'll be coming round the mountain." It was time to sing this because we were at the turnaround, and tour drivers often like to have a few extra spins. We went around at least four times.

Now, you may remember that we met a girl on the way to Rainbow Springs, and she did not have as full an itinerary, but I think based on our influence she decided to go to Tamaki, and we ran into her there. Also, she went to the museum (which we did not get to, but she recommended) and met a guy, and he mysteriously decided to go to Tamaki as well. Really they were both very nice, but it seemed strangely typical to see someone else picking up guys when we were not (no offense if you read this, Michelle).

And that will be a somewhat relevant point in the next update, which will be a bit of a transitional piece.

http://www.maoriculture.co.nz/
http://www.mitai.co.nz/
http://www.nzmaori.co.nz/
http://www.rotoruamuseum.co.nz/

Rainbow Springs Nature Park

Obviously, it was important that we see a kiwi while we were in New Zealand. My first thought was the Kiwi House in Otorohanga, but it didn't seem to work out logistically. While researching Rotorua, I learned about the Kiwi Encounter at Rainbow Springs, and that seemed like the way to go.

We really made the right choice. Talking to some people on the way to the hangi later, they had paid something like $40.00 at the Auckland Zoo, and the kiwi never came into view. We saw several.

You may notice that I have no pictures of kiwi. In the encounter itself, you cannot take pictures. There are two other areas in the park where you can see kiwi, a night exhibit and a day exhibit. The only one where you can take pictures is the day exhibit, and there were no birds there when we looked. So admittedly for taking pictures of kiwi there are issues with Rainbow Springs too, but for seeing them it still works well.

We do have pictures of many other birds, because New Zealand is the land of birds, with it's only native mammal being the bat. (Well, that's if you are not counting marine mammals. I don't think the seals were imported.) Anyway, we got to see many native species here. We fell most in love with the kea, a native parrot with an engaging personality. We were able to see them in many places, but this was the first. The bottom picture is a kea, below the weka and a kereru.

The blue splash there is a little out of focus, but it is an albino trout. The lack of pigment shows them to be blue instead of white. Trout are not native to New Zealand, but a fishing enthusiast managed to introduce them, and they are a very popular game fish. Rainbow Springs grows them from hatchlings, and so there were pools with them at all different sizes, and eventually they are released into fishing spots.

The top photo is a tuatara. They can live to be around a hundred years old, but this one was fairly young, I think. They are famous for having a third eye, but that is sort of an exaggeration. It is not a full eye and it gets covered with scales within six months of hatching, but it may still absorb ultra-violet light.

There are different areas focusing on native species (birds and reptiles, as well as plants), the trout, and then there is an almost petting zoo like area focusing on introduced species. You can explore the park without doing the kiwi encounter, and I believe you can do the kiwi encounter, but both are worthwhile.

For the kiwi encounter you should book in advance, because there are a limited number of spaces. This is primarily to not stress the birds too much, but it also helps ensure that everyone can see without being too crowded.

The problem with the various introduced mammal species (stoats, possum, dogs, and cats) is that in addition to habitat destruction, they tend to eat the eggs and the newly-hatched, so Rainbow Springs will find eggs in the wild, take them, incubate them, and then raise the birds until they are big enough to not be easy prey. They then get released into the wild near their original spot. The birds are monitored, so they can tell you that they have hatched children and granchildren of eggs that were hatched there.

It may sound unnatural, but introducing carnivorous and omnivorous land mammals sent them way past natural, and as much as they have tried to root out the introduced species, it has not worked. Actually, if I recall correctly the stoats were introduced to cut down on the introduced rabbits. It is considered a citizen's duty that if you see a possum in the road you will make an effort to run it over (one reason I was glad not to be driving).

Anyway, with the encounter they show you a little bit of the reproductive style, then you move to the incubators and see the eggs, the hatchery where the eggs go when they are ready to hatch, the room where the baby chicks are, then bigger chicks, and there is even a section where they have some adults. They do take in injured adults as well. Most are rehabilitated and released, but there are a few who become permanent residents based on their odds of survival. So you see, we saw many kiwis, even if we do not have the photos to prove it.

From my last post, I had indicated that the previous day was a good tour, but we got soaked. My coat and regular shoes were still drying, so I was wearing no coat and the Tevas, and another wet day would have been kind of bad. Really, we did pretty well. It was mostly clear with occasional sprinkles, and we ended up being okay.

There were some transportational snags. There is a shuttle that goes from Tourism Rotorua to Rainbow Springs, along with other attractions, and we took that. The shuttle is supposed to be hourly, and we asked about getting back and the driver mumbled something about noon. We should have asked for clarification. We were ready to catch it at noon, and that is actually the one hour when it doesn't run. We should have asked at the park, where the people are helpful and have lots of pertinent information. Anyway that was a long wait, so we had lunch there, which I do not recommend. The food is not great and quite expensive. So do go to the park, and do the kiwi encounter, but plan out your return trip so that you get back in town for lunch. Or pack one, I guess.

The other things that was interesting was that we chatted with a girl on the shuttle who was going to the Agrodome. This is sort of a farm expo. It can be interesting, apparently, but is geared more for kids. We found her on the return trip as well, so that is when it is acceptable to change names and consider keeping in touch. Actually, I think we influenced her decisions, so we encountered her for a third time as well. More on that later.

http://www.rainbowsprings.co.nz/
http://www.kiwihouse.org.nz/
http://www.agrodome.co.nz/

Hobbiton

Our trip to Hobbiton was one of our best tours, but it happened to fall on one of our worst days.

I have mentioned that often you don't really get complete information from a hotel listing. This was very much the case with our lodgings here, the Comfort Inn Gwendoline. First of all, they did have laundry, but it was only one washer and one very weak dryer. Also, the map showed it as being right on the main street of the town, and that was true, but it was a much longer walk from the center of town than we realized.

Still, we plan and leave lots of room for things to go wrong, so we arrived at Tourism Rotorua with time to spare. All of the major tours leave from here. They have an information center, gift shop, cafe with internet access, and ticket booth, as well as bathrooms, so it's really the hub of Rotorua, at least for tourists.

Danny picked us up, and he was wonderful. He was very friendly and considerate, he had an encyclopaedic knowledge of all things related to Peter Jackson, The Lord of the Rings, and New Zealand, and he got into the spirit of things.

He called us all hobbits, along with anyone else who would be joining us on the tour, and he would just not call anyone crazy, even though based on the stories, we would. Sure, people show up in costume, and you kind of have to expect that, but they had one person there who only spoke Elvish, and had her husband translate everything for her (I guess he spoke both English and Elvish). I would consider that person to be weird, but Danny would not say any such thing, and you could tell he has an affection for everyone who comes.

We had one other person in our van, and then met another person at the farm, so there was a total of five in our group. Danny did not end up being our tour guide for the actual set, but we'll get back to him later.

The film set is well worth seeing. You get a lot of behind the scenes information, and they do a good job of explaining how things were done. In addition, it is the only set you can see. All of the others were dismantled. Even with this set, they cannot make the holes look like hobbit homes, meaning they can't paint them in that manner or plant flowers around them. (Being able to paint the wood white was a compromise.) One of the girls with us had been on almost every Lord of the Rings tour in New Zealand (and the two she missed overlapped with other ones she had taken), and for those, basically they are pointing at a patch of grass or a tree and saying this is where the bed was. So this is definitely more interesting.

It was raining on and off (which will be important later). They provided umbrellas, but you are climbing up some fairly steep paths, and it does get a bit slick at times. It is not terribly hard physically, but I do recommend good shoes.

After the tour, they took us to to, well, I imagine it is a sheep shed, and not the sheep shed. They do shear sheep and feed lambs in here, but it is a small room and the farm has thousands of sheep, so they probably have larger facilities somewhere else on the property.

We got a sheep shearing demonstration, and they are fast and thorough. I think they said that to make any money you need to be able to do a sheep in four minutes. As a professional shearer, you can get very strong arm muscles, but will be lopsided if you do not switch sides regularly. However, you end up with very soft hands because you are constantly absorbing lanolin out of the wool.

We knew we were going to see a shearing, and then bottle feed baby lambs, but it did not go exactly how I imagined. I thought they would hand us each a lamb, and then a bottle. Instead, they distributed the bottles and released the lambs, leading to an itty-bitty stampede. Turns out that you don't need to guide the feeding very much. They know what they are doing. Yes, one did get hung up on the second bottle, trying to wrestle it away from his brother, before we helped him find the third bottle, and I think they all kept drinking long after the bottles were empty (you know, just in case they missed something). Oh, they were adorable.

There is a cafe and gift shop. Danny got us some food, and although normally only coffee and tea are included, this was one of those times when they allowed the substitution. I got a hot chocolate, and I think my sisters got Cokes.

The gift shop is pretty expensive. You can get a beautiful elven cloak made out of beautifully soft merino wool, but it will cost you. I bought a guide book for Misty, and a thing of Lanolin based hand cream.

Danny made a side trip for us to a statue of Gollum that they have in Matamata, and we made our way back to Rotorua. (He also taught us quite a bit about about the hot springs.)

Now, Danny offered to drop us off anywhere we wanted, so we could have had him take us back to the inn, but we wanted to check the internet and get dinner, so we just had him drop us off back at Tourism Rotorua. This may have been a mistake.

As we were checking e-mail, it started to rain. Well, it had been on and off, fine, we'll hang out a little bit longer. So we browsed in the gift shop and looked at the different tours. It was raining harder. Okay, we do need to get dinner, this restaurant we wanted to go to was only two blocks away, so we would get there and eat and then maybe it would clear up.

Not only did it not clear up, we couldn't find what we were looking for. We found a grocery store type place with kind of a strip mall/food court area, so good enough, we'll eat and hope that the rain stops.

Julie and Maria wanted to play it safe, so they tried the place with American style food, and thought it was gross. I had Indian food, and it was pretty good. Playing it safe gets you nowhere. Still, it just kept raining harder.

Although we were trying to conserve money, if I had seen a cab I would have gone for it, but there were just none to be had. So, we walked about two miles back, in the rain.

We got so wet, and later on I noticed that my clothes had kind of a moldy smell, and I wonder if the sulfur in the air was an issue. Anyway, the dryer was quite weak, and we already had most of our clothes spread out all over the room to dry, so we just had to spread out our coats and shoes as best as we could.

Still, it was a lovely tour. Maybe we just should have asked Danny to hit a drive-through on the way back to the Inn. I bet he would have.



http://www.hobbitontours.com/
http://www.rotoruanz.com/

Waitomo and the road to Rotorua

We were not allowed to take pictures in the glowworm caves, so all of the photos are from the road there.

One thing that I should mention is that New Zealand is really a pretty small country. Our cab driver the first day was saying you could drive the length of the north island in eight hours, spend three on the ferry, and then he wasn't sure about the length of the south island, but others said you could drive it in eleven hours. Obviously if you were to go at this rate, you would not be seeing and enjoying things, but the point is that you can cover a lot of ground in a short time.

The reason I mention this is because there were various places that I had thought about going when I was planning the trip, but decided against because I did not think we had time. Suddenly, as we are on the tour bus I kept seeing signs for all of these places, and they weren't really that far away. It is a good reason to consider renting a car. On the north island, things are really close together, and you can hit more that way. On the south island things are further apart, but all of the scenery is really beautiful.

This particular tour was selected because it went from Auckland (where we knew we would be) to Rotorua (where many attractions are) and stopped at the Waitomo caves. Even with that, it might have been worthwhile to be on our own, because we only saw one cave, and there are three there (Waitomo, Ruakuri, and Aranui). Actually, there are multiple glowworm caves in New Zealand, though I think Waitomo is the best known.

I definitely think seeing one of the caves is in order. There's something eerily beautiful about the glowworms, like a mini-galaxy of stars. The thread of personal connection that we experienced at Waitangi continued, as our guide was the granddaughter of the Maori chief who had owned the land and discovered the caves. It's nice to have that history built in.

For this particular tour, you walk in part of the way, and see some things, and then load into a boat to ride further in. We did not get the full tour, as heavy rains had caused the water to rise about twelve feet. We later met another tourist who had to miss the boat ride completely, as the rain did not stop after we left. We still saw a fair amount.

The tour does not take very long, and our option included lunch. There is usually a cafeteria at Waitomo, but it had burned and the new construction had not been completed yet, so they took us to the Big Apple Cafe. The picture shows the sign only. The Cafe itself is a regular building, with a normal shape, and quite large. It's more like a reception hall than a cafe.

The tour option was a lunch buffet. We had our choice of meat from the grill, and then there was a table with different things you could take. There was not much variety, but the food was really good. Partly it was that there wasn't much of a selection, and partly it was that they were not doing a good job of keeping the different dishes filled, but my steak, pumpkin soup, and fried rice were all good. So, that may not sound like a glowing recommendation, but I would go again.

Other pictures include a view of Auckland taken from Kelly Tarlton's, a tree I shot from the bus because I found it very symmetrical, and two shots from the pitstop we made. The dog building has a kind of a tourist shop/information booth and the sheep is a cafe. If I remember correctly, it is the Slightly Sheepish Coffee House, and the dog is of course the Good Shepherd, for the tourists as well as the sheep.

The drive was not at all bad in terms of distance or rough road. The company was not great. We had a very nice driver from Auckland to Waitomo, who was friendly and gave good information. At Waitomo we switched drivers, and John seemed to kind of hate us. He wasn't outright rude, but there was this thinly-veiled contempt. To be fair, there were some other Americans on the bus, and at least one of them was quite overbearing and obnoxious. I can see that if you get enough of those, you could build up a distaste for it, but then maybe you don't belong in the hospitality industry.

Again, the point of all this is that you should just get a car.

http://www.waitomo.com/