Dear Readers,
We were taken to a tiny airport outside Queentown about 9 o'clock in the morning and we took off in a small plane for the North Island. On the way, we flew over many mountains including Mt. Cook where there was a large glacier. Steve took pictures of the glacier which we couldn't see from the road when we drove by earlier.
We landed in Christchurch and were taken off the plane. Then they reloaded us about ten minutes later. Potty break! Then we took off there and headed for stinky town-I mean Rotorua. This was in Maori country-the land given to the natives because it was no use to the Europeans. The minute we walked off the plane, we smelled sulfur. Yes, the whole town was stinky! We smelled it everywhere we went-even in the hotel room. This was a place of geysers, mud pools, and steam rising from the ground. Here the old volcanoes are nearby-some still active. We had a huge geyser park right next to our hotel run by the Maori and could watch the geyser explode from our window.
The nice hotel we stayed in had a shuttle to the town center. This was where the restaurants were. So we headed out as soon as we got in and walked around the town center. We ate at the local dive-The Fat Dog. Here you get hamburgers with beets on them, butter maynonaise on my chicken. After that, we walked around the park and marveled at the mud pools and steam vents in the ground at the local park. Rotorua was known for its hot pools from the beginning. A huge mansion-hospital just like the Homestead in Virginia was built and people came from all over to take the cure. In the house we saw the mud baths they used to cure people back in the 1880's. We also saw a movie of a true event of a volcano eruption that blew up a whole Maori island just off the coast. The Maori were then brought to Rotorua where they had the last laugh-they run the tourist parks and even own the land today.
It was Valentine's Day and we decided to eat the buffett at the hotel. My stomach was going down so I had to be careful. We walked around the geysers after we ate and I was amazed at the mosquitoes that bit me after dark. I was that sweet!
The next day we caught the tour around town.On the bus were only Indian honeymoon couples. The driver was old and very cranky. The Indians were slow to get back to the bus. He yelled at them all the time. The air conditioner broke on the bus too. It got very hot and then everyone was hot!(irate) First we went to the geyser park where a native guide showed us teh mud pools and geyser we could see from our room. It erupted while we were there and that was cool. Then we went to the Agridome-where the same show shearing sheep was put on only on a much bigger scale. The man's dogs were hard to control and kept biting the sheep's ears. I wasn't impressed. Then we went to a wildlife park and got to see the Kiwi bird. They are noctural so they are kept in the dark during the day so people can watch them up and eating. I was very surprised at the size of this chicken like bird. It was the national bird but almost extinct. I understand the possums eat the eggs. Skin the possum! We saw alot of nice birds there. By then it was noon and the driver let us off at the town center. He was glad to see the end of the Indians.
After lunch, we walked to the museum where the senior citizens were playing croquet on the lawn. They also had a beautiful rose garden. The old hot pools are now part of the Polynesian Spa Building. If I had only had time!When we returned to the hotel, we went to a Maori tradtional dinner at the hotel. Most of the tour groups had left that morning so there was only about twenty people in the room. The show went on anyway. We sat with people from England. They were quite friendly and had been to Disneyworld three times! They liked Americans!
The next morning we left on a bus from Rotorua for an all day trip to Auckland, the capital and most modern and largest city on the North Island. Soon the stinky smell was gone and we were back out in the country. Here we saw huge cattle, sheep, and deer farms. Every once in a while I saw a llama, a pig, or some horses. We stopped at the Glow Worm Caves. Here was a typical Maori story. A Westerner and a Maori discovered the caves early on-the land belonged to a Maori family. The Maori decided to commercialize the caves and became very rich. Then the New Zealand government seized it for themselves and built new facilities. Then the Maori family descendants sued in recent times and got the caves back. The glow worms are mosquito like bugs who spend webs inside dark caves. The bugs are attracted to the glowing webs (like lightening bugs) and they worms suck their blood and make a cocoon. They hatch out, mate, and then die the same day. They aren't born even with a mouth when they hatch out. The cave was nice and then we got into a boat to float out of the cave. It was like a thousand stars at night inside the cave.
Then we got back on the bus and off we went to a lunch spot on the road. It was pouring rain by this time. Then we finally got to Auckland where a million people live. This was a modern skyscraper town just like Singapore but built on hills. We were in a hotel at the top of a hill. We walked down into town, rain gone, and looked around. We found a nice eating place, then walked around more. We found a store but it was closed that sold HUFFER T shirts. Steve had seen a man wearing such a shirt and asked if he was a Huffer. No, it was a line of T shirts designed for skateboarders. They were $100 a shirt! I never could figure out the significance of the name Huffer for these shirts. The gay designer is not named Huffer. I guess you have to be a skateboarder to get it. We were sad, however, that we couldn't find the shirt!So then we had to say goodbye to New Zealand and the next morning we took for Melbourne. Then from there, we flew back to Singapore. It was a long day but we were happy to get back. So there it is-our trip to the land under and the islands over.
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