This Weather Sucks...

Pictures here

https://photos.app.goo.gl/8S9HM6xgCuAQfAWd6

For those of you that haven't heard, there's some sort of crazy weather pattern going on in New Zealand that has caused storms and flooding mostly in the north island, which, of course, is where I am now. There's some kind of front from the west mixing with arctic winds or some shit like that. Hey, I'm not a meteorologist, I'm just a pissed off tourist who's getting rained on a lot. All I know is that my 4-day canoe trip on the Whanganui river got cancelled this morning which kind of put me on the irritable side.

Anyway, so far I've seen mostly cities in NZ. My first few days were spent in Auckland, which is much larger than I thought. 1.5 million people live there I think, which is about a third of New Zealand's population. I took a 10-mile walk across the city from one harbor to another which was nice. Auckland is built on top of 28 volcanoes so there were lots of hills, but I was able to get some good views and take some nice pictures. Some of the residential neighborhoods remind me of London, as do other things in Auckland, like a Starbucks and a kebab stand every half a block. Just as in London, I've almost been run over half a dozen times because I looked the wrong way crossing the street. There are a lot more sushi places, though, and a lot less Indian joints. Scott and James came back into town on Sunday and were kind enough to treat me to dinner in Mission bay. Things quickly turned sour though when I told them I wouldn't put out. Ha ha ha! (just kidding fellas)

Next, I headed to Hamilton which is NZ's largest inland city. I took a day trip out to check out a tour of Hobbiton from the Lord of the Rings movie.
The tour was very informative, but the set itself was pretty crappy. They've torn down most of the hobbit holes and can't restore them due to some legal stuff going on with New Line cinema. All you can see are cutouts of where the hobbit holes used to be and all the natural stuff that's still there like the lake and the party tree. Back in Hamilton Alex hooked me up with some of her friends from the time that she lived in NZ, which was great. I had dinner at Gay and Pete's house which is about 10 miles outside of Hamilton with an awesome 360 degree view of the countryside. Karyn was my chauffeur and also thankfully let me crash in her living room because I couldn't take another night at the YHA with the snoring, smelly Austrian dude who bunked above me.

From there I headed to Waitomo to check out the glowworm caves. I was scheduled to do a 5-hour caving trip which involved abseiling (which is lowering yourself by rope down into a cave), climbing, tubing, etc, but I was the only person who signed up for that trip that particular day so they cancelled it. I had to take the regular tubing trip, which was fun, but not the same. I learned a lot about glowworms, like the fact that they're not worms at all but fly larvae, which makes them really glow maggots. Also, the part of them that glows is their excrement. The tubing was really cool... definitely not for the claustrophobic. The glowing is actually a pale blue which makes it look almost artificial.

After Waitomo I headed to Rotorua which is a geothermal area that is also a center of Maori culture. It stinks like sulphur every once in a while, and it's nicknamed Roto-vegas because of all the tourists I guess. I can see where you could make that analogy because it's just like Vegas... minus the hookers, free booze, and casinos. I haven't seen any giant pyramids or replicas of Venice here yet, but I've only been here a few days. I have been to a replica Maori village courtesy of Tamaki tours which take you through a village and to a hangi (celebratory dinner) afterward. It was fun, but I think I was spoiled by my Fiji experience where I got to go to an actual village and saw firedancing and knifedancing and stuff like that. This was cool, but a bit touristy for me. I guess it also had to do with the fact that I was surrounded by old English people which kind of took away from the atmosphere. I think the combined age on the bus was about 100,000, but I would've had to cut the bus in half and count the rings to know for sure. So far, my favorite thing I've done in Rotorua is zorbing. What's that you ask? Well, it's where you get inside a giant inflatable ball, like a beach ball, and they roll you down a hill. You can either go straight down or do a zig zag course, and you can either do it dry or they throw in a bucket of warm water with you. I did a zig zag wet zorb, which was incredibly fun. It was like being in a washing machine. Awesome. I hope it comes to the US.

Anyway, I'm sure I've bored you enough. Since my canoeing trip got cancelled, I decided to stay an extra day in Rotorua and go whitewater sledging tomorrow. That's where they strap you onto some kind of boogie board with a helmet on and send you down a river. After that I'm heading to Wellington, then on to the south island.

Take it easy everybody,

Dave
Karate Expert
Cave Explorer
Zorbonaut

Greetings from Auckland

Hi everybody,

Pictures are here

https://photos.app.goo.gl/jrYgy67PPS7BMBqm9

I just arrived in Auckland after a week in Fiji. For a place that I didn't plan on going, it was an awesome experience. The first day was not so great as there was a ton of turbulence on the overnight flight so I couldn't sleep. I went directly from Nadi to a tiny island called Beachcomber. It took me less than ten minutes to walk around the whole thing. The water and the beach were beautiful. I fell asleep on the beach face-down so I got this weird sunburn on the side of my face and like a 1x1 foot square on my back. It was really nice but I don't know how the nightlife was since I crashed out by 9.

Friday afternoon I headed back to Nadi to stay overnight as I was being picked up on the Feejee experience tour Saturday morning from there. On the boatride to Nadi I got my first taste of a wicked tropical rainstorm. Apparently, it's monsoon season. It's not so bad since the humidity and heat can be oppressive. Let's just say it was a moist week.

I'm usually suspicious of tours, but I'm glad I booked this one. On the first day, we went to the longest beach on the main island (Viti Levu) which was a beatiful stretch where the water was as warm as bathwater. We then went to a small village to meet the locals. A bunch of kids came out and greeted us and showed us around the village. It was brilliant... they couldn't have been more friendly. We then proceeded to the Sigatoka sand dunes where we rode down the face of the dunes with boogie boards. It started pouring as we were doing it which made it especially sweet.

The second day of the tour had us on a three hour hike into the rainforest on the southern part of the main island, followed by a tube ride down the river and a swim under a waterfall. Again, more rain. We spent the night in Suva which is the capital of Fiji. It's not the greatest city in the world, but we got our pictures in the Fiji Times the next day because our hostel had no water due to a burst water main. Must've been a slow news day. From there we headed to visit a school where we met some more of the local kids. Portions of the proceeds from Feejee Experience go to fund this particular school which was great to see because it didn't look like their facilities were particularly good. We then headed to another village for a sevusevu ceremony. That is a traditional Fijian welcome ceremony where everyone gathers around and drinks kava with the chief. I had been warned that kava tasted like shit but I didn't think it was so bad. I ended up having three or four of them since it's rude to say no. It made my tongue numb and I felt kind of stoned. Good times!

This night we headed to an island off the north coast called Nananu. We had the option of going on a boat or taking a sunset kayak to the island. I chose the kayak, of course. Unfortunately, I didn't realize that it was a double kayak and I got stuck with this skinny Frenchman behind me who'd never kayaked before. For every three times I paddled he'd do it once. I think I developed some sort of combination of carpal tunnel and tendinitis. The sunset kayak ended up turning into a 90-minute endurance nightmare, but it was a good way to work off some of the beers I'd been drinking.

My highlight of the next day, which was the last of the tour, was having goat curry at an Indian joint. They should've called it bone and gristle curry. It didn't taste like chicken. Anyway, I'd met some interesting people on the tour, a couple of whom want me to visit them in Australia. Anthony from Brisbane is pretty mellow, but Julian is a pastry chef from Sydney who apparently ran a guy down with his car on the sidewalk for sleeping with his ex-wife.

The guys who I hung out the most with, though, were Scott and James, two ex-professional rugby players from Auckland, also known as Poss and Fetus. I think I could probably write a book about these two guys. They're both about 6'1" and a good 260. Scott stopped playing because he's 32 and James because he was temporarily paralyzed by a neck injury. I don't know where to begin. They definitely can put away a shitload of beers. I learned a lot from these two Kiwis... like what "rooting a bird" means (use your imagination). We got along pretty well so they invited me to join them to leave the tour early and go to another small island called Robinson Crusoe island. This place was outstanding. It was definitely a party island, but the Fijian staff couldn't have been friendlier. Fijians apparently love rugby and Scott and James signed about 10 shirts and pants. Scott didn't want me to feel left out so he was telling everybody about how I was a karate expert and I get mobbed every time I go to Japan. Heh. I would spend about 2 hours writing about these guys' antics so I'll just save it for when I get back.

Last night on the island, the Fijians put on an amazing show which actually lasted about two hours. My camera battery died just as the show began so I won't have any pictures of it, unfortunately. These guys did traditional warrior dances, then they busted out the knife dancing and topped it off with a fire dance. It was awesome! They were totally getting into it with the screaming and the face painting. Most of them are pretty ripped so it must've been terrifying having to fight these guys hand-to-hand a couple hundred years ago.

The last thing I have to say about Fiji is that I encourage everybody who wants a tropical island experience to go there. It costs about 1/3 of what you would spend in Hawaii, and it's not as exploited. The Fijians are without a doubt the friendliest people I've ever encountered. It was almost freaky how nice they were. On the boat ride out this morning I got phone numbers from two guys who told me to come stay with them if I ever come back to Fiji.

Hope you're all doing well! I'll write again in a week or so.

Dave