New Zealand Subdivision

Remember the subdivision I was working on in NZ, the one that was supposed to be finished before I moved back home?

Its finally finished, a mere 2 years after I moved home. This is what it looked like before we started.

And this is what the place looked like when I left, hardly recognizable!

To see these photos in ‘spherical’ mode: https://photos.app.goo.gl/RH8EXy6PGHVsW9cu7

And this is what it looks like now, almost ready for new houses:

Dean still doesn't clean his car! 

Hopefully one day soon I'll be able to return to NZ and visit this place, likely full of houses by then.

I've Been Evicted!

The rent, along with my working contract ended April 30th, however Dean asked me to stay on for a bit longer, but unfortunately there is a new tenant moving in on the 4th of May so we couldn’t extend the rental agreement.

So, Ive had to evacuate the premises...

And move to a motel room...

Check out my fridge!

Less than ideal, but its only for two weeks, and the free, daily cleaning is a bonus!

Gisborne Getaway

Saturday was ANZAC Day, and here in New Zealand, as of this year, it has been 'Mondayised' (their word, not mine) so I got Saturday and Monday off work, so I took the opportunity (quite likely the last oppurtunity) to take another trip around New Zealand, this time heading east to Gisborne. 

This was a last minute decision, I was expecting to work saturday, I had forgotten it was a public holiday, so after a quick pack on saturday morning I headed out. The first town I would go through is Matamata, best know for Hobbiton, which isnt far outside the city itself, this is the I-Site.

Pretty cool I thought, I stopped in for a look and a shot glass before continuing on my way. 

There are some great road signs around New Zealand, and I have been meaning to photograph some of them, so on this trip I made it a point to stop and photograph some of them, so throughout this post you'll see a few of them, like this one

Next town I came to was Te Puke, the kiwifruit capital of the world!

Also home to the largest kiwifruit in the world!

Shortly after leaving the worlds largest kiwifruit, google got a little confused...

I gather it was a new intersection, but looked like it had been there for quite some time. 

^^ another good road sign

This was a road sign I saw that I had to return and photograph

Mum & Dads place backs onto a Browns Rd, also a No Exit! 

The road south from Opitiki down to Gisborne was great! Another scenic, windy and fun stretch of road, after all the trips I have done, I am not surprised that a lot of successful race car drivers have come from New Zealand. 

^^ This was the first thing I saw coming into Gisborne, oddly, not the only Ship-on-a-stick I saw.. 

^^ The view out over the bay from the Top 10 Holiday Park where I stayed.

Some shots from around Gisborne

Before going to bed I did some research in google maps about my trip plans for Sunday, this was supposed to be directions from my current location.. 

Go home google, you’re drunk.

SUNDAY

After leaving Gisborne, I headed south, toward Napier and Hastings, I came across a picnic area with a great view back toward Gisborne and the bay

The road from here to Napier was yet another great New Zealand road, half way there I came across another picnic stop, this time on the edge of a lake, it was quite beautiful

Next stop, Napier, Hastings and Hawkes Bay, this is a really beautiful place, Hawkes Bay is very nice

Napier

Hastings

Hawke's Bay

Time to head back to my place! Pretty much no stops, I went directly there, tho I did grab a couple of photos while driving thru a small town with heaps of cool things made from roofing iron

Some more road signs

^^ These are road signs I think we need to bring to Australia! 

Well, I can now say that I have pretty much seen all of the North Island! Which is pretty cool, and oddly enough, not something I can say about Tassie... 

I have now also driven the full length of State Highway 1, which runs from the top to the bottom of New Zealand’s North Island, which I think is pretty cool. 

North to Northland

So we had a fair dump of rain Monday & Tuesday, Dean said work for the rest of the week is unlikely and has given me permission to head off again. This time I am heading North to Northland!
 
I sat down Tuesday night and worked out an itinerary for myself, picking out where I will camp, where I will be able to get food/fuel etc. I have planned it so that I can attend the opening of the International Rally of Whangarei this Friday night, and perhaps meet Ken Block, who will be there, but we shall see. The plan was to then go and watch a couple of the rally stages on Saturday morning, and then head home. This itinerary only required I travel between 250 and 300 km per day, which allowed plenty of time for excursions off the main route and plenty of sight seeing!
 
Meet my mascot for the trip.

Day One - The Adventure Begins! 
I say adventure because I am heading out with a $20 Kmart tent, a vehicle that has, until now, been extremely unreliable (tho we think its visit to the mechanic on Tuesday has finally fixed it, fingers crossed) and the weather forecast not very favorable! But, I don't have much time left to go and see New Zealand, and there are only a few places left to go and I will have seen the majority of the North Island, which is pretty cool! And so with this opportunity throwing itself in front of me, I wasn't about to pass it up! ONWARD! 
 
It started as any camping trip does, first off you must pack the car! Seeing as I was going for several days this time I was a little more thorough with my packing, taking along as much food as possible etc etc (btw Rob, all the items you left here have proven very useful! cheers!) Once this was done, I headed out! My first stop was to be the Sky Tower in Auckland City, as I have begun collecting shot glasses from the places I visit, and I hadn't yet got any from Auckland (and how could I go home without one from there?) So I took the opportunity to stop in on the way past. Looking back now, with the shot glasses I was able to obtain, I am glad I stopped, but at the time it proved to be a nightmare! You would not believe the traffic in the city at 10am! Don't people have jobs?! It took nearly half an hour to find a car park, and I had to pay thru the nose for it ($13/hour). I didn't take that long, but it was charged in half hour blocks. 
 
Anyway, with that now out of the road, I plugged my destination into the gps, and continued on! With only around 200km to my intended destination, and by this time it was only 11am, I was able to take my time, enjoy the sites and make forays from the main route, plenty of which proved to be worthwhile! 

a random something on a random hill...
 
Among my forays off the main route was this stop at a museum in the middle of no where, I stopped not to go thru the museum, but because museums often have gift shops... with shot glasses.. lol i scored a nice one there. But what I did see of interest there was this

Its an old steam powered log winch! According to the spec on the side it is a twin cylinder steam engine producing 13.5hp, not as much as I had expected. 

Also check out the epic shot of the bird in the top left, a total fluke!
 
I stopped at the last town I would pass thru, Dargaville, for a late lunch, and to find a shot glass, before continue on to the Kai Iwi Campgrounds, two campgrounds on the edge of a beautiful lake, 35km (tho it feels much further than that) from civilization. 

^ Dargaville
 
On the way out to the camp grounds I spotted yet another grouping of pink hay bales...

I have seen this several times now in rural New Zealand, some of them have signs expressing their support for the fight against breast cancer, tho personally I'm not sure what a hay bale can do in the fight, but anyway.. 
 
Upon arriving at the campgrounds I explored both areas before deciding where to set up camp, my decision primarily based on where I could get cell coverage.

The tarp is just in case it rains, it proved useful even before I entered the tent, a fairly violent and heavy, but short, shower went thru. After setting up camp, I wandered around the edge of the lake for a look, found a cache, and then enjoyed sandwiches and yogurt for tea (that was all i had at home to bring, everything else required cooking) I then ventured into the tent for the night. 
 
Day 2
Well.. the tarp backfired on me! While it protected the tent from a late evening shower, it was quite breezy all night and the stupid tarp was flapping around and making so much noise it kept waking me up! I ended up getting out of bed and taking it down, risking the rain, I slept well after that! 
 
8am and I was up, eating breakfast and packing up, I was on the road before 9am - no rush as i only have 280km to travel - the first thing of interest that I came across was a gravel road leading out to the west coast, it was only a few kilometers so I decided to go for a look, I was expecting a small beach area and that’s it, what I found was a small village of shacks, probably 12 - 15 of them on the hill at the edge of the beach

Continuing north on state highway 12, I came across a sign that read 'Waipoua Kauri Forest Next 18km' I didn't take much notice, until a couple of km down the road it became a magnificent drive, tight winding roads boxed in by beautiful forest on either side! Suffice to say I thoroughly enjoyed it, even tho my vehicle was less than suitable for this type of road.

About half way thru I found a turn off that led to a Waipoua Kauri Forest Lookout, I went for a look

^ Me in the Waipoua Kauri Forest, in front of the trees this forest is known for.
 
The next stop was something I had not expected to find way out here in the middle of no where, an I-Site with Forest Tours, and camping facilities! (I even scored a shot glass here!)

Not long after leaving the Waipoua Kauri Forest I came out on the coast at a town called Omapere, quite a beautiful spot! 

Almost there!

This is at Kaitaia, the last major town on route to the top! Here I grabbed my lunch, topped up on fuel, had a quick look around and continued north! 
 
I had heard a bit about Ninety Mile Beach before from the fellas at work, but I had forgotten about it, until the morning I left the fellas called into my place to get some keys and when I told them where I was off too they said oh you'll have to check out Ninety Mile Beach, well Kaitaia is only 10km south of it! 

It is actually considered a road.

I would love to travel the full length of the beach, but not knowing the access at the other end, nor the tides, I decided to play it safe. I did however do some investigating and googling and found an access roughly 20km up the beach, which I scouted out from the road, tomorrow morning I will be able to come back and do that 20km run down the beach.
 
After finishing my scouting, I found not far down the road a turn off that went across to the east coast, this part of the peninsula is only 10-12km wide! 

Next stop, the top! 
 
I had arrived in plenty of time, so when I saw a sign leading down to Tapotupotu Bay, so I went down for a look, this was about 4km from the top.

What I didn't realize is that this is in fact the northernmost campsite, and where I would be staying the night. 

Well there it is folks, this country isn't as pretty as other places in New Zealand, but it is still worth a look at the top.

I went for a walk down to the lighthouse, found a couple of caches, took plenty of photos, then returned to the Tapotupotu Bay campground to set up camp. I will head back up there in the morning to get some photos with the sun in a much better position! 
 
Day 3
I ended up going to bed fairly early last night, which payed off, I was woken at 5:30 by a group of guys with boats, packing and preparing to go out for the day. I tried to sleep a little longer, but come 6:30 I was wide awake so I got up and packed up camp. My boss had said he would talk to me today about work, I think he was hoping to work tomorrow (Saturday), but last I checked the weather forecast wasn't good, in any case I decided I would be on the road fairly early today in case he wanted me home by tonight to work tomorrow. Before heading south I returned to the top to get some more photos, it was an overcast morning, so I was able to get some good ones that I was not able to get the night before, due to the sun. 

I was heading south just after 8am, having already traveled this road there wasn't much to see, until I got to the Ninety Mile Beach access road that I had scouted yesterday, I headed out onto the beach and continued south.

^ Even google thinks its a road!
 
Everything was going well, until about halfway (10km down the beach) I realized I didn’t have 4 wheel drive…. I hit a couple of soft sand areas, so I decided to play it safe and engage 4wd, but when I took off, there was a horrible grinding noise coming from the front left wheel (I had used 4x4 the day before with no issues) so I had to disengage 4x4 and continue in 2wd, I made it tho, thankfully, and it was all in all quite a fun trip. Interestingly its also a quicker route than following the road, provided you ignore the 30kmh speed limit. Its around 15km less distance to travel than taking State Highway 1. 
 
Reaching Kaitaia in good time, I grabbed some breakfast, and tried to call the boss, he didn’t answer so I continued on my way, just in case, towards Whangarei. I was really hoping not to have to work tomorrow because I wanted to check out the Whangarei Rally that started tonight. 
 
About 20km south of Kaitaia there is this

Its a 13km stretch of absolutely magnificent road, so good, that I turned around and did it 3 times! (down, back up, down again) I only wish I had a better car! My 3” lifted patrol on 33” muddies handles better than this thing! This thing just flops all over the road. But still, I had fun.
 
Next stop Whangarei, I made it there in better time than I was expecting! I found a Maccas for some lunch and a spot to sit down and get online with my Macbook. I then contacted Ben, a mate of mine here who will be driving in this weekends rally, to find out some more details on this evenings event, he invited me to call into his motel, so I did. 

^ Bens Rally Car

^ Me and Ben at the Rally Opener

I spent several hours there hanging out with Ben and his crew, this was also the first time I had seen his car finished, last time i saw it, it was a shell on 4 jack stands. At around 3pm I decided I had better go and set up camp, and go find a parking spot ready for tonight’s event, which would begin at 4:45pm. I was expecting it to be quite busy and difficult to get a park anywhere, I wasn't wrong. I was able to make it there in fairly good time tho and got to watch many of the cars drive in, including Ken Blocks Fiesta, what a car!!

I found out later that this is in fact the Gymkhana Car in his Gymkhana Videos!
 
If that doesn’t interest you, then you may as well stop reading here. 

Unfortunately I didn’t realize it at the time, but this car ^ is of particular interest, I wish I had taken a closer look while it was on display, but at the time it just looked like a Peugeot 206 rally car, a nice looking car, but really nothing special. But boy was I wrong, and the second I heard it launch from the start line for SS1, I realized it. more in this later. 
 
I watched SS1 and SS2, two runs on the same track, it was dark, but still good to watch. I then retired for the night. 
 
Day 4
I was up, packed up and heading out in time to make it up to the Prime spectator spot on SS4, I wasn't up early enough to make SS3. 

^ a real drone, $16000 worth! 
 
when I arrived I found this viewing spot to be fantastic! Right on the outside of a hairpin!

Here are a few videos of cars going thru on SS4

and the ‘boring’ Peugeot 206 I mentioned earlier

I learned from various spectators a fair bit about that car (I also googled it later) it is in fact not a pug 206 at all, not even based on a pug 206, the ONLY pug 206 feature is the shell, underneath is a completely custom designed 4wd rally car, powered by a Renault 3.5L v6 Formula Renault engine. Yes, you read that correctly. This car is capable of going from 0 - 200km/h in just 7 seconds! A very impressive car, built by a 21 year old in his families barn! The car is called the Kelsey MC2 (Mad Creation 2), and it is quite an impressive piece of machinery. 
 
After seeing the fast cars go thru, myself along with a few other spectators moved on to the prime viewing location for SS5

Another good spot to watch, here are a couple of videos

Unfortunately Kelsey made a mistake there, going right instead of left, which is a shame as I would have loved to hear him come screaming around that corner sideways! We could hear his car coming a good minute or so before it surfaced at the top of the hill!
 
By this time the rain had settled in, so having seen all the top guys go thru I decided I better continue on my way, I stopped in at Whangarei (the rally was about 40km north) for an early lunch, I then stopped in at the car park where all the rally car workshops were setup, it was time for the lunch time service, so all the cars where returning, I had a walk around and spent some time in Ben’s area before heading off back home.  
 
On the way home I stopped in at Retrospace to pick up a Spock T Shirt they had ordered in for me, I then went straight home for a shower and to relax! 

This has been a good week, though I am not a huge fan of traveling solo, it has been worthwhile, and I have now seen most of the north island!

Score!

So I went to Hamilton today to get my haircut, finally! It has been long, long overdue! Anyway, I went into the local Noel Leeming (Harvey Norman style store). Before I continue, I should explain that I have been eyeing off a Logitech invention for a while now, a series they call 'Protection +' which includes an awesome magnetic phone mounting system for your car, I had originally thought it was useless to me, until I recently discovered that the kit comes with magnetic pads to allow any device to work with it, and even more recently I discovered that they now have an iPhone 6 case with a magnetic strip built in to work with the car mount, a case that is actually really nice (I never liked the iPhone 5 options), the only reason I haven’t bought one is because they are $50 over here, cheaper to buy them in Oz, anyway back to Noel Leeming, while wandering around their store, I found a bin full of smartphone cases marked as Clearance, and inside I found these:

Why buy 5 you ask? Well, one is for Mum so I will only have 4, 4 $50 cases i scored for $20! At that price I figured why not have a few spares? or if I get bored I can change the color.

A Spur of the Moment Trip

So it rained Friday evening, and the boss rang and said we wont bother working tomorrow (Saturday) so I decided,  I have two days, I might go for a drive somewhere and see a bit more of the country, so I got the maps app out and picked a route, I decided I would head down the west coast to New Plymouth and Whanganui and then back up the middle via State Highway 4. 

I should explain at this point what has been going on with my supplied work vehicle. In short ever since I have been here it has been giving trouble, it has spent more time at the mechanics than in my possession. I wont bore you with details of its amazing unreliability, but you will understand when I say I was hesitant to go on a road trip with it. However, we had only got it back from the mechanics again on thursday, and they had found a problem and so we were a little more confident in its reliability, confidence that was falsely placed, as you will learn later on. 

After packing the car with all the supplies I thought I would need I headed south, following the GPS towards New Plymouth. The first thing of interest that I came across was this, it seems these New Zealanders have stolen a local Spreyton landmark

Having not made any stops yet, I cruised into a small town Called Piopio, not seeing anything terribly interesting I continued on my way, but, catching my eye on the way out, was a sign that read ‘Hobbit Film Location 14km’. Obviously I went to investigate! I found Hairy Feet, a scenic tour of the filming location for The Hobbit: An Unexpected Journey scenes involving the Trolls in Trollshaws Forest, and also the cave where Sting was found and given to Bilbo Baggins. 
 
http://www.hairyfeetwaitomo.co.nz

The filming was done at the base of those cliffs, I am hoping to return at some stage and do the tour. 
 
Also, something interesting i found on the road to Hairy Feet

The countryside here is quite remarkable and beautiful

The roads here are absolutely awesome too! 

My first look at the west coast this trip

Notice anything unusual? 

No you’re not dreaming, the sand along the west coast of New Zealand is in fact black! 

These people have an odd fascination with shoes (interestingly, not the only place I saw this on my travels) 

I made it to New Plymouth at around 5pm, and I had decided that I wanted to grab tea and continue on to Whanganui, a further 180km down the road, so I could make good time heading north Sunday morning and catch the Hobbit Film Site Tour at 1pm, however, the car had other plans, and it let me know approximately 20km south of New Plymouth, as you may have guessed it broke down, well sorta, it has been filling the sump with diesel, in short, and as the oil gets thinner the injectors get less and less efficient, until the oil is so thin that they cannot function and the engine stops, so I was against the clock to get some fresh oil, and change it before it stopped and left me stranded. Unfortunately by this time everyone had shut, I was able to get the oil, but I did not have a spanner to drain the sump. So I found somewhere to stay and set up camp.  

The next morning my first stop was Super Cheap for a spanner, then out to find a quiet place to change the oil. Once that was done I continued on my way, towards Whanganui. As it turns out I am glad that things worked out the way they did, had I traveled to Whanganui Saturday night I would have covered most of the distance in the dark, and i would have missed an awful lot.  

The landscape is simply breathtaking

Some more black sand

This was my welcome into Whanganui

I had a look around Whanganui, stopped in at a few shops, took in the sights and then continued on my way, wanting to be back home tonight, and having 400km to traverse, which google told me would take 5.5 hours. And once I got on the road, I discovered why, think Tassie’s West Coast, only way better! State Highway 4, and for around 80km was a magnificent section of road that would be perfect for a Rally, or Targa run! and the view is simply spectacular!

I continued on until I arrived home, doing the last 150km or so in the dark, which I also enjoyed. Google estimated my arrival home at 8:50pm, I got there before 8pm.

This was my score for the weekend. I collect different shot glasses from the places i visit. The bottle on the left contains black sand, a souvenir I collected on Sunday.

I have an iPhone again and it's Bliss!

Due to a stuff up with the store handling my replacement, I was stuck with the Moto G for two weeks, by the end of it I didn’t hate Android! (Android 5 that is). But, I'm not fond of this particular phone, mostly because it is so so so slow! Reminded me of my old P4 Windows XP Machine! So, I will reserve final judgement for Android 5 until such times as I have a chance to use it on a high end smartphone, such as the Nexus 6. But I can tell you now, I will never be switching my primary device.

It was too cheap to leave there...

I have been wanting this printer for a while now, but priced at $350 AUD, I could not justify the purchase, but, by pure chance I found it on sale at Warehouse Stationary (think Officeworks) here in New Zealand. It had rained overnight and so the boss told me to take his car to work, and on the way stop in at the local tyre shop to get new rims/tyres fitted, while I was waiting for that to be done I walked around the local shops, and found this on sale. The new model has recently been released (the same thing in black and with a new number lol) and so these are on clearance, priced at just $197 NZD, and as if that wasn’t cheap enough, Brother NZ are currently running a cashback promotion, giving back $100 on this particular model. So all up it has cost me $97 NZD!!

I am without my phone

So while I was in Tassie last I had a little accident with my iPhone, I leaned on a sharp object and shattered the screen while it was in my pocket. (unfortunately I don’t have a photo of it). Fortunantely I had purchased Apples Extended Warranty which covers accidental damage (for a relatively small fee they will give you a new phone). So I took it into the local reseller here in New Zealand (Apples warranty is international, which is epic) and they are handling a replacement for me, so I am without iPhone for a week.

In its place I will be using this, a mid range Android Smartphone:

Until recently I hated android, still do hate v4 and older. It was v5 that sparked my interest, it was the reason I bought this phone, to have a play with it, and so far I don’t mind it, but, as of yet I havent used it as a daily driver. Well, that starts today, for the next week I am stuck with it, lets see how it goes!

Spotting the ISS

The other day a photo was posted on one of the sciencey Facebook pages, saying that the International Space Station (ISS) would be visible from Sydney for approximately 5 minutes. Being fascinated with space, an anything concerning it, this sparked my interest, so I googled it, and as luck would have it, on Friday night it was going to fly directly over New Zealand! NW to SE at a height of 85 degrees. So come Friday night I stayed up to see it! I was not disappointed! Very very cool thing to see!

 Unfortunately I did’t have a real camera, though I am suprised how well my iPhone did:

Here it is above my house - the Orange/Red dot is the Internet antenna on the roof:

and here is a video I was able to get (again very impressed with the phone camera)

Wellington Weekend

Friday 20th

So its Friday afternoon, the 20th of Feb, I was at work, the day was dragging on because my mate Rob Kingston is here in NZ, and he has been heading down to Wellington over the last few days, and I will be flying down this evening to join him, and drive back up north, which is exciting because I will be able to see the capitol of NZ and considerably more of the country than I otherwise would have seen.

The day drags on for an age, finally 5:30 comes around and we knock off, the plane doesn't leave until 7:55, but with the traffic problems around here it will take us close to an hour to travel the 30 odd KM to the airport (that’s not a joke, it has indeed taken me that long, and longer to travel short distances in the past) and obviously, you don’t want to be late for a plane! So after getting changed in the little hut at work, we left! Fortunately we over estimated the traffic and it only took around 40 minutes to arrive, so I was very early to the airport, which I didn’t mind, I have never been to the Domestic Terminal at Auckland so it gave me plenty of time to work out where everything was and time to grab some tea.

My plane left on time, and managed to arrive 15 minutes early! Which was nice, I am not a huge fan of flying. I had the front exit row seat so my chair didn’t lay back too, which made things a little more uncomfortable. Rob was waiting at the Wellington Terminal to pick me up, having already been to the campsite to set up our tents, and as it turns out my quality $9 job is embarrassingly transparent! It was only a shortish drive to the camp, and being dark i saw very little of the city that night.

Saturday 21st

And now its Saturday! Seeing as I have been working all week, a sleep in till 7am is all that I got (when you are up at 5am every day for work, a 7am sleep in is amazingly satisfying). Rob was awake too (this is very rare, in fact I don’t think I have ever seen it before!). So we packed everything up and headed for the nearest Information Center, collecting various flyers and information for things to do in Wellington as well as the rest of the Island. Deciding what we wanted to do we headed back to the car, stopping in at a few shops along the way. We decided to visit a local free museum (being on a budget, we had to limit our spending, it was also raining). It wasn't to bad, there were a few interesting displays, though its not something i would go back too.

Next up, the Weta Cave!! For those who don’t know (I didn't either till Rob came here, so don’t feel bad). Weta is the company that did the movie props and things for Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit Trilogy, the Weta Cave being their public shop of prop replicas and such, very cool place! Though I did not have enough money to buy anything cool (such as a gold replica of The One Ring, priced at $1800 NZD). After drooling over a few props we headed off for some lunch, Burger King was the nearest place. After a hearty feast we punched New Plymouth into the GPS and began our north bound trek! The day before I had been curios to see if there were any streets in the world named after me, how awesome was it that one of them was in Wellington?! So on the way out of Wellington we went and found it! Jasons Place, we went there just for the photo, was quite cool!

Several hours later we arrived at Palmerston North, we had a look around, went into a few shops before heading out to find the holiday park, we wanted to get our quality tents set up in good time. Arriving at the holiday park we discovered over the back fence was an aquatic center (Lido Aquatic), with insane looking hydro slides! I couldn't pass that up, and as luck would have it we had both packed our swimmers, and when we got there discovered they had an after 6pm discount! Score!

^ you hit 60km/h going down that thing!

This has to be the most epic aquatic center I have ever been too (not that I’ve been to many) going down the yellow slide you hit speeds of 60km/h! I have to admit the first time down that one was a bit daunting! I think the green one was my favorite though, spinning around in the bowl and then going down the exit tube backwards was just fun! (I did fall off the tubes a few times...) 

We also tried the diving boards, and swam a lap of the Olympic pool before we left. After cleaning up and grabbing some tea, we went to hunt out a Kmart because I wanted to find some additional padding to sleep on, the $10, 10mm thick foam air thingo just wasn’t sufficient! The only thing we could find in Kmart that was remotely suitable was a fitness matt, not ideal, but better than nothing! Upon returning to the holiday park, setting up my new bed, it was time for another adventure with my transparent tent!

Sunday 22nd
Surprisingly the addition of a fitness mat made for a more sound sleep! I slept far better than I did the previous night! Rob has been finding a geocache at each location he has stayed at, so while we waited for the shops to open we went and found one in the town square. After exploring a few local stores, we continued our northward trek toward Rotorua. Stopping along the way to take photos, we also found some impressive clay cliffs and mini canyons:

Because we had forayed from the main highway we ended up finding an alternate route to the next town, which proved much cooler than the major highway. 

After rejoining the highway from our little foray, we were just cruising along, in no particular hurry, heading towards Rotorua, when BAM, there’s a tank on the side of the highway! Upon closer inspection we discovered the National Army Museum. So being boys, we pulled in for a look, grabbed a few photos on the tanks (there was more than one) and had a look in the shop. Because of budgets and time constraints we didn't do the tour. Perhaps one day I will return to do it. But for now, ONWARD!  

As we were driving up through the highlands (it was quite an awesome bit of road) we were driving past a mountain, we took notice because it was covered in white (like it had been snowed on) but it was way to hot for snow or ice, so we theorized it was clay. Little did we realize we were staring into Mordor…. 

^ Behold Mt Doom!

Our route to Rotorua bypassed Taupo, but seen as we were exploring we couldn’t go past without at least driving thru, on our way thru I spotted a sign that said HUKA FALLS, it was a spur of the moment decision, but I said lets go that way! Veering off course (Rob was not expecting my input) we headed down to have a look. To our surprise it turned out to be well, well worth the detour, as you can see in the photos below, its not your typical waterfall, and it is quite impressive!

^ an insane amount of water! 200,000 Liters per Second, I’d love to see it in flood!

Our next stop on Saturday was Kerosene Creek, this is what we had packed our swimming gear for, its a hot water creek, yes hot, hotter than you would have a bath in! Its quite unreal, its a fairly large, fast flowing creek too.

It’s quite an experience sitting under a waterfall of hot water in the middle of the bush!

After we got ourselves cleaned up we continued on to Rotorua, the weather was a bit crap so we pre-booked a cabin.

I can tell you I was very much looking forward to sleeping in a real bed!

Monday 23rd

Slept like a log last night! Turns out a real bed beats a foam mat underneath a fitness mat, who knew right? Anyway, today we planned to visit Skyline to ride on the Luge and visit the official Jelly Belly Store! But before they opened we went and found a local geocache, and while we were looking for that stumbled on a pretty epic, and very active geothermal area on the shore of the Lake.

Rob hadn’t seen this sort of thing before (I saw it last October when mum and dad were here) so we had a good look around, its interesting to see pockets of boiling water just metres from a stone cold lake, what was more interesting though is when I spotted a section of boiling water about 10 metres out into the lake:

By this time Skyline was open so we headed up! Skyline is situated on the side of a hill on the outer edge of Rotorua, you get to ride a fancy enclosed chair lift to the top, which is a bit of fun, there is quite a few activities you can do up there, but for me the Luge is the most exciting, we payed for 5 rides and headed on up, for our first ride we got straight on basically, but once we got back to the top there was a Q, it was about a 15 minute wait, but when we got back for our third ride it was even longer, and again for our 4th, it took around 40 minutes to get our 4th ride, due to time constraints we couldn't take our 5th, so after the 4th ride we headed to the Jelly Bean shop, and then back down the Gondola to grab some lunch. 

^ made of Jelly Beans

Our next stop…... HOBBITON!!! Ah I was so keen for this one. You can’t come to Kiwi Land and not visit The Shire! About an hours drive from Rotorua, Hobbiton is on a farm in what seems like the middle of nowhere! Fortunately we had been smart enough to pre book a tour, the place was packed! We were there with plenty of time to have a look around the shop and be ready for our tour at 3pm. The tour took 2 hours, and I can’t really describe it, so here is a heap of photos:

How Awesome!?

After Hobbiton the plan was to hit Hamilton and go drifting at the local Blastacars! An absolutely awesome activity I have done many times before (there is no equivalent in Aus) but when we got there found that it was shut on Mondays.. So we went and found some tea, fish and chips (how kiwi of us right?) and then headed back to my place. Dean had sent me a text and said the weather looked bad for tomorrow so no need to rush home, so I didn't set an alarm! And was hoping to get tomorrow off so we could go drifting (we checked! they are open Tuesdays)

Tuesday 24th

Sleeping in till 7 again, and waking to find a message from Dean saying it was dry and to ring him when I surfaced, I was a little sneaky and got up and had a shower and some breaky before ringing him. But when I did I was asked to go to work, I cant complain, he has given me plenty of time off, so I packed a lunch and headed off. We decided that, whilst it would be a late night, we would go drifting after work that night, Dean caught wind of this during the day and said I could leave a bit early and sleep in tomorrow (I have a really good boss). After ringing Blastacars I got us booked in for 8:30pm, so I worked until 5pm then headed back to my place. Hamilton was closing at 5pm, so we booked into the Auckland track, which I didn't mind because I wanted to try that track anyway. The Bighorn (my work car) still isn’t going right, so we decided it best to take Robs rental car up. Stopping on the way at Burger Fuel for a true Kiwi meal, the Fush and Chups Meal, which is a fish burger, a side of chips and garlic aioli dip and a L&P drink (a Kiwi creation). You cant get much more Kiwi than that:

The drifting was loads of fun! The Auckland track is good, but I think the Hamilton one is better. Anyway after our sessions it was around 10:15, and we were hot and sweaty from the karts so we called into a local Maccas for a McFlurry before heading back to my place, getting into bed at around 11:40pm, with an alarm set for 7am..

And that marks the end of a pretty good weekend seeing NZ, now to try and resuscitate the bank account…. 

Its Time for the First Post

Well here I am working on my new website. I am currently sitting in my house (rented) in New Zealand, writing this first post.

As a side note, for those that didn’t know, I am currently working in NZ, I will be here until the end of April 2015 operating a Terex TS-24B (previously owned by my father) for a business called D&N Smith. 

Anyway back on topic! Welcome to www.virgincubalibre.com! The website is still under construction, I am yet to map my domain, and get the ads removed (I am using a free host atm). Once all that is done I will be ready to roll it out to the public! Until then, I will post just for myself (no one knows about the site yet, obviously).

So the primary reason for doing this is basically a diary for myself (how cool will it be to look back through it in 10 years!?), and also somewhere friends and family can come to keep up to date should they desire to do so. 

Thats all for now. 

*signature to appear here once i figure one out*