The entertainment of the Mother Superior

We arrived in the Tongariro National Park after a drive from Napier along the Thermal Explorer Highway, with only a short stop to stretch our legs at a 'scenic viewpoint'. These scenic viewpoints are not usually anything special, but this one was a nice surprise. What you couldn't see from the road was that the car park had a nice view of a lovely waterfall.

We upgraded the hire car

While we were there a British couple in a campervan pulled up and we got talking to them. When we mentioned that we were planning on walking the Tongariro Crossing the following day, they told us they'd started it, but had found it very hard going and had turned back. This was definitely not what we wanted the Mother Superior to hear, so Sarah and I bundled her back into the Rolls Canardley (because it rolls downhill, but can hardly get back up them) and got on our way to the Discovery Lodge. This was the place that we'd booked into for our two nights in Tongariro. We'd chosen them because they do a drop-off and collection service for walking the Tongariro Track. The room itself was a bit basic, and the kichen contained a tea towel that could have done with a good boil wash, but it would suffice, plus from the deck we had fantastic views of the sun going down on the three volcanoes, Ruapehu, Tongariro and Ngaruhoe. Try saying that after a few drinks.

Next morning we were up at 5am to get ready for the walk, the bus was leaving at 5.45! It was interesting to see how all the different walkers were dressed and prepared for the track - some were dressed like ourselves with plenty of warm layers, long trousers and walking shoes, while others turned up in shorts, T-shirts and trainers, so we really weren't sure what to expect.

The Lonely Planet (and just about every other guidebook) says that the Tongariro Crossing - one-day walk from Mangetepopo Hut to Ketetahi Springs - is a fairly easy walk that can be attempted by most people. I would beg to differ. The first section of the walk from the car park to Mangetepopo Hut was pretty easy going. We actually started when it was still dark, but the track was very well formed with boardwalks in some sections. This led us to the last toilet for a (very) long time, so it gets used by almost everyone and to say it is a bit smelly would be an understatement. This was nothing for the Mother Superior though, who said that during her nursing career she'd smelt and seen a lot worse!

The next section was a real killer and I'm not surprised that the couple we met the day before turned back here - the track suddenly became very steep for the long haul up to South Crater. What had been a fairly wide, well made up track became more like a goat track that was so steep that in parts it was more like climbing than walking and you had to rely on using your hands to pull yourself up.

It was a long haul, but eventually we made it to the top of the section - and it was worth the effort because the landscape changed to something that I have never seen before. I can only describe it as being lunar - the South Crater was huge and the ground was a very hard baked earth. The sun had come out as we got to the rim of the crater and it really looked spectacular. We crossed South Crater and headed up the next section which was again hard going, this time not so much because of the steepness, but because of the amount of small volcanic scree that made up the path. It meant you slipped backwards a little bit every few steps which was very energy-sapping on your legs. Yet again the effort was worth it though as the ridge that you climbed up to gave a fantastic view over a landscape that could have been Mordor from Lord of the Rings - and as they filmed it around there, it probably was Mordor!

Behind those glasses, they're crying

We didn't have time to stand admiring the view because we had to keep going towards the highpoint of the track at Red Crater. This was another long slog, with a very long steep drop over one side, followed by an interesting descent down a long scree path that you could only really slide down. We all took a tumble a few times on the way down, but thankfully we managed to make it down unscathed.

All downhill from here

After a very quick lunch stop we continued on our way. It was pretty much all downhill from here and you would think that would be easy - but in fact it became just as hard going. The steps that were cut into the path in some places had a tendency to be the perfect size for somebody who is eight foot tall - in total there were 5kms of downhill steps and they really took their toll on your knees.

The sign was the only thing holding them up!

We eventually made it to the end at about 2.30pm, completely shattered but very pleased to have completed it. If any of us had been unable to finish the walk the only way off the mountain would have been on a big red helicopter!

We all slept very well that night and headed off to Lake Taupo the following day where we arranged to go on a Maori experience evening. We were picked up by bus to be taken to Wairakei Terraces - here they have recreated a Maori village and even recreated the terraced hot springs that existed a few kilometres away until they were destroyed to pipe the hot water out to a power station! On our way the bus driver gave us a bit of a spiel about how the evening would go, how we would be welcomed and so forth. Unfortunately he had a tendency to put the word 'there' (pronounced theer) into the sentence at random intervals. At first this was amusing and a little endearing, but unfortunately his spiel lasted about fifteen minutes and as he went along, the number of 'theers' in a sentence kept growing. By minute eight he was saying something like:

'When the chief theer welcomes you theer, to the village theer, he'll theer offer a gift theer and the person theer who is elected theer as your chief theer will accept the gift theer, without taking theer his theer eyes theer off the village chief theer'.

I'm not exaggerating, it was that bad and it made it almost impossible to work out what he was saying. If we had relied on his information alone we could have been killed by the village chief before we'd even sat down for dinner!

After a tour of the terraces and the Maori village (with a bit of history thrown in), there was a traditionally cooked Hangi meal, followed by Maori singing and dancing. As part of this, they decided to take a few volunteers out of the audience to teach them the Haka. Guess what, they chose Sarah! Well she made a good effort, and you can see it below (a bit fuzzy but Sarah is in the pink top on the right).

The next day we had more excitement planned for the Mother Superior - we were going jet-boating! The Mother Superior is not renowned for her love of boats, so it took a bit of guts to do the jet-boating - and we kept reassuring her that it would be OK - something along the lines of 'Don't worry, you won't have time to be sick'! Well we needn't have worried, because the Mother Superior thoroughly enjoyed - screaming 'I love it!' in our ears as our very entertaining driver whipped us up and down to Huka Falls. He had a special signal to let us know when he was going to spin the boat, however, he had a tendency to forget to signal sometimes and would signal afterwards, very amusing.

Scream if you wanna go faster

After the excitement of the jet-boat we made for Rotorua, the Hot Mineral Pool capital of New Zealand. Along the way there were a couple of quick stops - first at Aratiatia Rapids. These rapids are not very rapid these days apart from at 10, 12 and 2 o'clock everyday when they release the water from a dam above to show tourists what they looked like before the hydroelectric power station was built and they dried up. New Zealand uses a lot of hydroelectric power generation so there are these power stations everywhere. It was quite interesting to see a load of rocks on a dried up river bed turn into a raging torrent when they opened up the dam.

Next we also stopped at the Wairakei Thermal Village for lunch and a tour of their thermal pools. To say that they were disappointing would be an understatement, there was certainly an abundance of steam, but the boiling mud pools both seemed to have dried up and it was all a bit of a shambles. Time to move on.....

Steaming

Every motel that we looked at in Rotorua had it's own spa baths and hot pools, so we checked ourselves into the Boulevard Motel. On arrival we decided it was a bit grotty, so we gave their hot pools a miss and headed instead to the Polynesian Spa, in an attempt to soothe our muscles, still aching from the Tongariro Crossing. The Polynesian Spa is probably the best known spa in Rotorua and we made the mistake of arriving at the same time as several busloads of Japanese tourists. A very helpful lady on reception told us it tended to quieten down around 7.30pm, so we went for three flat whites (another tin fifty!) to wait a little while. It was worth waiting - it is very nice there, with one of the pools right on the edge of the lake - it was very relaxing.

Hiding in Government Gardens

The problem with Rotorua is that because it is a hive of hot pool activity there is a lot of sulphur in the air and it really stinks, so next day after lunch and a walk in the Government Gardens we decided to head to Waitomo. It was quite a drive and fast, comfortable journeys were not one of the Rolls' strong points.

Wishing Rock (Wishing we could find Rainbow Falls)

It was quite a pretty journey, with a few detours. Sarah was determined to find Rainbow Falls, which were on our roadmap, although the exact location was rather vague. After half an hour of searching around a lake and a dam we had to give up - we thought they'd be easy to find but all we found was yet another hydroelectric power station! All the way along the journey I kept thinking that the landscape reminded me of somewhere, but I couldn't work out what it was. There were lots of small green mounds in the fields, not quite hills, just mounds really. Then it occurred to me, we were driving through Teletubbyland. I'm not sure when I have seen Teletubbyland before, as I'm not an avid viewer of the show, but I must have seen it somewhere.

All the whole world loves a rainbow!

We made a stop in Otorohanga a little way before Waitomo, because we were all hungry and fancied fish and chips. We still had a gallon of vinegar to use up after all....

As it turned out, none of us actually had fish, because it didn't look very appealing, but the Mother Superior did have the weirdest hotdog ever. I think she was expecting a frankfurter type sausage in a roll, not a battered sausage on a stick!

Heart attack on a stick

As a special treat for my globetrotting mother-in-law I had secretly arranged some special accommodation for the night - a 1950s Fiat Train Carriage.

All aboard!

It had been turned into a motel, along with a Bristol Freighter Plane, but unfortunately there were no vacancies on the plane. The Mother Superior seemed quite pleased with my choice of accommodation although she did complain that she had been left in the second class carriage while Sarah and I were in First Class at the front of the carriage!

We were up early to get to Waitomo Glowworm Caves - it was a good job because they get up to 2000 visitors a day, whereas we had a small group of only ten people for our tour. We went into the Cathedral Cave first, which apparently has fantastic acoustics and has hosted concerts by Sting, Kiri Te Kanawa, Rod Stewart and the Vienna Boys Choir - up on the ceiling was the occasional glowworm. Then we got into a boat to go through the main caves, which are covered with glowworms - it looks like one of those images of the world taken from space where they show up all the lights from the cities - very impressive.

It was our first day since Raglan with rain and it belted down most of the way to Auckland. This was a bit of a pain because the roofrack straps we were using to carry my surfboard were letting water into the car at quite a rate. Sarah was getting wet in the backseat and was not amused!

On arrival in Auckland we checked into the apartment that Sarah had arranged, very nice it was too, the Oaks Apartments on Hobson Street, just a short walk from the Sky Tower, with air-conditioning, washing machine and dishwasher! That evening we consulted the Lonely Planet and went to the Cafe Midnight Express for dinner. It was a nice little Turkish restaurant and our meals were great but we made the mistake of ordering Turkish coffee after the meal, which spoiled my whole evening! I expected it to be strong, but in fact it was just plain awful, very thick with lots of coffee grounds in it, yuckkk!

It's not that funny!

It was in Auckland that we found a good use for the Mother Superior's gallon bottle of vinegar.....my shoes and socks. Some of you may recall from earlier blogs that Sarah has been complaining rather a lot about the smell emanating from my shoes and socks, well the Mother Superior had a remedy. Apparently putting newspaper soaked in vinegar into shoes kills the bacteria that cause the smell. While my shoes were being seen to, the Mother Superior decided to try pickling my socks too! Well, it seemed to work, because after pickling, then washing, there did seem to be a significant reduction in honkiness. Sarah was pleased.

It was a busy few days in Auckland - we had lunch at Orbit, the revolving restaurant in the Sky Tower, stopping along the way at the viewing deck, where we all had a go at standing on the glass floor panels that hang out over....well, nothing!

Nice shoes

The food in the Sky Tower was very nice - but it was weird because every few minutes somebody would go flying past the window in a downwards direction attached only to a couple of ropes - they have a strange bungee jump type thing from the Sky Tower and the jumping platform was just above the restaurant. We were all full from dinner, so we gave the bungee jump a miss.

Next day we caught the caught the courtesy bus to Kelly Tarltan's - it's difficult to miss because it has a giant shark on the roof! It was quite good fun there, they had a lot of penguins as well as some huge stingrays.

Happy Feet

For our last afternoon in Auckland we headed to Parnell to do a bit of shopping and flat white drinking. Parnell is a posh suburb of Auckland and we had high hopes, but to be honest there wasn't much there. The highlight, or actually lowlight was when we went into a specialist chocolate shop and cafe for a couple of hot chocolates and for the Mother Superior, a flat white. Here we met our first unpleasant New Zealander - the woman in the cafe really didn't want to serve us and seemed to think that she was doing us a favour! What made her stand out so much was the fact that everyone else you meet is so friendly and can't do enough for you, there's always one I suppose....

That evening Sarah and I told the Mother Superior that we would spend our last evening having dinner in a Belgian Bar - this was only half true, because we had something else planned. On the way there we stopped at the 'Minus 5 bar' - this bar is made completely of ice, even the glasses. You have to get dressed up to go in there, they give you a lovely warm Parka jacket with a hood, gloves and booties and then you go in for your drink. Sarah and the Mother Superior were very pleased to find that a cocktail was included in the admission price - so they sipped their drinks while sitting on an ice sofa covered with a deer fur blanket!

Can somebody turn the heating up?

After that we really did take the Mother Superior to 'The Occidental' - a very popular Belgian bar, famed for its mussels. Sarah and I both ordered the mussels, but we were a bit disappointed - they were big green lipped mussels and a bit chewy! We still managed to enjoy a few beers though, Sarah and the Mother Superior rekindled their love for Raspberry Beer, a Belgian speciality apparently. We didn't overdo it though - this was our last night in Auckland and next morning we would have to get up early and collect the campervan......