Soaking Up our Last few Days in New Zealand

Plenty of additional great statues to
be found on our drive back to Auckland

We can’t lie to you, loyal readers… we’re back in the states as we write this.  In fact, we’re writing this last NZ post from our global full-mooning headquarters in the basement at 6 Oakwood Road, in Paxton, MA.  We know… Our blog posts are never quite as good when we allow time to pass before writing them.  But we have a good excuse this time. 

We’d love to tell you it was a hectic, somewhat frenzied departure from NZ, and we just didn’t have time to write.  But it wasn’t… We had a smooth departure, with plenty of time to make our way back up to the North Island, and then back up to Auckland, and then on to the airport.

We’d love to tell you that Dave’s spleen was once again an unnatural (and impressive) size, and we were too busy continuing our study of public health systems around the world.  But we weren't.  Aside from a significant number of sand-fly bites, we’re both in fine health this time around. 

We’d love to tell you we spent all our money and couldn’t afford internet access in the last week, and therefore couldn’t write. That would at least be half-right… we certainly spent plenty of money.  But that didn’t stop us from doing anything else, and it definitely wouldn’t have stopped us from writing this last blog post.

And personally, Dave would love to be able to tell you that Amy gently placed Dougie in another ditch, and we were stranded on some isolated dirt road for days, preventing us from writing to you all.  But no, aside from a drained battery one morning, we had no car troubles to slow us down. 

No, dear friends, loyal readers, and Ira… the truth is, we were soaking in some hot springs… a whole lot of hot springs.  And given the choice between writing to all of you, or soaking in some incredibly relaxing hot springs… well, we’re not quite sure how to break this to you… But maybe try looking at it this way:  at least you came in second?

So, when we last left you, we were discussing how Dave has quickly learned in our first few months of marriage that Amy is always right.  We’d just hung up our tramping boots and put away our tent, caught an incredibly unlikely ride into Queenstown, enjoyed some of the most impressive burgers around, and were reunited with Dougie in our home-away-from-home, the Wanaka Top 10 Holiday Park. 

From there, we started our long journey northward, with about 5 days left to enjoy New Zealand on our way back up to Auckland.  We planned to do three things during our last few days in Aoteroa (New Zealand's Maori name, meaning 'the land of the long white cloud'):  we had a whole lot of miles to cover in our running shoes, a whole lot of kilometers to drive in our van, and a whole lot of hot pools to sample.



The famous church at Lake Tekapo...
not a bad view while praying for eternal salvation

 We first headed to Lake Tekapo, widely recognized as one of the finest places in the southern hemisphere for star-gazing.  The University of Canterbury built its observatory here, and the area is known for an unusual number of nights of clear skies, free from light pollution.  We climbed up Mt. John, where the telescopes are located, to the Astro Cafe, which our Lonely Planet promises is the finest place in the entire world to enjoy a cup of coffee.  360 degree views from the summit, with Lake Tekapo below, and the Southern Alps in the distance (home to Mt. Cook, NZ's tallest peak -- it's Maori name means 'cloud piercer', which is pretty darn cool).  Neither the views nor the coffee disappointed. 

Then it was time for some hot springs.  These, we learned, were not natural thermal pools… but they were still pretty cool.  They had built an outdoor ice rink (for skating and ice hockey), and somehow they use the byproduct energy from cooling the ice to heat the pools.  Perhaps one of you understands science better than us… we just thought it was neat… and fairly relaxing as wellJ.

From there, we headed north to Christchurch.  Somber sights, there, due to all the devastation from the earthquake.  We had big plans to spend our tourism dollars there as our contribution to the earthquake recovery.  But very sadly, every store we had researched in advance was either completely destroyed in the earthquake, undergoing renovations as a result of significant damage from the earthquake, or located in the central business district, which was completely closed off to all civilians due to the earthquake – maybe 10x10 city blocks.  It was some pretty staggering devastation.  We walked around a little, drove around a little, and then felt too much like tragedy voyeurs and decided not to linger -- instead we continued on up the coast.

After a few long training runs, a ferry ride back to the north island, and many kilometers of driving, we reached thermal country in NZ.  We spent one night at Waikati Falls – depending on how you look at it, it’s either a campsite that comes with its own thermal pools, or thermal pools that come with a campsite.  Either way, it’s a pretty fantastic concept.  We’ve told you in previous blogs that we think all tramps should come with their own hot springs.  We’d like to amend that statement to now include all drive-in campsites as well.  Ending a long day of driving by staring up into the Milky Way while soaking in some thermal pools… what could possibly be better than that?  Perhaps only waking up the next morning and starting the day with another soak in those same glorious hot springs. 

We explored Rotorua the next morning.  It’s one of the most famous tourism destinations in New Zealand – known for its thermal geysers and boiling mud pots.   But just not really our scene… a bit too touristy for us.  So we cruised out of there, continued northward, and stayed just outside of Waihi Beach… at another campsite with its own hot springs!  We could really get used to this whole ‘soak in the morning, soak in the evening’ routine that we were getting into!  One last training run in NZ the next morning (followed of course by one last soak in those hot springs), and we continued up to Auckland. 

Soaking in hot springs our last few days was a great way to reflect back on all the wonderful experiences we had in New Zealand – exploring the country's incredible natural beauty, meeting some really great Kiwis, and falling through NZ’s beautiful skies.  We really fell in love with this place.  From Cape Reinga in the north, where the oceans met… to the beautiful alpine peaks around Mt. Aspiring in the south… NZ is definitely one of the most beautiful places one can imagine.  We’d definitely be living here, if it weren’t so incredibly far awayJ.

It was a teary goodbye with Dougie… he was really good to us, and we’re going to miss him dearly.  Please, friends, if our blog has inspired any of you to visit NZ, we know a great van that would love to show you the sights.  Just let us know in advance, so we can send you with his disco ball…