June 26-28

Burke: June 26^th & 27^th 
                I think that I’m developing memory lapses, because I had to ask what we did 6 hrs. ago, or the sheer awesomeness has temporarily given me amnesia. Ok, it’s all good now. So yesterday, we woke up and had a little jaunt through Windy Welly (Wellington.) It really proved its name the night before when it was gusting on our 25^th hotel floor at 4:00 in the morning. We then saw the national museum of New Zealand, Te Papa. It had lots of interesting exhibits about New Zealand’s wildlife, history, and their native people, The Maori. After Te Papa, we drove to Whanganui. We climbed a 176-step tower and saw a lovely view at the top. The side effects of going back down were jello-legs. We spent the night in Whanganui and had tacos for dinner.

                The next day we woke up and drove toward Waitomo. The drive had great scenery until it started snowing, I couldn’t see anything after that. Well, not until we got to The Grand Chateau, a giant mansion that was a ski resort. We were able to go outside and have a (snow) ball. I made Fort Burke and Josh and Dad made a snowman. We then finished driving to Waitomo and ate a lasagna made by Mom.

               
Laura: As I may have mentioned- the boys are a little short on words. The time in Wellington wasn’t too remarkable outside the Lord of the Rings tour. It is a lovely town that is very reminiscent of San Francisco, right down to the active earthquake zone. At one point the shore line for the harbor was about 500 feet above where it is now- an earthquake in the late 1800’s lifted up the entire harbor and gave the town a lot more real estate to build on. It is the capital of New Zealand, which is now embroiled in their own high profile murder trial (think OJ Simpson without the celebrity). The drive from Wellington to Whanganui was one of our easier drives- minus the 5-7 miles that went right along the crashing waves of the shore. Whanganui was a stopping point for us, not much to see there, but it did give us a good shelter for some rain and wind coming through the region. The next day we hoped to see the highest point on the North Island and the active volcanoes used as the Mt. Doom for the Lord of the Rings- Mt. Tongariro and Ruaphepu.

We couldn’t see them due to the 6+ inches of snow and the low clouds that accompanied them. We did stop at the Grand Chateau Tongariro and had a fun snow play day. Only 20 minutes away it was green, sunny with rainbows and no trace of snow. We headed to Waitomo.

We stayed 2 nights at Waitomo, best known for its extensive network of glow worm caves.  On Thursday, we took a short hike up to the Waitomo lookout, and saw a country very much like I picture Ireland- and found a flock of turkeys to visit in the process. In the afternoon, we had booked an adventure tour, and we were not disappointed. We went with Kiwi Raft Adventures and started by putting on wetsuits and harnesses and getting a short course in abseiling (what I call rappelling). We then abseiled into a 90 foot cavern, with a stream running at the bottom. This was followed by a walk upstream to a few caving spots where we tried our hands at squeezing through small spots and pulling ourselves out of holes and caving spots.

We then got a lesson on glowworms, turned out our headlamps and saw a constellation of glowing worm butts. They produce the phosphorescence to burn off their waste, as they have no other way to get rid of it. We then jumped into our innertubes and proceeded to coast down the stream, passing our entry point and continuing on in complete darkness at times. After a nice long float, we dismounted and did a little more caving. Our guide, Simon, was encouraging, even if his language wasn’t always family friendly!

After a nice warm drink and some chocolate, we then walked against the current back up to our entry point. This was the hardest part of the trip as we had gotten plenty wet and tired, and it was sometimes hard work slogging back upstream, but we all made it.

Our final part of the adventure was to climb out of the cave we were in. Simon practically walked up to the belay point, and then Burke was the first up, followed by Josh, then George and I brought up the rear. By the time I went, it was almost completely dark, so I didn’t have much help in seeing where I was going- There were plenty of hand and footholds, and the slope wasn’t too severe, so despite some jelly legs and wetsuits holding us back, we all made it up and back to our waiting van. It was a true adventure and amazing time for all.

 George won the award for caving, or the ‘superman’ award, Burke had the award for humor and ‘aiding and abetting’ award, Josh got the perseverance award as well as ‘I am ready!’ award, and Laura got the ‘that’s why we wear a helmet award’ or maybe the ‘I just want to take a swim’ award.  The next day we headed to Hamilton, but not before stopping for a Finn Brothers museum exhibit in their hometown of Te Awamuta and a full tour of the Hobbiton set near Matamata- but I’ll let someone else talk about those.