New Zealand Trip 2003

New Zealand - Most Beautiful Country In the World!

I've just had a wonderful holiday in New Zealand (December 2003). It is the most beautiful country in the world that I have seen so far in all my travels. Far more beautiful than Australia even, and that's got to be saying something, coming from me !

I think what you notice with New Zealand's beauty, is everything is close together on two smallish islands (North Island and South Island), whereas in Australia, our beauty is scattered across our massive continent. We still have beauty, but it takes several months to see it all, whereas it takes about two to three weeks to see everything in New Zealand properly and enjoy the fun times to be had there.

I had never really had the inclination to visit New Zealand before in my travels. It was only that my fiancée Brent (r-bear) invited me to fly across the Tasman Sea to spend some time with him and see the beautiful country he lives in that prompted me to make the travel bookings.

Brent was the perfect tour guide and host for my trip on the North Island. He collected my mother and myself from Auckland airport and drove us to virtually every scenic spot on the North Island. (Well.. there was one waterfall he didn't show me, saying it was too far off the road.. so pfft to him because the road sign said only a few kilometres! LOL ) But all in all, he did a great job, even tried to get me to pronounce all the Maori town/city names. What a mouthful they are! Places like Whangarei, Waipu, Paihia, Waitangi, Whakatane, Otorohanga, Whakamaru, and Te Awamutu (which just disappeared off the planet as we never drove through it on our way to Waitomo Caves). If a Maori town name has WH in it.. its pronounced as an "F", so as an example Whakatane sounds like "Fuk a tarnie" - my mother was not impressed, to say the least! LOL

Every day we saw spectacular scenery. We went on a cruise around the Bay of Islands, saw about 70 or so pilot whales swimming beside our boat including one baby whale supposedly just 24 hours old learning to swim and we cruised through a hole in a rock, cut out by the continual waves pounding through it. It was a fun trip, especially seeing all the whales.

Other interesting sights included the Waitomo Caves where we slowly glided through caves in a dinghy and saw thousands of glow worms on the ceiling. It was just like looking at the stars at night.

My most memorable sight to see on the North Island was "The Buried Village" near Rotorua, as this brought tears to my eyes. In 1886 the eruption of Mt Tarawera claimed 150 lives and buried the village with ash and mud and in recent years parts of the village has been excavated. So sad also to see the destruction of the Pink and White Terraces caused by that same eruption, as they were once known as the 8th wonder of the world. Another tourist spot was at the Whakarewarewa Thermal Springs with geysers shooting up to the sky making spectacular rainbows in the mist and this was also the location of hundreds of boiling mud pits. Be warned though, a rotten egg smell wafts through the air in Rotorua - or was that Brent farting?

After a week, we left Brent's company on the North Island and mum and I flew to the South Island and with a hire car drove through the Southern Alps to the West Coast. Scenery was just spectacular as we drove through the snow capped mountains. Memorable sights included the Franz Joseph Glacier, Fox Glacier, Mt Cook, Milford Sound Fjord, "The Remarkables" mountain range near Queenstown, and many small scenic towns along the way. Major cities visited included Invercargill, Dunedin, Timaru, birthplace of some my ancestors and also Brents [oh no!! maybe he is really my cousin !! - so thats what's wrong with him! LOL] and Christchurch. After just over a week in the South Island, Mum and I flew back to Australia, to meet up with long lost relatives in Melbourne.

One cousin lived about 2 hour drive from Melbourne, so along the way we met up with some #gabriel channel regulars. We had lunch with Lexxee and her husband Frang and children, and later popped into Horsey's workplace and surprised the hell out of her and then got Mel out of bed in the middle of the afternoon (OK she was tired from all the pre-Christmas shopping!) and I showed her all my pictures from the New Zealand trip.

It was just an incredible trip, and I recommend to everyone to go visit New Zealand! (I would've suggested you call in on Brent too, he would have made you a coffee, but he is living back with me in Australia now - lucky him!)

~~ thanks Brent for a great time ~~

I will be updating this page one day, with pictures of my trip, just not in the mood for it right now.

~~~ New Zealand - most beautiful country in the world.. no wonder they call it "God's Own" ~~~

This page was created Saturday 10 January 2004 at 5.00pm

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