11/2 NZ 2011-2012 part 2
New Zealand - the land of the long white cloud.
Part 2: Paihia (Bay of Islands), Cape Reinga & 90 mile beach
I took the flight back to New Zealand from Australia on December 4 and arrived to Auckland on the evening of Dec 4th (2011. I got picked up from the airport by a german couple (Gyde and Richard)that I met at Bounce hostel in Sydney. On Dec 5th (next day) we decided to take a small roadtrip to the West coast of Auckland (Piha & another beach I cannot recall the name of.. AMAZING!). I love that place, it's really, really beautiful, and considering it's 40-60 minutes drive from Auckland's Central Business Disctrict it sure doesn't feel as if it's close to such a big city.
Anyhow, we spend a few hours walking around on the beach taking photographs, and finally back at my place we cooked us some awesome food - rice cooked in coconutmilk with beans + chicken for me and Richard. We put on a movie (Thor - which were totally crap by the way) and they stayed over for the night.
The next day (Dec 6)I was going to jump on the Kiwi Experience bus and start my real New Zealand adventures. I was super excited but had unfortunately picked up a nasty cold. With an early pickup time (7am) outside of Base hostel on Queenstreet (Auckland CBD), I had to get up extra early to jump on the bus & ferry from North Shore in to the city. I felt quite miserable to be honest as I jumped on the bus that would take us up to Paihia (Bay of Islands) on the East coast, approx 3-4 hours further up North from Auckland. Luckily there weren't many people on the bus so and I didn't need to be super social as everyone seemed to be quite tired (backpackers don't fancy jumping on buses at 7am in the morning, might have something to do with the frequent partylife).
Anyhow, I was a bit surprised about the bus and its seats that kept falling off continuously if you decided to whipp your ass forward a bit too much. I definitely didn't think it met up to the standards of bus quality I had in mind, but as my travels proceeded it didn't take me long untill I understood the whole concept of traveling with these buses. There're so many of them, so basicly the nicest ones are the ones going down South from Auckland.
3-4 hours later (can't recall how long it actually took) we arrived to Paihia, checked in to the hostel (Pipi Patch?) (who had a hot tub!!) and socialized for a while before heading out to check out the super tiny city (really, the city center were stretched out over one small street). I met Jan here, the first german guy I became friend with during my Kiwi Experience adventures. Need I say I soon realised there were lots and lots of germans traveling around New Zealand. It was inevitable to not at least meet 5 germans either on the buses or at the hostels.
Bay of Islands is a lovely place, if you have a boat. Me and Jan decided to go out for what we thought would be a rather short hike, but later turned out to take ages - only to realise we had totally gone the wrong way (it was apparentally better to return the same way you came) as we headed back towards the hostel. I didn't enjoy the surroundings at all as we walked inland towards a waterfall (I guess I had become a bit spoiled by New Zealands beauty already). Turns out the waterfall wasn't anything spectacular at all, rather a small one located just by a fast-laned road. We then ended up walking over 5 km back in flip flops - or jandals as they call them in New Zealand - (on the big road) back to Paihia. We tried to hitch-hike but with no success, and as we approached our hostel I had already managed to kick my big toe on an annoying bump in the asfalt - resulting in a relatively heavy bleeding, but luckily with no pain. To sum it up: the hike was pretty miserable, maybe even more so due to my continuously dripping nose. I don't normally complain about these things but I want to keep it as truthfull as possible on here ;)
The next day I had booked in a boat safari along some of the beautiful islands outside Paihia. Stupidly enough I had taken some pills that helps to keep your nostrils clear (yeah, SMART Alex :P) so my nose went totally crazy and didn't seem to have the decency to stop bothering me. Not to forget that I had lost my new sunglasses in Sydney and was too stubborn to buy me new ones (thought of saving money..). So there I sat, on the boat, with a dripping nose and squinting eyes due to the strong sun, trying to look as comfortable as possible. I didn't want to portray myself as some virus infected human being that you regret sitting next to, but polite enough (or stupid) to move away from (change to another seat), so I tried my hardest to look as normal as possible :) Anyhow, the possibility came up to jump in to the sea (18,5*C) and swim with dolphins, which was something I really wanted to do! but considering the cirqumstances I decided not too, as I wanted to get healthy as soon as possible! so no dolphin swimming for me, but I got some great shots on the people who did it (hehe, weeeh00). Overall, the tour was really nice and I would've really enjoyed it if I didnt feel so miserable! I sure learned my lesson not to insert any more of those pills into my fragile system :p
In Paihia I also met Martin Kendrick (UK guy who travelled by himself) and Brooke & Hayden (NZ peeps who travelled together). I met a lot of other people up in Paihia but Brooke, Hayden and Martin would turn out to be fellow travellers down the North Island (from Auckland down South).
That evening I ended up with a bounch of people at a secluded place further down the beach, playing drinking games (with a very stupid "one up - one down" game from Martin)and just enjoying the stars. It was really optional to sit and do drinking games at the main beach as it's illegal to drink at the beach in Paihia, you can get heavy fines for it. Anyhow, overall a nice evening with nice people :)
The next day I jumped on the bus again that would take me up for a day trip to Cape Reinga and 90 mile beach. The busdriver was a bit hard to understand as he had a strong Maori accent and the microphone was cracking up all the time. We did a mid-stop before Cape Reinga at a forest with massive trees (don't remember what they're called and too lazy to look up!) which was quite cool. Then we headed up to Cape Reinga, which was AMAZING! It was so nice, and my cold wasn't bad either :)
After Cape Reinga we did another "mid-stop" at a pretty sweet beach not far away from Cape R. We layed in the sun for a bit and jumped back on the bus to head to 90 mile beach and the sand dunes up its top. The sand dunes were amazing, almost like a desert just by the beach. From the top of the dunes we boogie boarded down (or body-boarded), it went pretty fast and was loads of fun :)
Drenched in sand we jumped back on to the bus and drove along the 90 mile beach, it's such a massive beach that they've made it a highway. Although you'll need to watch out as it's easy to get stuck in the sand if you're not sure how to drive there!
