A Crisis That Wasn't in Kaikoura

When you have a month of travelling with barely a hitch or a problem the entire time, it's inevitable that something has to go wrong.

And so we decided to lose our documents.

We were staying the night in Kaikoura. We were roughly halfway done with our two-day "ceremonial last drive" home to Christchurch, and we were only a few days away from flying back home to the States.

We were relaxing in our hotel room, having eaten dinner a couple of hours ago in a casual little takeout place a couple of miles up the road. And that's when we realized we had left Laura's bag at the restaurant.

Uh-oh.

We jumped back in the car, rushed back to the restaurant (it was just closing up at 9:30), and asked, loudly, if anyone had SEEN A NAVY BLUE BACKPACK!!??....

..... .....

...And oh, it's right over there, exactly where we left it two hours ago. Duh.

This isn't to say you should go around leaving valuables all over New Zealand, expecting to find them hours later, unmolested. We were just lucky. But this little "crisis" does help illustrate, in a very small way, how things roll here in New Zealand.

One final note about Kaikoura: We stayed at the Donegal House and thought this little inn was so good that we had to recommend it to others. A nice atmosphere, beautiful gardens, free wireless internet, a large room and a friendly Irish pub, all for the reasonable price of NZ$150 (about US$80) a night.




Horses in a paddock next to the inn. Laura offered the horse on the right a sugar cube, but she hated it and spit it out.



We like to think that this bird stood guard over Laura's bag at the restaurant.


If you spent a month looking at scenes like this every day, you'd be in such a state of bliss that you'd start leaving your stuff in restaurants too.


View from our hotel room door that evening:


Related Links:
Donegal House
Schoolhouse Road, Kaikoura
Phone: 03 319 5083

Lake Taupo and the Drive Back to Wellington

Today was another day of driving, which meant another chance to see still more of New Zealand's stunning scenery. In about six hours of driving time, we went from Rotorua to just north of Wellington, the town where we would catch the ferry the next morning.

On our way was Lake Taupo, formed by a massive volcanic explosion that occurred in AD 186. Today, it's one of the trout fishing capitals of the world.


We stopped into the town of Taupo, a bustling yet casual sports community that hosts the Crater to Lake Challenge, a multi-sport single-day race event involving 4.3k of skiing, 35.7k of mountain biking, 34.5k of road biking, 16.6k of kayaking, 31.5k of water skiing and 11.5k of running.

And Dan thought running marathons was hard!

We spent a relaxed hour enjoying a delicious lunch and coffee at the Bodyfuel Cafe.



And then headed back on the road. Here is Mount Ruapehu, as it looms into view south of Lake Taupo:


More scenes from the road:



Chalk cliffs, a famous landmark in the region surrounding Taihape, NZ (also south of Taupo):


We decided to spend the night in Porirua, about a 40-minute drive from the Wellington ferry terminal. And as it turned out, at NZ$150 (about US$80), this nice little double room with a kitcheonette and complimentary french press coffee was the most expensive accommodation we had on our entire one month tour of New Zealand. If you can just get past the airfare, it just isn't that expensive to get around in this country.

Finally, after a long day of driving, we enjoyed a couple of badly-needed beers and some fish and chips in a Kelly's Irish Pub. Tomorrow, we'll be taking the ferry back to the South Island. Our New Zealand adventure, sadly, is beginning to draw to a close.

Couchsurfing in New Zealand

We would be remiss if we didn't say a few words about Couchsurfing on our New Zealand blog, since it was an important part of our trip here.

What is Couchsurfing? Well, check out their site for one thing. But we think it's one of the most exciting and creative ideas in travel. Why stay alone in a sterile hotel, when in almost every city in the world there are open, friendly and generous hosts who are willing to offer you a night or two in their spare bedroom or on their couch? It's one of the best ways we've found to connect with like-minded people all around the world.

Laura and I have been participating in Couchsurfing for years. We've hosted some 20-25 people--from places like Austria, Belgium, Brazil, London and of course New Zealand--in our Manhattan flat during the three or so years we lived there. And many of the people we have hosted have become good friends. Laura even says that in some ways Couchsurfing restored her faith in humanity.

As it turns out, thanks to Couchsurfing we already knew three of the Kiwis you've already met on this blog: Richard and Colleen, as well as Dan, all spent time with us in New York. And a big part of why we went to New Zealand in the first place was to "return the favor" and visit them in their home country.

As if that isn't enough, we also stayed with Steven in Wellington, and Jen and Mike in Tauranga. All together, we "couchsurfed" for eight of our 27 nights in New Zealand. There is no better way to get to know local people, learn far more about a community than any guidebook will ever tell you, and last but not least, dramatically reduce your travel costs.

Take a close look at Couchsurfing's site. Consider being a host or a guest. And if you have any questions about our experiences or about Couchsurfing in general, feel free to email us any questions.

Rotorua: Phew!! What Is That Smell?

There are lots of remarkable things about the vacation town of Rotorua, New Zealand: the beautiful Lake Rotorua, with affordable hotels lining the main roads through town, the amazing geothermal pools and related sights in the region, opportunities to learn about Maori culture in performances for the tourists here, and of course a kiwi rescue and research facility.

But the most remarkable thing to us as we drove into town was the distinct odor of sulphur in the air, a typical feature of any area with extensive geothermal activity. Our hotel owner said we'd get used to it, but we didn't really. It wasn't noxious or terrible-smelling or anything like that; rather, it reminded us of driving through a small town in the south that has a big chemical plant or a paper mill nearby. Not exactly pleasant, but it won't kill you.

Rotorua is so central to the North Island that if you visit it on the way north, you're likely to pass through town again on the way back south. And since our one night here mainly featured Laura and me getting into an argument (if you must know, it was triggered by a debate we had on how to handle writing this blog...), we later decided to stay here another night on the way back from our drive up north to the Whangarei area. We didn't want to pass up the chance to see some examples of the volcanic activity here, and Laura was hoping to get a chance to see some Kiwi birds too.

Plus, the hotel we stayed at had a really nice hot tub.


Stay tuned! Tomorrow we'll run two posts: one featuring some creepy, burping and bubbling geothermal mud pools, and another with the key sights inside the Waiotapu geothermal park.

Easy Accommodations in Palmerston North

In our last post, we left you with what passes for a snafu here in the lower part of New Zealand's North Island--which basically meant driving another hour up the highway to find a backup motel just outside of the town of Palmerston North, New Zealand.

Actually, the only real snafu was a minor argument Laura and I had about the competing merits of a room in the hand versus a room in the bush. I thought, after our experiences with everything closing down so early in Motueka, that we should take the first place we found. Laura wanted to stay someplace that didn't suck.

Neither of us should ever have worried. Our little motel, like almost all of the places we stayed at on our trip, was owner-operated by a nice older couple. And we knew the room would be perfectly fine when she asked us "would you like a jag of milk for your tea in the morning?" and she poured fresh milk from their fridge into a carafe for us.

The next morning, we asked the two of them a few questions about the area and got all kinds of suggestions about places worth visiting in the general area--including, of course, plenty of motel recommendations. We got advice on Tongariro National Park and its famous volcanoes, just another two hours' drive north of where we were; and we got still more advice on what to see in the town of Rotorua, which was four hours north of us and famous for its geothermal activity.

The town of Palmerston North isn't particularly special, and it isn't a major tourist destination in New Zealand, but it has many of the features we've grown accustomed to seeing throughout this wonderful country. It seems like every town here is well-laid out, easy to navigate, friendly and welcoming to tourists.

An immaculately renovated former warehouse, near the town center:

Clock Tower and Carillon:

Palmerston North War Memorial:

Modern art near the town square:

Peka Peka Beach, Otaki Beach, and Our First Logistical Snafu

Even when things go wrong for us here, they kind of still go right.

We were supposed to stay the night with a host in the town of Otaki, NZ, but our host had to leave town suddenly to look after her father who had become ill.

So at around 7:00 or 8:00pm that night, we had to find a new place to stay. This would be the very first time on this trip that we would have to line up same-day accommodations.

You may not want to try this on the South Island during the busy summer tourist season, simply because many of the communities near key South Island sights are quite small and often don't have that many places to stay (this is particularly true if you want to limit yourself to budget accommodations at hostels or backpacker lodges). For example, if we hadn't lined up accommodations a day or two ahead of time in Franz Joseph Glacier or in Anakiwa, we would probably be sleeping in the car those nights.

But up here on the North Island it was no big deal at all. We drove for about 50km to the nearest sizeable town, Palmerston North, NZ, and quickly found a nice, clean and spacious motel room for only NZ$100 (about US$55).

And in the meantime, we had the chance to spend the afternoon and evening wandering around two of the several little beach towns on the lower west coast of the North Island.

Peka Peka Beach and Otaki Beach are tiny little communities less than two hours' drive north of Wellington, filled with modest little homes and blessed with easily accessible (and nearly deserted) beaches.


In the USA, it is impossible to find beach towns like this. The modest homes would have been replaced by monster mansions (or worse, high-rise hotels), and the quietest beach towns would attract so many people seeking quiet that they'd no longer be quiet any more.

But New Zealand's paradises aren't ruined by too many people. After all, this country has a population of only four million on a land mass roughly the size of Oregon. That's the advantage of living on two huge and hard-to-reach islands.