Kia ora (tuesday 26th July)

From whitianga to There are many long and winding roads here in new zealand and on a slightly uncomfortable stomach it can be a little harsh and nausea inducing. But much relief and astonishment was had when we found 5 people on the bus who had never seen Top Gun, which I beleive is a criminal offencce in several countries

Our destination today wasRoratoa, check out eh link for all the back ground info. But essentailly this whole town... and the surrounding area is a Sulpher stinking pit! It reminds me of the smell of my feet sometimes.

Myself, Stacy and Chantal where hunting around town for a opticians but they eventaully got sucked into a tourist tat shop in town. Even I got tempted by something but It is present for my Dad, that is winging it's way home.

The afternoon was spent at The New Zealand Maori Arts & Crafts Institute » where amoungst all the thermal mud pools and cool geothermal sceneary and Maori wood carving demonstartions I Learnt o do the Haka with all the boys on the Bus... Video to follow. when I get a place I can really upload all of my photos and mini video's. Surrifce it to say it wasn't too bad. But whetehr we scared our enemies... the women in the audience is another matter...!

The Girls you see are not allowed to do the Haka so they do a dance with poi it wasn't as energetic as ours but fun to watch none the less. realise we only learnt the Haka in 15 mins...

We went to a traditional Maori festioval which is for the benefit of the tourists $70 we saw the professioanls doing dances for us and also welcoming us into their "village" but most impotantly we atre food froma sground stone oven known as a hangi and it was a eat as much as you can buffet!! strangely enough all us back packers on the bus went up for several servings. Bizarelly I felt a wave of sleep hit me in the midlle of their dance performance for us and I had to pull myself together.

Any way more memories and tales later on.. stuff to do here in New zealand. It was on this night that I bumped into the person who would join us the next day Lesley...

G out of here!

Kiwi experience (25th Monday)

Blogging today from Smitty's Sport's Bar (Monday ) in Whitianga on the north Island of New Zealand... and I have seen some pretty Amazing and beautiful sights all day long.

Allow me to fill in some of the details for you all.
After arriving in the ACB here in Auckland I went out for a few drinks at the globe bar here with this one guy I bumped into here in the dorm. I would have been dancing except we saw what could only be described as 'Come Dancing' meets car crash. A 50 year old was break dancing as well as 2 asian girls (who could well have been Lady boy Prostitutes) and a couple of guys who decided to throw off the shirts and dance around.

The sight of these people doing only what I would loosely define as define as dancing (they were also using a pole )put people off the dance floor. which was a shame. But in fact two of the people on the bus this morning where also int eh bar and they said that the sight of this nutter bunch dancing/flailing around the dance floor made every one want to leave!!

My bus promptly turned up got on and realised that my long sleave top was still in the bar I vacated at 13.00 last night. and At the moment it has to be said that it is winter here... and that means rain! Damn. But early into the trip that day a visit to a local supermarket meant a new black hoody top

The first day was filled with a visit to cathedral cove. some footie out there was a great laugh.
then we headed off to Hot water beech where we hit the tide at just the right time so that we could dig up the beach a little and expose at one area a hot geothermal water spring that bubbles up from the sand. Inventively they call the area Hot water beach.

Then to bed at the hostel at Whitianga
after we had some lovely chips and spring rolls. In fact there was a little too many. We had this pile of chips and greasy congelled fatty fried fish the next morning... needless to say we didn't eat it! (but we were tempted.

...

Um I really wanted to wait before the blogging this but Oh my god.. I have just jumped out of a plane 12,000 ft up in the air above Lake taupo... It is so hard to describe the sensations and feeling runnign through me at the moment.. but let me just say that there is nothing... nothing like it and my body and my emotional state are just in a complete high! I will hopefully be putting up a mini video of my landing soon!

It only cost me the equivalent of 60 UKP or 150 NZD but I got out of it the feeling that there is now nothing I can't Acheive... Nothing can stop me.. And I don't want this buzz to stop or end...

An amazing experience that only my jumper buddies today Daniele, Leslie, Chantal, Stacy, Markus can understand.

"Nothing going get in our way .... not tonight" like the lines from a classic rock song!

FORZA

G

I am alive

Just very busy doing things and with not a lot of internet acces and time I can't blog as effectily but in about 2-3 day I will have a full and fun report on all my activities.

ps I am going skydiving.
G

I blog from the Land Down Under

There is something to be said of being able to rock up to a country get into your hostel, then within the space of 2 hours book the next 2 weeks of your holiday.

With the time I have available here in New Zealand, now 2 weeks instead of one, I will be only have time to do the north of the island, so this is the trip I will be dfoing initially from tomorrow.

Kiwi experience

It is the geseyerland and great lakes trip. and depending ont eh time I have available, I will be doing the awesome and top bit trip as well.

I will wander around town today and try to look for a wireless place to upload my photo's and final San Fran blog.

Who loves ya...
G

Auckland.

Yep I have arrived and will be checking in here at the ACB at 11.00.


Couple of things to note first of all with the time difference and the flight times... I don't feel jet lagged at all.. I have just simply lost a day.. which is criminal since no alcohol was involved...

And after having spent to much time in america.. it was strange to see traffic on the other side of the road again... it looked wrong.

Now I have to investigate the Magic bus which I hope to be taking around the north island.

other things to write i know

I do have a ton of other stuff to write but at present i am using another extortionate inter kiosk at LA airport... i am now heading off to new zealand... after a day on a grey hound from SF... and i also have a small hangover from the drinking and dancing i did last night at the Cat club again ,for now i am heading to the other side of the equator and the date line for the first time in my life!!!! bring it on... Missing SF allready...LOVE ALL

Tattoo

Yes so I now have a tattoo, it got done by one of the staff here in the hostel who is a Tattoo artist. It got done about 9-10 days ago. Here is the picture of it being done... enjoy.

Surfing california

So Lisa Bermeo, invited us to stay at her house over the weekend and it just seemed llike too good of an offer to trun down. She livd up in Marin County in a place called Petaluma. A great little town just north of San francisco.

So we spent a fun little weekend that involved us going to Point reyes a completly fogged in ligh house with her and simon, one of her sons. And like all kids, he instantly leeched on to me... I seem to have a magnetic ability with children in that they are compelled towards me...

Any way we had a fun time at the light house and the peasouper therein, but then we headed all of to see charlie and the choclate factory. Now let me lay my cards on the table here. I like Tim Burton's films... but some of the last ones have been les than adequate of his vision... so I wasn't expecting much, but it is a work of genius. brilliant. He is back in form and also I saw the trailer for Corpse bride his new film, which looks absolutely amazing!

Any back to the house where I finally taught Lisa (and simon) the card game shithead. Some how Lisa had avoided playing the game for the whole fo the 16 days we spent on the bus. Honestly, I feel as if I am on a mission now to spread this card game all around the world, to people everywhere.

Thge next day was the most important as we went to a place called Bolinas with an amazing beach. And it seems to be run by a bunch of facist hippies. For example they tear down road signs to the town so that people have less chance of finding it. Trees are pulled out of peoples gardens if they ruin the old town aesthetic of the area. And yet the town is very chilled and bummed out and full of hippies. I am sure there is a movie script in the idea of facist hippies... suggestions?

Any way back to the surfing... and I should point out that ruby came out with us on this day (lisa's daughter). But it toook me about 1 1/2 hours to remember how i used to do surfing in cornwall a couple of years ago.
But it did come back to me, and I even managed to stand on the board for a bit.

There is more to follow but I need to sort out my new zealand flights

Yosemite and tattoo

So I suppose the first thing I should tell you is how amazing the Yosemite trip was. It was an intense 4 nights and three days.

All the people who had to get on the bus had to meet up at the back of the greyhound bus Station. For those of you who know anything abou these places, you will know that they stick to high heaven of piss...

So 21.00 we were all there, All 35 of us! A very full bus load, in such a way that I knew that there was going to be a whole heap of problems keeping track of personal stuff all through the upcoming days.


I knew in advance that Jimmy the great Driver from my last trip was my driver again... but he had no idea, so when he said hello to the whole group, and I answered back in such a way that he heard me. I could see his face light up a little... that was fun. Especially as he singled me out... Oh dear!

Remember this was the first night on the bus for Heid so I thought I would give her a chance to get a 'good' night's sleep. So I arranged to get the cave rooms/beds under the table, occasioanlly called the 'honeymoon suites' because they are quite private. During the night however it got really hot and heid discoverd that she has a huge aversion to confined spaces (practically having a fit). So that made my night's sleeping equally comfortable.

So we awoke to find ourselves in Yosemite and after breakfast and some more driving we went on a hike up Vernal falls. Yosemite on the whole is mightily impressive with waterfalls, rocks and trees and giant granite stone faces. The hike we did was about 2-3 km but involved hiking up massive stone steps in the waterfalls rain drenching precipitation. An amzing Hike and thoroughly debilatating.

I should also point out that I have a really nasty little chest infection. That meant my voice now sounds like Barry White and I have a rasping cough that could choke a snake (ps it is getting better). So climbing was a bit harder than it should have been.

Once again this country's landscape is amazing, and it is scary to think how much of it have and haven't done in the past three weeks.

When we headed back to the bus it wasn't there when it was supposed to be so we were going through a minor mutiny thinking "Well we were here on time!!"

Thankfully and obviously the bus arrived and we drove to ur final destination... and we drove some more..... and then we turned around and then we seemed to be going down some darkened blair witch project roads at about 11.00. Jimmy wasn't sure were the camp ground was. So we all piled off the bus and I turned into the gentler form of Gordon Ramsey. Helping sort and organise the food preparation for dinner. I was a Cooking demon. Adam (the Co-driver who didn't drive but cheffed) described me as an excellent sous Chef. Which with his experience is worthy praise.

So at about 12.30 we arrived close enough to where we where mean to be to be able to get some sleep.

Day 2
After the breakfast we head straight to lake Mono which with it's Salt water and Calcium carbonate had a pH 10 and was 3 times saltier than the sea it had an eiree quallity the landscape round there. But it was fun to get a in, though I only went in to my waist. I will explain why later.
after lunch we then headed to the second of our day trips which was the hot springs nearby... they consosted of a rover which passed by a geothermal vent that heated the water up on a regular and semiirregular basis.
So in some spots your feet could be cold but your bum would be hot.

So there was constant cries of "ahhhhhh" "ahhh too HOT" "oooowwww fuck that's cold" and the rest in the space of 1 min. much fun it could us amused for hours.. and it did. PS this time due to the rules of the place we had to keep our clothes on!


The night was our big bonfire camp out night. Where we created the INFERNO. a fire so big that we all had to step about 10 meters away from the bad boy. ANd atfer some drinking we all decided to introduce our selves to each other. Jim (Captain) was a genius for doing it. Good one my man. and Jimmy did some more peotry recital from Howl by Allen ginsberg.

Awoken for the final day after we had slept out under the stars... in fact we had all drifted off pretty quickly despite having all said that we needed to see 10 shooting stars, we where klunked out in 5 mins flat. (I managed to see 6)



A quick ride up first of all to what was meant to be a strenuous hike to Dog Lake, but was nice and relaxed and ended up with us paddling around in a fun lake where the bottom never reached beyond 1-2 deep. we started to even through the frisbee around in the water... and again I had to be careful not to immerse myself completely.

Then off to the giant sequoias and redwoods... big wood....heh heh heh.

Bu the high light of the final night together wasn't some awe inspiring beauty... no it was the bar just outside of Yosemite.

They had cheep drink and wait for it....KARAOKE!
HIghlights of the night include:
Me, doing "The Lady is a tramp"
The Ozzies from melbourne Pete and Cam, doing "Can't touch this"
Dendi and Andrew, doing "Daydream believer"
Everyone, doing "The Lion sleeps tonight"

but it has to be said that when we walked into the bar myself, Mike and Jim. It was a bit of a scary Hick hole. where the worlds worst singing/depressing karaoke owner in the world... he sang the in teh most appaling way imaginable... it needed our crew of green tortoisers to kick the bar into gear... in the arse...

We then proceeded to drink at the front of the bus till 3.00 am and then collapsed and woke up slightly hungover in San Fran. trip over we stumbled our way to the hostel and collapsed.

Now that was friday and Heid did some shopping and I did some preparation work for the weekend to come. I will update you on how that weekendwent but to say that Heid is now on her way back to the UK and we did Surf California...

PS I now have a real permanent tattoo with the word science written in Japanese on my shoulder. Oh yes!