NZ-Auckland

We almost didn't get home in time for Christmas... completely our fault this time!
When we arrived at Queenstown airport, we couldn't be found in the travel registry. It turns out that we booked the flight a day earlier than we should have, so our flight was purchased for a day too early. Yikes! Fortunately, kiwis are nice people and those at the ticket counter let us on board once they determined they had room for us.
After that drama, we ate dinner at White restaurant in Hilton, 7 course prixe fixe with wine pairings. We felt we deserved some luxury after all our hostels & backpacking! After all, it is our honeymoon...
Towards the end of dinner we met my dad's friend, Peter Hawthornwaite, in Auckland - they are friends from when my dad started working in NYC! We were really excited and felt blessed to have some fellowship time with other christians - that was a nice, unexpected surprise.
The next day, after strolling through Auckland downtown, we left for the airport and we found we were actually able to pack all the NZ wine into our luggage! And checking in our box from Australia turned out to be no problem.
We do plan to have some wine tasting events to try out the wines we purchased. But with all the events going on this year of 2007 it looks like it may not be until next year...

NZ-Te Anau and Doubtful Sound

In Queenstown, when we went to confirm our reservation for the Milford Sound boat trip, we decided to go to Doubtful Sound instead of Milford Sound. Why? Well, we learned there was a 2-hour drive to Milford, then 2 hours on a boat, followed by another 2 hours drive back to Te Anau. Sounded kinda dull spending all that time driving, and sharing the sound with a bunch of other tour bouts, so we decided on the less touristy Doubtful Sound instead. To get to Doubtful Sound, it is a short bus ride to Lake Manapouri, where we take a boat ride to the power station at the other end of the lake. Then we take a short bus over Wilmot Pass for some views of Doubtful Sound before taking the boat ride through the sound.

Well, this tour did not disappoint. The boat ride across Manapouri was pretty, and Doubtful Sound was even more scenic - there were dramatic mountains all over the place. I think we were starting to get used to the massive granite peaks all around us; at the end of the day I was tired of looking up at huge mountains next to our boat. But to see forests of fern trees and waterfalls right by the sea was incredible.

We learned there is amazing sea life to see. Apparently the fresh water coming down the mountains absorbs a lot of plant tannins, so the few feet of fresh water that constantly sits on top of the sea water in the fjord blocks almost all the sunlight, and deep water coral and fish live just a few meters below the surface. Well we didn't go to any underwater observatory or scuba dive, but we saw the videos and now we want to do some cold-water diving!

NZ - the Routeburn Tramp

The morning after our arrival in Queenstown we left for the Routeburn trek. We drove up along Lake Wakatipu to Glenorchy, with incredible views of the surrounding mountains.

Facts: The Routeburn is usually done in 3 days hiking just over 30-some kilometers. It climbs from temperate rainforest in Mt Aspiring National Park up to the Harris Saddle, which is alpine scrub and some snow even in early summer, back into mossy wet rainforest in Fiordlands National Park before stopping at The Divide near Milford Sound and Te Anau. We learned the rainfall averages 5 meters/year near Glenorchy to 6 meters/year near Te Anau! The great thing about the Routeburn tramp (as kiwis call their trails) is considered one of their Great Walks, which means there are huts with kitchens and bunkrooms so you can cut down on the gear you need to carry.

Well, starting at the eastern side, it's a gentle 2 hour climb to Routeburn Flats hut which is by the side of a beautiful mountain meadow valley. Along the way we were stopped by 2 ladies who were bird watching. We got to see & hear the Mohua, a yellow-headed canary which is slowly disappearing due to the European-introduced stout (a smaller, shorter, nastier version of the weasel). They said in their 20 years of hiking in NZ they had never seen this bird before!

After hitting the Flats hut, we hiked up another hour to Routeburn Falls hut where we had reservations for the night. Since it was a beautiful day out, we decided to take the advice of the park ranger we talked to earlier in the day at Glenorchy, and spent the late afternoon hiking up to the Harris Saddle to take in views of Hollyford River valley. We were advised by quite a few people that the weather can change daily, and the views up around the Harris Saddle are incredible, and we didn't want to miss those!

As we hiked up, another park ranger pointed out to us the Mt Cook Lily, which isn't really a lily but it's still a pretty little white flower. We had incredible views looking back behind us and ahead as we saw more and more of the Hollyford River valley.

Well, once we arrived at the Harris Saddle, we decided to hike a side trail up Conical Hill. We had passed a couple hiking the opposite way who said they had views all the way to the ocean! Great, except when we arrived the trail said it was closed... Well, that didn't really stop us - we figured we had hiking shoes and poles, so we could handle the snow! We hiked up the mountain, over the snow and arrived at the top to see... uh, not much! Well, we had a slightly foggy view of Hollyford River due to the clouds coming in, but couldn't see much else.

We returned back to the hut and had a tasty dinner of freeze-dried food and quinoa ;) We were a little envious of some other groups who brought along bottles of wine, but one great thing about camping is that most food tastes great when you carry it for several hours or days!

The next morning turned out as expected - rain! As we hiked up the Harris Saddle again, the trail was practically a stream with the amount of rain and water pouring down the mountains. As you can imagine, this 2nd day we didn't get to see much of anything with all the clouds and rain. I learned that my 10-year-old rainpants didn't work - they were completely soaked by the time we arrived at the Harris Saddle shelter! I also arrived with fully soaked hiking shoes. But I was not alone - many of our fellow hikers also were quite wet, and it was comical to see the steam rising off our jackets and pants as we huddled in the shelter in an attempt to dry off.

After a quick lunch, we walked along the mountain ridge above Lake Mackenzie, where our 2nd night's shelter was located. We were lucky that the wind wasn't as bad as the rangers had cautioned us, so we quickly hiked along the ridge and then down towards the lake.

Luckily, on the way down, the rain stopped and we started to get some views of the lake and the forest on the mountain. We thought the moss was heavy on the eastern side of the mountain, but here it was even denser - it practically carpeted the trees and rocks!

We were quite happy to reach the hut mid afternoon, and we quickly took all our wet clothes and shoes and put them by the super-warm coal stove in the middle of the common room. It was quite a sight to see everyone's clothes and shoes ringing the stove, and it was so warm in the hut that the ranger warned us we might set off the fire sprinklers! Luckily he was just being cautious, but we did all move our shoes a little farther away so we wouldn't melt them or burn down the hut.

That night we met some of our fellow hikers - 3 families were hiking together. One family had 3 generations - grandkids, parents, and grandparents, and the granddad had even had a stent placed in his heart 3 months earlier! Julie and I were really impressed, and hope we're that active in our mid 70s!

Our third and last day turned out to be a sunny day. We had beautiful weather hiking along the mountain, and took pictures of Lake Mackenzie and the mountains to our west - more snow-capped majesties! Near the end, we detoured up the side trip to Key Summit, where there was an informational nature walk and we learned a few things about the flora in the area, like the peat moss can hold 25 times its weight in water, and the NZ beach tree is genetically very similar to the South American beech.

After 3 days of hiking, we finally arrived at The Divide. We took off our hiking boots and relaxed in the sun, waiting for our bus transport to Te Anau, where we planned to spend 2 nights and visit Doubtful Sound. As we waited, another hiker saw some keas - this is a NZ parrot that lives in the south, and is quite the pesky bird. It was trying to pull off the rubber lining around the doors to an RV, so we tried to scare it off. Apparently the kea likes to pick at rubber lining, windshield wipers, and shiny parts on cars.

NZ-West Coast Adventures

After our arrival to the South Island and spending a few days out on the water kayaking, we decided to make our way to Queenstown by driving. We decided to go west and drive along the coast as we heard it's beautiful and figured we had a few days to enjoy the scenery. We also were told about some neat sights like the pancake rocks (Punaikiki), the glaciers, and the beautiful glacier lakes near Waanaka and Queenstown.
The West Coast definitely lived up to our expectations. While the weather was quite variable, it was much like the San Francisco coastal area in summer - fog/clouds and occasional sun! We just had such a blast seeing the sites that we didn't really mind.
Our first major stop was at Punaikiki to see the pancake rocks. This is a cliff area that has been carved into grottos and coves by the ocean, and the layers of rock here eroded differently so it looks like someone carved horizontal lines into the grey cliffsides. I was personally amazed to see palm trees this far south - apparently they're native to this area! And I thought palm trees only liked warm weather...

We finished our first day staying in Franz Josef. This little town is right by the glacier, so we drove over to the park and hiked to a view point. We lucked out with a little sun, and got to see the front of the glacier poking through a river valley. It was quite a sight to see a mass of blue, black and white ice in the middle of a lush green valley! We learned that Franz Josef and Fox Glaciers in NZ are unique in that they exist in the middle of the temperate rainforest, whereas other glaciers exist in more barren mountainous terrain. Later, in South America, we got to see massive glaciers in their typical location.

On day 2 of our trip down the west coast, we drove down a few minutes to Fox Glacier, where we had reserved room on a helicopter ride to go onto the glacier and do some hiking. We really lucked out with weather; it started getting a little sunny and clear, so the company decided to start helihike services that afternoon, starting with our scheduled trip! Praise God - we learned they had not flown up in several days, so we were the first group in the last 2 or 3 days.

Julie and I agreed the heli-hike was one of our NZ highlights. We put on some heavy leather boots and strapped on little crampons that didn't look like they'd work. But they kept us steady as we walked around for 3 hours on top of Fox Glacier. Our trip up was fun - the pilot circled around the lower part of the glacier, arriving at our landing spot where we waited for the other sets of trekkers to be brought up. Our guide was a college student from Detroit, MI! who was working in NZ and was on his last helihike before heading back home. So he was quite enthusiastic in chopping away at the glacier, clearing a pathway here and there as we tramped around. He even found us a few ice caves to crawl through, which made for some spectacular photo shots. It was really amazing to see the deep blue color that the ice creates when it's compressed as hard as it is in a glacier. Finally, he took us close to a waterfall that was pouring down along one of the sides of Fox Glacier, and we quickly trekked back to the heli landing so we could get back down - apparently the clouds were coming back so they only ran 2 trips the entire day! Well, we were about 1/2 hour late, but we didn't mind - we got a fun trip poking around on the top of a glacier.

The rest of the afternoon, we drove to Haast and stayed the night, at what was probably the cleanest hostel we've seen on our travels. Along the way, we stopped at one or two beautiful beach spots, to take in some of the amazing forest scenery along the coast. It was quite entertaining to talk to our Haast hostel owner - he was very proud of his clean hostel and we made sure to tell him we were enjoying it!

Our third, and last day, we drove from Haast through Waanaka to arrive at Queenstown. Along the way, we stopped at a bunch of short hikes through the Haast Pass to see some blue-green pools, waterfalls and of course the beautiful glacier lakes near Waanaka and Queenstown. Well, a coworker told me this was a beautiful drive, and I'm really glad we spent the whole day driving through it - it is just a majestic area; makes you feel like you're in the movie trilogy LOTR!

NZ-kayaking in Abel Tasman park

After a night in Nelson, we were to take a bus close to Abel Tasman National Park where we hired Abel Tasman Kayaks to take us on a 3 day kayak trip through the park.

Well, we almost didn't make the trip! We woke up a little later than we should have, and we arrived at our bus station at 7:45 AM. After about 5 minutes, we still didn't see a bus and called Abel Tasman Kayaks to find out what happened. Oops... the bus actually came on time at 7:35 AM! So we rushed to find a taxi and catch up with the bus. Phew! They actually waited for us.

Luckily that was the only major hiccup on this trip. We arrived at the kayak place, met our guides, and packed our kayaks. Let me tell you it is amazing how much stuff fits into a kayak! We packed several jugs of juice, bags of cookies, a propane tank, our tent, 2 sleeping pads and bags, and all our clothes. All the other kayaks in our trip, 5 double kayaks, were also packed full.

No matter... when you're in the water, you hardly notice it! Plus, we had spectacular views of the park as we paddled along. Shortly after enjoying this scenery, our guide pulled out a big tarp and had us set up a sail! Huh? Well, they have everyone hold onto each other's kayaks and form a big raft-like mass, then 4 people hold each corner of the sail and off we go!

Our entire 3 days were fantastic. We lucked out with the weather - no rain really, and generally clear blue skies. We would paddle into beautiful little sandy bays for lunch or for our campsites, and even paddled a little ways up a river or two during the afternoons.

We felt spoiled by the gourmet camping. We camped in the same campsites as the hikers, but our guides would set up a tarp above the picnic benches to keep rain/tree junk from falling on the food. We'd have proper teatime with biscuits (aka cookies), and later that evening a gourmet dinner including wine! We even had eggs & bacon for breakfast once, and then pancakes another day - yum!

One of the highlights of the trip was a last-minute kayak out to an island nature refuge for sea lions. We decided to go late one afternoon and paddle hard to make sure we got back before dark. Our guides got us to within 5 feet of the sea lions and cormorants hanging out on the rocks - quite amazing really - and even up close to some young sea lions playing in the water!

NZ-marlborough wine country

On Day 1, we visited Montana (aka Brancroft in US), Cloudy Bay, Allan Scott, From and Grove Mill.
Montana was recommended by several kiwis as it's the biggest winery in NZ, so being fans of the mom & pop wineries we were a little apprehensive. However, we had a great time tasting 8 different Sauv Blancs thanks to a very knowledgable winery employee. We learned about all the different brands, vineyards and appellations where Montana-Brancroft has grapes, which was a bit dizzying at first! We bought 1 terroir-specific wine to enjoy on our NZ trip, and another for tasting back home with our other NZ wines (don't forget to remind us!)

I was really looking forward to visiting Cloudy Bay, as I've had their wines in USA, and was excited when we arrived - the place had a great brick courtyard where you walked in. But I was a bit disappointed with the wine tasting - not a big variety, and the staff seemed a bit distracted with their coworkers milling about.

In a similar vein, Allan Scott was a quick visit. Even though he's been a longtime winemaker in Marlborough, the girl pouring our wines only seemed to know a little about the wines and the winery. But we did buy a Sauv Blanc from here.

A nice surprise was Fromm. A German decided to start a winery in Marlborough and focus just on reds, making some fantastic Pinots in a variety of styles. We bought one that I think we'll cellar a few years and then see how it comes out! We also enjoyed reading the detailed wine notes they had at the tasting room and chatting with the lady pouring our wines.

Our last visit of the day, Grove Mill, seemed like a bit of a letdown. I think we were really tired after all the wines we tasted that day! But we really liked their organic and environmentally friendly approach. We also bought a Pinot for future tasting :)

Our dinner was at Gibb's Vineyard Restaurant, fantastic place in the middle of a vineyard. We had a Fox Island Pinot; our waitress' father is the owner! We started with a delicious mussel appetizer, followed by our lamb and fish dishes. Wow! One of the best meals we had in NZ.

Day two was a short wine tasting trip. We visited Clos Henri, which was started by a french winemaking family from Sancerre. Their wine tasting room was a small church they transplanted from 60 km away! We bought a mellow Old World-New World style Pinot.

Finally, we visited Seresin winery, named after the NZ director Michael Seresin. Here we tried a variety of whites and reds; we did buy one, but the fun part about the winery was that we also got to taste some of their boutique olive oils - yum!

After Marlborough, we headed to Nelson where we planned to spend a night before going on a 3-day kayak trip. Along the way, we drove through coastal towns in the Marlborough Sounds and stopped to have a quick seafood lunch. We had some great fried oysters and mussels - these were really tasty with beer :)

NZ-martinborough wine country

After our Tongariro speed hike, we had a leisurely morning wake-up the following day and left National Park to continue our journey south along the North Island. Our destination this time was Masterton. A few times we stopped along the drive to Masterton to ask about which route would be more scenic, and each time the Kiwi we asked said, "why Masterton?" with a bewildered look on their face. See, kiwis seem to think there isn't much of interest between National Park and Wellington, except for some wine country regions along the east coast.

Well, the simple answer is that we were meeting my cousin Claudia who was working at Johner Winery. Claudia has been travelling around Australia and NZ on a working holiday visa. It had also been around 10 years since I last saw her, which was when I was graduating from college.

We learned from Claudia that winery work is quite demanding. Actually, we have learned that any agriculture seems to be tough work - seems like there's always something to do. Hmm... sounds a lot like consulting...

We met most of the Johner Winery crew, including the owner, Karl Heinz, the winemaker, sales rep (winemaker's girlfriend), and another girl, Katy, who was working there on her working holiday visa. Everyone was German!

After introductions, we took Claudia and Katy to their house to drop off our stuff and headed to the market to get dinner supplies. We (Julie, Claudia and I) prepared a delicious NZ mussel stew in tomato sauce, steamed veggies, and of course plenty of Johner Sauvignon Blanc and Pinot Noir to accompany dinner.

Claudia, Katy, the winemaker and his girlfriend were all living in a little cottage close by. It had a beautiful view overlooking Johner winery and the surrounding farm region, with views across the Masterton /Gladstone valley. Claudia was kind enough to give us her room while she slept on the couch - I think she got a nice deal as the couch is in the living room with the coal-burning stove for warmth! It was a true experience of living in the country!

The following day we headed over to Martinborough for some wine tasting. This area is known for its Sauv Blancs and Pinots. We visited Gladstone, Ata Rangi, Alana, Canadoro, and Nga Waka. Ata Rangi had some great Pinots, while we bought a few Cab Sauvs at Canadoro - believe it or not NZ can make some good heavy reds! I was surprised to hear that Alana considered their regular Sauv Blanc to only need 3-7 years of age, with their Reserve at 12-15! We later learned not all the wineries bottle such young whites. Nga Waka was a quick stop, as the owner, Roger, didn't normally do tastings, but stopped by to say hello since he was good friends with a PwC colleague, Peter Randle.

We had such a good time with Claudia that we decided to stay an extra night, and the housemates were kind enough to let us do that. Fortunately for them it also meant they had 2 extra cooks for another night! We learned that Claudia did most of the cooking - I am proud of our family's cooking skills! After dinner, Julie and Claudia spent the rest of the night talking, with much laughter - I think Julie was enjoying the childhood stories that Claudia was sharing with her :O

The next day we went to Wellington to visit the town and take the night ferry to the South Island. We found Wellington to be a pretty harbour city with a bustling downtown area, albeit small by US city standards. Our first stop was up to a vista point at Mt. Victoria, which provided some very pretty views of Wellington and the harbor. Julie and I visited the Te Papa museum while Claudia kicked around town. The Te Papa musuem was great - lots of big Maori artifacts to look at, and we were lucky enough to catch some schoolkids doing some traditional songs & dances in the auditorium! Very impressive to see how NZ is working to preserve the Maori customs. Later we walked along the bay, meandered through the city hall plaza, and walked up a pedestrian shopping street. We had some of the best gelatto of our trip at a small bayfront store. Unfortunately that was all the time we had, so we left Claudia and headed to the port to take our ferry to Picton on the South Island.

NZ-tongariro death march

From Waitomo, we drove off to National Park to hike the famous Tongariro Crossing. As we approached, our usual north island scenery of rolling green hills were punctuated by a few snow-topped mountains and one ominous black volcano. We later learned this was a film site for some of the Mt. Doom scenes in LOTR. We were quite excited to learn we would be hiking around it!

We stayed in Howard's Lodge, which also conveniently provides transport to the Tongariro hike. The weather in the morning of our hike looked poor with low heavy clouds which seemed ready to rain at any moment. However, as we approached the trail, the sun came out and we were excited about the great views we'd see!

Our hike started in alpine brush, slowly giving way to alpine desert as we hiked up the pass between 2 old volcanoes, Tongariro and Narahwhoe. Once at the saddle, we rested a bit and then spent some time figuring out if we wanted to, and had time for, a side trek up Mt Narawhoe.

Our dilemma stemmed from a simple question of time. The buses have a fixed time they take you to the trail and when they pick you up. The trail normally takes 6 to 8 hours. The 2 side treks up either volcano each take about 2 hours based on the trail map we had, and we were told Narawhoe had great views. So we figured it would be doable but tight. However, what threw us for a loop was that when we actually arrived at the pass, a sign stated it was a 3 hour side trek, which translated to at least a 9 hour hike!!! Guaranteed to make us arrive late to the bus pickup location...

Well, there we talked to a young Irish couple that was on our bus and looked like regular hikers. They decided to go up, so we figured there was strength un numbers! So up we went.

This slowly turned out to be a challenging side trip. The higher we went, the steeper we got and the more scree we found. This loose rock/pebble combo made us feel like we were taking 1 step backward for each step forward. However, we pushed on and made it to the top for some amazing views for miles in every direction. Not only that, we also saw the Narawhoe volcano crater!

We spent a few minutes to enjoy the views and take a small break. I (Xavier) practically jumped my way down the scree since it seemed like I was sliding down anyway!

We hiked up the next part to Red Crater, the highest part of the trail, and stopped for lunch. There we talked to the Irish couple and realized we were way behind schedule. It was nearly 2 PM, with 1.5 to 2 hours to Ketati Hut. Our bus driver said we needed to be at that hut by 2 PM to safely make it back down to the trail end by 4:30, our pickup time! Oops...

We quickly finished lunch and started our afternoon speed hike. We passed the Emerald Lakes, named for the sulphurey minerals that color the water. These were an incredible sight of deep green, albeit the smell. We started our descent through more alpine brush and arrived at Ketati Hut. We had made it there a little after 3 PM, just 1:10 hours of hiking. OK, at our rate I was hoping we'd make it by 5!

We took a short break to fill up on water. Did I forget to mention we didn't bring enough? Hmm, that was because I didn't plan on our 2.5 hour side trip and our speed-hiking pace! Luckily I knew the hut was enroute.

From the hut, the alpine brush continued until we got a lot lower, when the trail moved into the familiar NZ fern&tree rainforest. By now we had sped by quite a few packs of hikers. Nearly at the end, or so we hoped, we ran into 2 Chinese girls who thought they were lost. We told them they were on the right path and then they tried to keep up with us for fear of getting lost again! I told them to take it easy since we were running to catch our bus... 10 minutes later we got to the trail end, whew! We got to the bus only 10 minutes late! In hindsight, the views were well worth the adventure....

NZ - Waitomo Glow Worms & Caving

After a full day of hot springs and Maori culture, we set off for yet another picturesque drive and arrived in Waitomo in the afternoon. We immediately visited the glow worm caves, a major attraction of this area. While the 1 hour tour was quite 'toursity' we still enjoyed the information shared by the apathetic guide and of course, the viewing of the glow worms via row boat in the cave. It was as if we were viewing stars in the sky, dozens of constellations all above us within the caves. These stars were the worms glowing in the dark (they reminded us of lightning bugs). A quick explanation of glow worms: these worms are fly larvae that have just a mouth to feed but no means of expelling their waste (no anus). They process their waste by a chemical reaction within their body..this reaction creates a florescent glow...neat, eh? They produce thin stringy hair like webs to catch and eat curious insects that are attracted to the glow.

Our real adventure and one of our most memorable, was experienced the next day where we spent the day in the dark with 1 other adventurous couple from NZ and a certified canyoneering guide crawling through an extensive Waitomo cave, abseiling down water falls, wading through waste deep water, bouldering and climbing through holes just big enough for us to crawl through on our bellies or backs while partially submerged in water. Thank goodness they armed us with 2 layers of thermals, a caving outer layer, boots, helmets and head lamps.....it was cold and muddy but we were prepared! Amidst the adventure, we saw some glow worms and incredible stalactite formations. The main focus, however, was to give us a true experience of the sport of canyoneering itself without a hand holding approach.

When we had reached the furthest point of the cave, 2 plus hours into our expedition of predominantly climbing (the high road) we were tasked to work as a team to find our way back out following the river path (the low road); our guide shadowed us but became our silent and invisible guide. Our team worked incredibly well and we had the best time.....we're ready to explore more caves and have heard of quite a few in Northern CA ;)

NZ-sulphury Rotorua

Our drive to Rotorua (the land of the thermal springs) seemed to be a typical spring day in NZ with clouds and occasional rain on our drive south from the Bay of Plenty. As we arrived into Rotorua, we could distinctly detect our approach due to the famous sulphur smell of the city. Our advice to you would be to carefully pick your hotel so that you don't stay too close to the thermal active areas - those are the smelly places! We stayed in the Hot Rocks Backpackers which was quite basic; it's worth checking out the other hostels in town.

Our first order of business was to book our "adventures" in Rotorua. Apparently there is a strong Maori culture still present here, so we decided to sign up for one of the traditional hangis, which is a show of Maori song & dance as well as their traditional pit BBQs. These reminded us of Hawaiian luaus. We booked a tour through the i-site in Rotorua, which included a free trip to the Rotorua museum or a spa. We chose the museum as we thought it might be useful to get some local culture.

A side note about visiting NZ - nearly every town has at least 1 i-site, which are useful information centers with free maps, hostel/hotel/motel listings, and other tourist services. We used these quite a bit to get useful info and local knowledge of the towns we visited since we had done very little planning prior to arriving in NZ.

We first hit the Rotorua museum housed in an old spa center considered to be a 'healing center' in the old days including treatments such as scary electric baths. Since we had just a short time before our Maori hangi, we skipped the last half of the tour describing the details of the spa in the old days and focused on the much more stimulating Maori exhibits describing the history of how the Moari arrived, how they survived, and artifacts of their culture, weapons, jewelry, and homes. That part was pretty cool since we knew nothing about the Maori before arriving in NZ.

Our hangi show started with an entertaining bus ride to the site. Our driver was a friendly and funny Maori who liked to poke fun at Ozzie rugby. On the way, we learned each bus load of people (our 'tribe') had to pick a "chief" to represent our "tribe" for the welcome ceremony. There was an Aussie couple honeymooning so our bus driver picked the lucky groom to be our chief, who was responsible to receive the Maori welcome and lead us into the village. There, we saw Maori doing traditional activities like war dances, songs, and then we went into their main house for a song & dance show followed by a traditional dinner! That was tasty - slow cooked pork, chicken and veggies all slow cooked in the ground.

The next morning we decided to go to a spa after all (hard to pass up ;)), so we hit up the Polynesian Spa after breakfast and spent a comfortable hour soaking in the various mineral pools there. After that we drove to Te Puia to check out the thermal park and viewed bubbling mud pools, hot rocks, and a pair of geysers that were spouting nearly 50 feet high just as we arrived - very cool! They also have a Maori house there with some wood artisans. We took part in another Maori welcome ceremony and show. This time, I (Xavier) volunteered to be the chief.

What I didn't mention before is the Maori tribe would do a welcome war dance when another tribe arrived to determine if they came in peace or to fight. So if the chief laughed or looked away, the Maori at our hangi site would have traditionally attacked us due to this sign of disrespect. Fortunately I kept my cool as the local Maori warrior chief did their wide-eyed, tongue-protruding war dance which ended in a gift of a leaf from a native plant, symbolic of peaceful welcome of our tribe...phew!