11th -> 15th (Paihia, Bay of Islands, Omapere and back to Auckland)

The bus trip was an easy choice for me, because it included a free boat tour of the bay of Islands that I wanted to do anyway, and the whole trip cost the same as the tour by itself! Weird. Anyway, Climbed aboard and low and behold three different people I'd made chums with got on as well. So it was looking good very quickly. We arrived in Paihia, the gate way to the Bay of Islands, and swapped onto the boat. Weather conditions weren't great but at least it wasn't raining. The boat trip was a sight seeing/dolphin watching/HOLE IN THE ROCK EXPERIENCE! That's right, a highlight for the Bay of Islands was a rock, with a hole in it. I asked the girl at the ticket desk what the fuss was about and she did say it was a big hole, but it wasn't incredible. At least they weren't trying to beef it up, calling it The Great Mysterious Portal Through Earth or something. Anyway, I never got to see the hole because it was too windy. And the captain warned us they hadn't seen a dolphin for a few days. So we did a short loop of some islands because the wind was too strong to go further out and then came back to shore. I went to sleep.

Hole in Rock:

At least it was a nice town though, and the hostel was really homey with a top quality kitchen and swimming pool. I spent most of my time in Paihia chatting away to various people and this continued well into the nightlife too in one of Paihia's two bars. It was a good bar actually, with a raffle going on one night where our table won 2 for 1 on: sky diving, bungy jumping, kayaking, fishing, sailing, paintballing and horse riding. Not a bad lot! Indoors was a safe place to be the next day as the heaven's opened. A group from Auckland on a weekend break arrived in the hostel. They were celebrating one of the girl's 21st Birthday, woot! so that fueled the evening's entertainment. Time was running short, weather was poor and I had to move on, so I caught the early morning bus across to the west coast: Omapere. This quaint little place was by far the best stop in the far North. A lovely old gal ran the hostel and provided us with anything we wanted, including chocolate cake :) The hostel was more of a home, and we were the only people staying there. A huge sitting room hosted a bountiful collection of games and puzzles, so we spent the morning exploring, followed by chess, checkers, jenga and jigsaws (we're so cool). That night we headed off to the beach to watch the sun set, and walked across the sand chatting to some local fishermen before heading back. We played some silly drinking games with cards and packed in for the night.

Morning broke through, and we hurriedly got ready for the day's excitement: bone carving. The whole day was about us as individuals. We were to design, cut and carve our own pendants, and we had all day to complete it. A lovely Mauri man called James collected us and took us to his house where we were introduced to his wife and grandparents before being seated in the workshop. We each had a cow's leg (meat removed) and a dentist's drill (James had bought them from a dentist friend). We drew our designs on the bone with pencil and got going. My carving was a traditional Mauri shaped pendant representing strength and leadership, engraved with another Mauri symbol for the joining of two cultures/peoples. Rather good idea thought. The scariest thing about the whole experience was how easily the dentist's drill went through bone. Seriously, it's scary! I am going to be very nervous when I go to the dentist now. the whole process took a long time. I finished mine in around 6 hours, but others took seven or eight. The whole process was very labour intensive and took incredible hand control but I was pleased with the end result. I get the feeling it gets a lot easier with practice. The whole experience though was incredible, just concentrating on the little piece of bone in front of you, not thinking about anything else. It was quite meditating. Everything was done in James's house and his wife cooked us lunch (lots of fish). They also had a 10 week old puppy that provided me with endless joy.

That evening we booked onto something called the Footprints Tour'. In short it involved walking through the forest and watching a Mauri guy sing to humongous trees. It was alright, but nothing special. especially seeing as the paths were public walkways anyway. It was ranked as the second best thing to do in NZ by the Lonely Planet Guide Book, but I wasn't that impressed. The trees were very big though. Trunks 17m in circumference.

Soon it was time to head back to Auckland, and I had a long night ahead of me. The bus back took six hours, so took up most of the day, so I only arrived in Auckland late afternoon. I grabbed some food and watched a few films with friends. I had befriended the owners of a hostel so they let me stay there with my bags until my flight that night. My plan had been to go out that night but a bit too much of the bone marrow dust had got lodged in my nose. I stayed up all night, to catch a 6 o'clock flight. It was necessary, especially with my watch alarm being so bad.

I was incredibly impressed with NZ, and al coming back for sure. I think next time I'm coming with a friend, or a group of friends, because NZ has to be done by campervan. There is not other equivalent way of doing it, camping is the best by miles. The only problem with it is it sucks the money out of you like a vacuum cleaner. This was mainly because I had no car, but it was still twice as pricey as Australia and multiple times more than Thailand. I've learned a lot in NZ, and I believe I have picked up a lot of secrets needed to enjoy the country fully; it's very easy to get sucked into the tourist trap and you have to spot the genuine from the unnecessary. Can't wait to come back, but for now, bring on Hong Kong!