Australia and New Zealand

“Come back next year and go to Australia with us!” That’s how I said goodbye to Gordon and Wyveta when they visited us in Singapore in April of 2011. I knew that it was only a matter of Wyveta talking Gordon into it. ☺ We started making plans last Spring. Two factors made it difficult to plan. First, we wanted to have some time between the Aus./NZ trip and the trip to China to pick up the new kiddos. At least a week or two. But we also wanted to wait as late as possible to try and get into the Southern Hemisphere’s Spring and out of their Winter. Our best guess was that we would travel to China in late October, so we settled on a Sept. 14 departure for Sydney. Erin’s aunt and uncle asked if they could come too, and we said, “Sure! The more the merrier!” So we would be a ‘party of 9’.

We bought tickets on British Airways/Quantas for the overnight flight. We’d never tried one of those, and thought, “Hey, we’ll sleep on the plane and have an extra day in Sydney instead of landing at 8p.m.” Uhm. Yeah. It sorta worked like that. I’m not sure if anyone slept much on the plane. My inflatable travel pillow sprung a leak about 2 hours in, and I was finished after that. ☹ The kids were playing video games and watching movies half the night. “But Mooommm, it’s the Avennngerrrs!!”

So we landed a bit tired and groggy. Coming down the jetway I was thrilled with the weather. It was COOL! Woo-Hoo! The kids were already whining about it being cold. I was loving it! I made a bet with all takers to see who could go the longest without a jacket. H. immediately volunteered to lose. We picked up our luggage and headed downstairs to the subway. Wyveta and I had both done a lot of research about how to get from the airport to our hotel. We found that a taxi would cost a fortune. There were private shuttle busses that also charged a fortune. The cheapest way was to take the subway. However, the airport has a scheme in place where they can charge you $8 per person to enter or leave the airport by means of the subway. What?!? Well, it was still cheaper than the other options especially when combined with a one week pass for the subway.

After much grumbling (mmbrhmbrrr didn’t sleep. Mmmhersheughna stupid airport charges), we did make it to our stop. After some map consulting and street sign checking, we started walking toward the hotel, which was about ½ mile from the subway. I had chosen our Sydney and Cairns hotels on the internet. I always check tripadvisor.com to see what people have to say. I remembered reading something or other about the neighborhood south of the hotel being ‘less than desirable’. Uhm. Understatement! We were walking through the trashiest part of the red light district! We sorta stuck out – 9 fully clothed people (including 3 kids) with suitcases. Well, that and we didn’t have any tattoos or hangovers. The good thing is that it was 7 a.m., so businesses were closed. A policeman stopped and asked us if we needed help! He told us the neighborhood got better on up the street. He also told us how to use the subway without having to walk through there again.

We arrived at the hotel and 2 of our 3 rooms were ready. We had 3 rooms of 3 people, so one kid went with each couple. We had to share one bathroom with 2 or 3 other rooms on our floor. Not ideal, but hey, we’ve done it before. Fortunately, all the adults in the group agree that we’d rather share a bathroom than pay a lot more for a private one. So we stashed our bags and headed back out.

We decided to do some easier things since we were all pretty tired. We bought tickets for the Hop On/Hop Off bus. I highly recommend this if you go somewhere new. Our first ‘hop off’ was at the Sydney Opera House. We took all the usual touristy photos and decided to pay for the inside tour. I’m glad we did.

Side note: One of the posters advertising for the tour said, “Before the addition of safety nets, what fell on the head of the cellist?” Answer: a chicken. This became my kids’ favorite joke for the trip. The answer to everything became “a chicken!” followed by 3 rounds of giggles. “Hey H! What are you reading?” “A chicken!!” “bwa ha ha ha” etc. In fact, it’s still a pretty popular answer for any question.

The Opera House is actually several buildings. One is for Opera performances, and one is a symphony hall. The Opera stage is very small. Smaller than the Clarence Brown stage by a LOT. But that’s probably good news for the stage hands. Because the singers only use the natural acoustics of the building (no microphones), they can only do 2 or 3 shows per week (voice strain). But the Opera House has a show every night. So they might run one show Monday and Thursday, a different show Tuesday and Friday, and a third show on Wednesday and Saturday. This means the stage hands take one set completely down and set up the other set every day, and twice (or more) on Saturdays and Sundays (for matinees)!!!! I cannot believe how much work that is!! I’ve seen how much work goes on to set up one show. I find it difficult to believe that it can be done in one day. They are re-doing the lights and everything! Wow. While we were watching, they took down a set and started building something that required a moat – yes they were going to fill it with water. They also have very little room to store sets. We heard more about the chicken as well. Apparently, one director wanted live farm animals to walk across the stage for his show. The chicken decided pecking at the trail of grain was not as interesting as what was going on in the orchestra pit. After she landed on the cellist, she wandered around the floor of the orchestra pit distracting the musicians until someone threw her back on stage!
In other news, the Sydney Opera House is not all white. The tiles on the outside are 3 different colors including some yellow. Now you know.

We hopped back on the bus and stopped near Darling Harbor to get some lunch. H. immediately spotted the Hard Rock Café sign. That was o.k. with me. I normally protest the eating of American food when we’re traveling outside the US, but hey, what exactly is authentic Australian food, anyway? Beef? O.k. Well, as usual, the Hard Rock Café was loud and overpriced. So much for letting the kids choose where we eat. We walked around the attached mall for a bit after lunch. I think some of us bought t-shirts. I don’t think I bought anything (shock!).

We got back on the bus and hopped off at “The Rocks”. This is one of the oldest neighborhoods in Sydney. It was a nice place to walk around. We went in the museum there (The Rocks Discovery Museum). The lady there was very nice and gave us a little talk about some of the items and history. I wish I remembered more of what she said, but we were all suffering from the plane ride and the post-large meal sleepies. Then we explored the small museum on our own. Everyone got interested in their own thing and before you know it, I found A. asleep on a bench although he swears he was only resting and NOT asleep! We also lost Uncle Gary. ☹ We sent people to look in the bathroom and upstairs. Couldn’t find him. We left word with the lady at the museum to have him call our cell phone if she saw him. We went on and had a brief look at Cadman’s cottage (not much to see really), and then walked back up toward the Hop On/Hop Off bus stop. As we approached we saw Gary standing at the bus stop. He thought we’d all left the museum, so he came back to the bus stop figuring we’d turn up there sooner or later – and we did.
It was about 4:30 or so by then, and we discussed the possibility of switching to the other line of the Hop On/ Hop Off so that we could do a ‘drive by’ of Bondi (pronounced ‘bond-eye’) Beach. Bondi is one of the most famous beaches in the world and has good surfing (at least during certain months). Some of us wanted to see it, and others wanted to go back to the hotel and get some rest. We made plans to split up. By 5 the bus still hadn’t arrived, and our papers said the last bus left the station at 5:20. (I might be wrong on the times.) We couldn’t figure out how we’d missed a bus. Finally we saw our bright red bus coming. We asked the driver if we were too late to switch to the other line. He was clearly very frustrated when he replied, “I don’t know. There’s a riot going on down there, and I’m not even sure I can get you through there. They’re throwing things at the police and everything.” OHhhhh. Maybe that’s why the bus was late. We were completely clueless! Turns out, the muslims were down there protesting that movie that makes fun of Mohammed. There were little kids with signs that said, “Behead anyone who insults the prophet.” Real classy stuff. They did throw things at the police as well. The normal residents of Sydney were steaming mad at these people the next day. Articles were coming out in the paper against Islam and these people in particular. They really hurt their “Islam is a peaceful religion” campaign in the sight of Sydney’s population.
Anyway, by the time we got to the place to switch bus lines the sun was going down, it was getting colder, and the beach goers had decided that the hotel sounded like a fine idea. This is about the time that Erin pulled out his jacket and put it on. That only left me in the ‘no jacket’ bet. I won, but only because I had left my jacket at the hotel. That open-topped bus was cold by the time we got where we were going. But I wanted to stay up there so I could see better.

Just down from the hotel was a Woolworths(!) which in Australia is a grocery store. We popped in there and bought some things for breakfast in the morning. Then I stayed in the hotel and Erin and everyone else went for pizza nearby. Erin had agreed to bring some back for me. (He IS the best husband ever, you know!)
The next morning, we got up, ate our breakfasts, and headed to church services. We used the alternate route to the subway and found it was much, much better. We found the church with no problems, and enjoyed worshipping with the Christians there. It was such a nice Spring morning that they left the outside doors open and more than once a pigeon wandered in!! I was sitting on the aisle and was a bit startled to see a bird walking by in the middle of Bible class! Ha! You’ll be glad to know that the pigeon did not land on anyone’s head – in or out of the orchestra pit. – There was no orchestra pit.
Another funny thing: across from the church building was a real estate agent. The sign said, “Hooker” in big white letters on a dark background. Apparently, LJ Hooker is like Century 21, because we saw offices for them all over. Still, funny to look up and see “HOOKER” on a sign when you come out of church. Another funny sign was “Discount Chemist”. I’m thinking they mean drug store, but if you ever need to buy a discount chemist, I can show you the place.

After church, some of us changed clothes and then we all took the subway and then bus out to Bondi beach. We walked along the shops there until we decided on a place called “Moo Burger”. It was pretty good. Better than Hard Rock if you ask me. Next we went down and stuck our toes in the water of Bondi Beach. It was mighty cold! Hard to believe that people were swimming in that! Our guide book detailed a walk from Bondi Beach down to Coogee Beach. The book says it’s about 6 km (3.7 miles). The first part of the walk was just breathtaking. The views from along the cliffs were stunning! I highly recommend this walk if you go to Sydney. It was a beautiful day and the sun and wind were perfect. We reached the halfway point and had the option of going back by bus, or continuing on to Coogee Beach. We nearly decided to go back, but in the end we continued on. Unfortunately, the views either got worse, or we just got used to the spectacular-ness of it all. The second half of the walk just made us tired. But it was a good kind of tired. I don’t remember what we did for supper that night – either we got sandwiches at Woolworth’s, or we went to Harry’s (see below). We all slept well that night.

Monday, we were scheduled for the “Sydney Wilderness Tour”. http://www.sydneywildernesstours.com.au/content/blue-mountains-day-tours

They picked us up at 7:30. We had an excellent driver/guide. There were only a few other people on the tour beside our group of 9. Our first stop was at Featherdale Wildlife Park. http://www.featherdale.com.au/ We walked in through the kangaroo enclosure. We bought a couple of cups of feed for them and they ate out of our hands. These were not the giant kangaroos that you sometimes see on t.v. (Those would be too dangerous for tourists – they can really kick!). But we fed Eastern Grey Kangaroos, and a few types of Wallabies (which look like kangaroos, except they’re shorter, their noses are a little more pointed and their tales are longer). We saw wombats and dingoes (no babies were eaten), echidnas (pronounced “ee kid nuh”), and tried to spot the Tasmanian Devils (they were napping inside a log). The highlight was getting to pet the koalas. They are so stinkin’ cute!! Although it seems everyone that works with them doesn’t like them. Apparently, they’re not as nice as they look. Oh well, I still think they’re about the cutest thing going. I could’ve spent another hour at Featherdale, but our tour was moving on. (I can’t remember the exact order of our stops. I remember which ones were before lunch, and which were after – maybe….)
I think our next stop was the Mt. Tomah Botanic Gardens where we had our ‘morning tea’. (Hot tea and cookies aka biscuits.) There was a nice view of Hunter Valley from there, but the Gardens themselves had not yet reached their Spring splendor. I wasn’t very impressed. They’d probably be nice in another month or two, though. The gift shop was nice. ☺
From there we went to see Wentworth Falls. The view from there was wonderful. (I’m going to run out of adjectives for the scenery on this trip!) From there we went to Govitts’ Leap for lunch. This was a very high cliff. Here is an excerpt I found on the net:

So "Why is it called Govett's Leap?" Well the name is controversial, as the waterfall feature of Blackheath has also been called Bridal Veil Falls - thought to be more attractive to tourists. "Govett" was a surveyor under the direction of Mitchell. He was involved in the early survey work of that area. The word "Leap" is Scottish for waterfall or cataract. Brian was also keen to point out that the local myth is just that, another tourist industry story. The story involves a supposed Bushranger "Govett" who robbed a bank in Blackheath, was chased to the end of the ridge and then rode over, the gold apparently never being found. The monument on the Great Western Highway refers to this.
http://www.weedsbluemountains.org.au/news-why-govetts-leap.php

We had a picnic lunch of some sandwiches provided by the tour. They were the best sandwiches we had on the trip. Erin also bought some dill pickle chips and some smoked ham and cheddar chips. Weird, but good.

We stopped at “scenic world” where some other members of our party paid tourist prices to ride a cable car and incline railway. We didn’t feel like giving up that much money, so we stayed and shopped in the gift shop. Erin bought himself a hat like my Aussie hat that I love. He got many compliments on it as he wore it around Australia. I thought I might really have to get me a stick to keep the ladies off of him.

Anyway, I think I’ll skip a bit and tell you that we saw several very nice places that God made. We saw a famous one called “three sisters”. It had just finished raining, and there was a beautiful rainbow just beside the famous rock formation. Cool! We also visited a Koomurri Aboriginal Centre where I bought two small vases. At the centre, they did some dances for us and played the didgeridoo. It was very touristy, but the man gave a nice talk about how they used what they could find in nature. I would recommend it. If you ever go, it’s in the small shop near the Echo Point Lookout (on Echo Point Rd.).

After we finished driving around the Blue Mountains area, we headed back to Sydney. We drove through the Olympic Park area, which looks mostly abandoned. I think they have events out there, but it’s not a happening part of Sydney. Our tour driver dropped us at the Ferry Terminal. From there we took the ferry back to downtown and then the subway back to the hotel. For supper we walked over to Harry’s Café de Wheels. We’d heard great things about their pies. Now don’t be thinking about apple pie or pecan pie. These were more like pot pies. I had the beef “tiger” pie. It is like a beef pot pie but with mashed potatoes and ‘mushy peas’ on top. Oh my.

http://www.harryscafedewheels.com.au/Menu.aspx

This was by far my favorite meal in Australia! I liked it so much I went back the next night even though it was rainy and we had to walk up 120 stairs to get back from there. It was worth it!

The next day, our group decided to split up. Erin’s parents, aunt and uncle wanted to take the guided tour of the Sydney Botanical Gardens. The rest of us went on “The Great Platypus Hunt”. All of us are fans of the show “Phineas and Ferb” (If you’re not, you should be!) Therefore, we wanted to see a platypus (A semi-aquatic egg-laying mammal [of action!].) O. was probably the biggest fan of Perry the Platypus on the show. Our first stop was the Sydney Aquarium which boasts of their platypus as well as dugong (like a manatee). When we got to the aquarium we saw they had deals for tickets to other attractions. We stood there a while debating which package to buy. We were planning to meet the rest of our group at the Syndey Tower Eye (big tall lookout place) for lunch. We decided to get the three attraction ticket and use it for the aquarium, tower, and Mme Tussaud’s wax museum (the kids had never been in one). So. Decision made, we approach the ticket counter and proceed with purchase. I was chatting with the ticket girl while Erin was paying. I noticed a sign that said, “Dugongs are temporarily off display”. Bummer. I explained how I’d been trying to show those to the kids. (In Disney World in 2008, the manatees had been temporarily off display. In Singapore’s aquarium, the dugong was missing when the kids went.) I said, “Well, at least you have the platypus!” She sort of groaned and the guy next to her got a very worried look on his face. “Uhm…. Actually, the platypus is also off display. He’ll be back next week.” I said, “Erin – don’t sign that credit card slip! Let’s think about this!” We’d just forked over a heap of money to see a non-displayed platypus and a wax museum that we thought was thrown in for free. I was in favor of skipping it. But Erin said, “Meh. There’ll be other things in there that are good.” So we went ahead. The aquarium was o.k. I guess I never got over my disappointment, though. It seemed pretty much like all the other aquariums I’ve been to.
Next we went to the wax museum. This was very well done. They had famous people from around the world (including Barak Obama) as well as figures from Australia’s history. So my kids got a sneaky homeschool hour in! There were a couple of figures in there in modern clothes that at first I wasn’t sure if they were wax or tourists! The descriptions were very good and there were a lot of places where you could put on costumes or have your picture made with the figures. It was very fun.
By the time we finished at the wax museum, we got a call from the other half of our group saying they had found something they wanted to do, so we called off our plans to meet for lunch. Instead, we walked along the pier at Darling Harbor until we came to a sign that said, “Best $10 steak in Sydney”. So we gave that a go. It was a very good $10 steak. But since it’s the only $10 steak I’ve ever had in Sydney, I feel unqualified to vote.
So “The Great Platypus Hunt” continued. We took a ferry over to Taronga Zoo. The zoo is built into a hillside, so we took a bus up to the top and made our way back down. The zoo cost another fortune in entrance tickets, but we DID get to see a real life platypus. He was swimming around in little neurotic circles in the corner of the cage. Every now and then he would swim across the aquarium and then come back to the circles in the corner. It was very sad. We were all surprised at how small he was. We were debating if he was a puggle (baby) or not. The sign said they only grow to about 20 inches long. So he was an adult. Hmm. I think most of us were underwhelmed.

After the platypus exhibit, were wandered by the Tasmanian Devil exhibit. They were out and playing. We got a good look at them. They are also very cute! We didn’t spend a lot of time looking at the kangaroos or koalas since we’d seen them at Featherdale. I think if we hadn’t been tired by that point we would’ve enjoyed the zoo more, but our long days of touring were starting to catch up with us. We took the ferry back across to Central Station and the subway over to the Tower. (Hooray that the ferry tickets were covered by our week-long subway/bus pass!) Erin and H. were going to do the daredevil walk around the outside of the tower (with a harness, of course!). They filled out the forms and got all ready to go. The boys and I sat down with an ice cream to wait for them. Then the walk got cancelled due to lightening in the area. Bummer. So then WE had to wait while they had their ice cream of disappointment. Of all the tall towers I’ve been in lately (Sydney, Auckland, Tokyo), the “Sydney Tower Eye” is the best. They had maps corresponding to the view from each window. They also had computer maps that would zoom in on what you were seeing. There was even a brief description of the landmarks. Each map had several language options. All the maps and view finders were free. Very nice.

While we were up in the Tower, the sun went down, so we got a nice view of the city with the lights on. After the Tower, we took the subway back to the hotel, walked back over to Harry’s for more pies (YUM!) and then went to bed.

The next day, Wednesday, we caught our flight to Cairns. I (mercilessly) pawned off the flights within Australia/New Zealand on Erin’s aunt Aneita. I was looking at flights for so long my eyes were crossing. For the flight from Cairns to Auckland I couldn’t find anything better than leaving Cairns at 11p.m. and arriving at 4 a.m. (3 a.m. our bodies’ time). I thought, well, I hate to do that to the whole group. Well, that’s what we were left with. Aneita agreed with me that those flights were better than the 12 hour trip involving changing planes in various places.
Anyway, the flight to Cairns was straightforward enough. We landed and went to the rental car counter. I’m very glad we rented cars there. We had originally planned to let our tour people shuttle us, but they wanted something like $16 per person for each pick up! The rental car was $150 for 3 days! Duh. We ended up using the car quite a bit…..

So we found our hotel and dropped off the luggage. The hotel was nicer than the one in Sydney. We had our own bathroom at least. We were still in three rooms of three, though. The rooms all had problems with ants. We had to be very careful with our food. We put ours up in a ‘bear bag’ hanging from the closet bar. By the last day, they’d found it anyway.
We decided to go looking for lunch. Not knowing where anything was, we just tried our luck with the gps. Erin found a fish and chips place and we headed off. We ended up in a little subdivision across from an elementary school. The fish and chips place opens at exactly the time school lets out. Coincidentally, they sell candy there. A lot of candy. We got in line behind twenty 5th graders blowing their allowances on “sweets and lollies”. One little guy worked for 20 minutes to get a coin out from under a sign. He did finally get it and immediately spent it on candy. We took our fish and chips back to the hotel and ate at the outdoor picnic tables. Erin and the kids were tired and decided to stay at the hotel. The kids wanted to swim, but that didn’t last long because the water was cold. The rest of us decided to go exploring. Fun! We drove on into the center of town. We found a parking place for the following morning’s boat tours. We stopped at a travel agency to pick up some brochures and maps. We found a grocery store and bought breakfast foods. I found a Target (!) and bought some cheap sunglasses to replace the pair of UT ones I’d lost (yes, again!).
I honestly don’t remember what we did for supper. I think we’d eaten a late lunch and probably just snacked for supper.
Thursday we were booked on 2 different Great Barrier Reef tours. Erin and me and our kids went on the Reef Magic tour
http://www.reefmagiccruises.com/
I was really looking forward to the cruise! We took a large boat out to their floating platform called “Marine World”. The weather was gorgeous and the waves were calm. Perfect. On the way out, they had sign-ups for the scuba diving and the biologist-led snorkel tours. I signed up for both. H signed up to do the scuba diving with me. The kids didn’t want to do the biologist tour, but we signed them up anyway – hey “Homeschooling is anyplace you want to be!”. Also, I figured this guy was really good at dealing with nervous people and coaxing them into the water. I was right. The boys had both acted nervous about getting in the water (sharks, jelly fish, barracudas, oh my!). We thought the water would be cold and we were right! We rented wet suits for everyone, and that helped our core temps, but there wasn’t much for the extremities. It was a bit painful to get used to the water temperature every time I got in or out. The biologist was awesome. Worth every penny. He got the boys in the water fairly easily and had us all comfortably snorkeling around. He told us the names of anything we pointed at and answered all the kids’ questions. He was GREAT. We saw all kinds of beautiful fish. It was like being in a tropical fish aquarium. They even have a large Wrasse out there that they’ve named Wally. I’ve never seen a fish act like a dog before, but this one did. I’m sure they trained him to hang out there by giving him food. But I saw very little feeding of him going on. You could tell that he really liked coming up to people. The first time he came up to us, he swam up right behind A. and scared him to death! Wally is big – 2 and ½ feet long, by about 2 fee ‘tall’. He is also very colorful. He has some seriously big lips. He likes to be tickled on the lips. He is very soft. I enjoyed petting him. He almost became a pest. He kept swimming up to be petted. He really liked his ‘job’ of posing for pictures. He certainly had every opportunity to swim away into the big wide ocean and find another coral home for himself. But he stayed there as long as we did at least. Once or twice I saw him taking a break underneath “Marine World” where people couldn’t get to him, but other than that he was out doing the meet and greet.
Too soon our guided time was up. The boys enjoyed it so much they snorkeled more after the tour. SUCCESS!!
We didn’t have time to do much else before it was time for H and me to start our scuba dive. We had done the orientation lecture on the big boat on the way out to “Marine World”. Let me just say, that other countries do not tell you things 3 or 4 times like they do in the US. They told us things on the boat that they didn’t repeat again. –Important things like “don’t stop breathing underwater or you’ll get the bends”. I guess I’m just used to the law-suit happy US, but I felt kind of unprepared. Fortunately for me, I pay attention in class. I was just hoping H. had done the same. I was also nervous about the scuba dive (and maybe the reef in general) because I just don’t like sharks and I don’t want to ever be on the same side of the aquarium glass with one. I mean, I can appreciate the effort The Creator spent on them. They are marvelous at what they do. And all that cartilage – cool. But I spent the days leading up to the dive concentrating on NOT thinking about sharks. When I did see a shark (t.v. chose that time to do Shark Week) ☺ I thought about the lovely internet statistic that chairs kill more people each year than sharks. (Who cares if it’s true or not if it works to calm me down?!?) I don’t know how chairs kill people. Was my fifth grade teacher right about leaning back in your chair? Do those tight-rope walkers die from practicing sitting in chairs on the tight rope? Do fat people cut themselves when they break chairs and the cut becomes infected and they die? Do car seats count as chairs – because if so, that’s cheating. Do babies fall out of chairs that much? Are wheel-chairs attacking people? Oooh, I know – the electric chair! But that seems like cheating too. This seems like a reputable report:

http://www.telegraph.co.uk/health/healthnews/8855924/Deaths-from-bee-stings-chair-falls-and-boiling-water.html

Well, leaving the chair vs. shark statistic controversy behind and plowing onward with my travel journal…….

H and I got fitted up with scuba gear and attempted to stand. Let me tell you people, that stuff is heavy! They put several lead weights on me to hold me down. Actors who run around with scuba equipment on are faking something. I’m used to carrying 50 pound feed sacks, and this was 80+ pounds of stuff I was carrying! I could barely walk, much less down a flight of stairs to the platform. When we got to the platform, we put the regulators in our mouths and kneeled down on the platform. I was o.k. with this, because I knew I could stand up and breathe the air that God had made, and not the canned stuff. We practiced clearing our masks and dropping/regaining our regulators. After they added even more weight (!!), we linked arms and swam off. I was quite happy with the linked arms arrangement. I figured this way I wouldn’t get lost, panic and surface too quickly, or get eaten by a shark. Four humans linked together would surely be too confusing or intimidating for a shark, - right?!? I was between the instructor and H., so I was happy with my position. It took a minute to get the hang of leaning forward and kicking to go down. I had to constantly clear my ears. It was hard to remember to give the ‘o.k.’ sign instead of the ‘thumbs up’ sign. I’ve been trying to break the ‘o.k’ sign habit since I lived in Europe where it can mean the same as the middle finger. But ‘thumbs up’ in diving means, “I need to go back to the surface now.” I managed.
The beauty of the reef is just awesome. I’ve heard a lot about dead spots and global warming, but the colors we saw were magnificent. The closer you get to the coral, the more vibrant the colors appear. Diving was a great way to see it up close. The blues and pinks and oranges and yellows were so beautiful! I’m just amazed that this whole other world exists down there while we’re going merrily about our business up here on dry land. I thought about the verse in “How Great Thou Art” where it says, “O Lord my God, When I in awesome wonder, Consider all the worlds thy hands have made.” He knew it would be thousands of years before humans would see most parts of the coral world. Yet it has been there all this time waiting for people to appreciate it and praise Him for it. I’m not like that. When I do something cool, I want everyone to see it and tell me how good it is right away. :-D Anyway, so long as I concentrated on the beauty of the reef, I didn’t think about the unnaturalness of breathing canned air through a rubber hose. But I had to ‘talk myself through’ a couple of times when my claustrophobic nature tried to surface. “You’re fine. You ARE breathing. You’re fine. Calm down. Do NOT panic. You’ll look stupid. Look over there – isn’t that pretty?” etc. I enjoyed the view, but I wasn’t sad when the dive was over. I was also not going to sign up to do it again. I’m glad I did it. I’m thrilled that I didn’t see any sharks, snakes, jelly fish, or barracuda. I would recommend doing it. I see why people love it, but it isn’t for this little ol’ mountain girl.
Our dive time was right at lunch, so by the time we got our equipment off, we were the last ones to eat. There was plenty though, and it was tasty. After lunch, we caught the last semi-submersible trip. This was a boat pretty much like the 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea ride at Disney World. Except this one wasn’t staged. You’re sitting in the bottom of a boat that has portholes. The view was very good, and it was perfect for people who want to see the reef up close but don’t want to get wet. When we got back from that, I went snorkeling with all three kids some more. Then it was time to head back to shore. It was a great day!


When we got back, we were so tired. We went back to the hotel and got cleaned up. We heard from the other half of our group that they were going to get their own supper (they had gone on a ½ day cruise out to the reef and then on a self driving tour of the Tablelands area [see below]). So we drove back into town and walked around the markets until we finally threw our hands in the air and agreed to eat at McDonald’s. sigh. I had the lamb wrap. Yeah. It was very good. I wish they had that here or in the States. Turns out I was glad to go to McDonald’s that night. Who knew? After supper we got a gelato, which helped take a lot of the tired out of my body somehow.

The next morning we all went to Tjapukai (Pronounced “jah poo kai”). Tjapukai is an Aboriginal Cultural park. It was very well done. They had a schedule of shows for you to follow, and I think we got the overall idea of the Aboriginal peoples. We saw various shows including music and dance and fire starting. They also taught us how to throw a boomerang and a spear (with a spear thrower). Of course, all the boys young and old loved that part of the day. Lastly, we had a buffet lunch. It was advertised has having some traditional “bush tucker” (i.e. food), but it looked pretty haute cuisine to me. They did use native foods in the recipes, but I’m thinking mango chutney is not something the natives were likely to eat 100 years ago. Just sayin’.

After lunch, we decided to drive up into the mountains to see some waterfalls. We drove up a twisty road to Barron Falls. The other half of us had driven the road the day before and counted 105 curves! The road was narrow and 2 lanes. There were a few pull-off places for trucks to pass. It reminded me of the road between Gatlinburg and Pigeon Forge. Very beautiful scenery, but the drivers didn’t get to see much of it. After Barron Falls, we went over to Crystal Cascades. The kids had a lot of fun wading and skipping stones. (O.k., some of the grown-ups did, too.) We would’ve stayed longer, but it was getting dark and we decided that supper might be a good idea. We drove back down the windy road to the hotel. A funny thing happened on the way back. Erin was driving one car, and I was driving the other. We were both following the gps. Erin’s Mom, Wyveta, was riding with me, and at some point we passed Erin and the others. We suddenly noticed that we were following the wrong blue car! The gps did manage to get us to the right place, but we still don’t know where we passed them!
That night we sent the fellows out for pizza. They brought Dominoes back to the hotel and we ate it around the pool.
Saturday was our last day in Australia. We were scheduled on the 11p.m. flight. ☹ to Auckland. So basically we had the rental cars all day, and didn’t need to be at the airport ‘till 9 p.m. The Singapore Percells decided to take off for the Tablelands area again. The Tennesseans decided to stay a little closer to town.
We started off by driving up another very curvy road. This one was much longer than the one with 105 curves. We finally did arrive at Tarzali Lakes.

http://www.tarzalilakes.com/content/view/107/142/

The main attraction here was the Platypus pond. We paid our $6 each (refunded if you don’t see a platypus!) and walked down to the lake. The man (Pete) told us to keep up a normal conversation so the platypus would know we weren’t trying to sneak up on them. He said not to point, because they see that as aggression and they’d all hide. He knows a lot about platypus, including that the plural of platypus is platypus. (I’m going to take his word for it – he’s the expert.) He was explaining that they can detect electro-magnetic pulses with their bills and they use those pulses to communicate through the water to one another. He said if we pointed it would take about 30 seconds for all of the platypus in the pond to know they should hide. Fascinating little creatures. We got to see 5 or 6 of them at least. Pete said they were all females. He said the males only come around every now and then to cause trouble and make babies. Hmph. The platypus didn’t come too close, but we got to watch them swimming along and diving for food in their natural environment. So much better than the poor little neurotic guy in the zoo!! After we’d had our fill of platypus viewing, we walked back up to the café. Pete is also a butcher and he had several types of sausage for sale. (No, you sick-o’s not platypus!) He let us sample them and we bought enough to make us happy for lunch. We enjoyed the lunch and ‘picking his brain’ about interesting platypus facts. Pete works with some biologists to study ‘his’ platypus. He was rightly proud of his farm and efforts. We talked to him so much that he forgot his lunch was in the oven and we caused him to burn it. Ooops.
Another funny thing: When we drove up, another customer had just ordered iced tea. Pete had never made iced tea before and was a little confused about how to do it. He said, “O.k. I have a lovely cup of tea here. Now, I’m just going to uh… put … some… ice?? In it??” (Clearly thinking this would ruin everything.) The lady (who sounded British) said, “Well, I think they normally put some sort of flavor in it. Do you have any lemon?” So Pete squeezed some lemon juice in it and they presented their first-ever iced tea to the customer. We just sorta smirked and didn’t say anything.
After lunch, Pete gave us the low-down on what else there was to see in the area and we mostly took his advice. There was a road with about 6 waterfalls on it. We went to the first 2 on the loop and then saw that the road was closed 10 km ahead (before the next waterfall), so we went to the other end of the loop road and started back. When we came to the next waterfall parking area, we saw a sign that said the road was closed ahead, so I guess there’s no way to see some of the waterfalls ‘till the road gets fixed. The waterfalls that we did see were very nice and worth the drive and short walks that we did. We could drive closer to the waterfalls than you can in the Smokies for the most part.
We continued on to Mount Hypipamee National Park. I spent most of that hour intentionally mis-pronouncing Hypipamee. Try it. It’s fun! “Hip a pip a pamee” is maybe my personal favorite. In spite of the name, it was a cool place. When the volcano blew it left a very very deep crater. We dropped rocks from the lookout ledge and counted to “6 Mississippi” before they hit the surface of the water. After Mt. Hypipapapapapmameeee we continued on around the giant loop we’d carved out for our drive. We eventually came to Karunda. This is a small (Hamburg,AR sized) version of Gatlinburg. We got there about 4p.m and the tourist busses had all left, so the carpets had been rolled up and the lights switched off. We stopped to look in the store front of a place called Crystal Caves. I’d read mixed reviews of the place. It was closed when we got there, but it sure looked like a tourist trap. It had stucco/fake rock walls. I think the attraction was their basement that they’d made into a fake cave. You can break your own geode there(!). I’m going to agree with the people who said it’s a rip off. I can’t believe Lonely Planet would talk so highly about it. (L.P. also left out Tarzali Lakes, which is a real shame!!) I need to write my own travel guides. Oh wait, I think I’m doing that now….
On we drove. We passed a lot of interesting things. We did not stop at (I kid you not) “Humpy Nut World”, although it looked like they had roasted peanuts. I did stop to take a picture of some HUGE termite mounds. They were 5 feet high and 3 or 4 feet across! We saw hundreds of them scattered along the road side.
Eventually we came back down the curvy road of 105 curves. We still had several hours until 9 p.m. (when we had to be at the airport), so we stopped at a go-cart track to waste some time and money. The bigger kids drove on their own, but O. had to share a 2 seater with Dad. Mom was the photographer. I’ve done go-carts, and I’m too timid to really have fun at it. –Turns out #1 son is like me in that. But after several laps he started to go faster. H. took off first thing. However, the helmet procedure was very awkward for girls with long hair. After one session she decided it was too uncomfortable. Her helmet blocked her vision at times. Once she did a cool looking spin out through some tires. It sorta looked like it was on purpose, but she says her helmet was giving her trouble. The boys went two more times. O. was getting the hang of steering. Dad let him do most of the work.
Because we couldn’t think of anything better for supper, we drove back down to the Dominoes. (Really, what could be better? Papa John’s. But that wasn’t a choice.) After supper, we headed for the airport to meet back up with the rest of our group.
Our flight to Auckland left at 11p.m. and arrived at 5:30 a.m. Auckland time (3:30 a.m. Australia time). Ugh. We had quite a few hours before church started at 9:30. I didn’t sleep much at all on the flight. I’m not sure anyone else did either. Fortunately, the Auckland airport had free showers! We put down a deposit and proceed to take advantage of the facilities. The shower really helped wake me up! Ahh. We ate breakfast at the McDonald’s in the airport and then jumped in the rental cars for a quick look at Auckland. We drove up One Tree Hill (Joshua Tree album by U2!) for a view. It really was a good first stop. The hill is in the middle of a big green park. (You cannot imagine how green the grass is in New Zealand. Think the greenest grass you’ve ever seen, and then turn the color knob up a knotch or two.) There were sheep grazing around the hill. Lots of people were already out and biking or climbing up the hill. I, for one, was grateful that we could DRIVE all the way up. From the top, you could see messages that people had left down below. They’d used large rocks to spell out, “Will you marry me?” or ‘John loves Mary’ or whatever. It was fun.
From there we drove over to the Auckland Sky Tower. This one is the tallest one in the Southern Hemisphere. (Oh bother! I just remembered that I forgot to do all those neat Southern Hemisphere experiments while we were there – like see which way the water circles the drain…) The neat thing about the Sky Tower was the glass floors. I totally stole my photo idea from some other tourists. (They’re getting credit for it here.) It was a little scary stepping out on that glass floor at first!
We had to hurry down from the Sky Tower in order to make it to church on time. There were only two other families at church, so they were happy to see us. Australia and New Zealand both are much more secular than the U.S. (I may elaborate on why I think that is in a future rant.) When services were over, we had to hurry down the road to Waitomo (about a 3 hour drive). At Waitomo, they have some really neat caves with a large “glow worm” population. The pictures on the website are better than mine!

http://www.waitomo.com/waitomo-glowworm-caves.aspx


We walked through the caves at first, and then got on a boat ride to see the glow worms up close.

Because we were going to go on the ‘Lord of the Rings movie locations tour’ later in the trip, we had all watched the trilogy just a few nights before leaving Singapore. The movies were all very fresh in our minds. So when we got in this boat in the dark cave and the lady asked us all to be quite to appreciate the cave more….. I admit that the kids and I were not very obedient. #1 son got me tickled with his golem impersonation (He’s very good!). He was saying, “Don’t follow the LIGHTS!” “I told you don’t follow the lights!” “Yes, take them to HERRRR, She’lllll know what to do.” “Stupid fat hobit!” etc. I had a hard time not laughing!
Nevertheless, the caves and glowworms were very very cool.
After the caves, we hit the road for Rotorua. It was another 3 hour drive. But no, this was a 3 hour drive through the middle of absolute no where! We did not pass an open gas station (lucky we had plenty of fuel!). About halfway there we did pass a couple of houses. The roads were curvy and completely without additional light. I was driving in the front car and kept thinking, “I know I’m going much less than the speed limit, but I want to make sure I can tell where that next curve is going!” There were steep drop offs all around. It was a harrowing drive at times. I had to slam on the brakes when I came around a curve to a one lane bridge that a tractor trailer had started across. I thought Erin wasn’t going to see me stopped in time. I crept up a little, but then the truck passed me with inches to spare! That’ll get your heart pumping!
Later in the drive we saw a HUGE possum in the road. Well, we think it was a possum. It was large and had big eyes and a fluffy tail. It looked something like this:

http://www.outdoorssa.com.au/Camping_in_SA.htm

Wyveta saw it too, so I wasn’t hallucinating! When the headlights caught it, it stood up on it’s back legs. I had just time to honk the horn at which his tail poofed out like it had been stuck in an electric socket and it ran off. Fortunately, it ran the correct direction to keep from doing damage to itself or the rental car. Shortly after that we saw some rabbits and this:

http://www.wildlife-fauna.com/mousedeer.html

Now, I’m not claiming to have seen a mouse deer in New Zealand. I’m just sayin’ that the thing I saw (and I did get a good look at it) looked like this picture. It absolutely was small and had deer-type legs.
Anyway….. We did make it to Rotorua that night. We were all so very tired. O. started crying as soon as he got out of the car. Rotorua is built in the hollow of an old (not sure if the right word is ‘extinct’ or ‘dormant’) volcano. The entire valley is very geo-thermally active. The whole place smells like sulphur and O said, “When will the smell stop?!” I said, “It won’t.”, which felt really, really bad to him at the time. Erin (that wonderful guy!) volunteered to go pick up supper for everyone. O. felt better after getting some fast food. I just wanted to rest. I didn’t even care about supper. H. and I got interested in “The Help” movie which I’d seen before. We watched that and then crawled into bed.
The hotel in Rotorua was pretty good. It was a little old, but the layout was great. All 5 of us Singaporean-Percells were in one suite (2 bedrooms and a couch bed), which was nice. That meant the other four could have more privacy.
New Zealand was much colder than Australia. In fact, they’d had snow the week before our arrival. Some of the beds in the hotel had mattress warmers. (Like an electric blanket, except it’s under you instead of over.) We also had towel warmers in the bathroom. Ahhh. Outside, they had a mini-golf course, which grabbed O’s attention right away. We asked in the office and they said it was free!

The next morning, H had talked me into going to Hobbiton. She is a huge fan of The Lord of the Rings trilogy (hey, she’s part of our big geeky family – why wouldn’t she be?). Hobbiton is the sheep farm where they did the outdoor shots of The Shire. The farmer got a knock on his door one day asking if the location hunters could look at his farm. They came back in a couple of months and told him if he signed the contract they would tell him what they wanted to film there. He was like, “Lord of the What?!” After they filmed, they tore down most of the sets. They only recently rebuilt them for filming of “The Hobbit”. This time, the farmer knew more about what he had, and forced them to put a clause in the contract that would allow the sets to remain and he could run tours of his own farm. (Tolkien’s family and Peter Jackson get a cut of the profits, of course!) None of the Hobbit holes has an interior, but standing there looking at them, the attention to detail is amazing. You really feel like you’re in The Shire. Some of the Hobbit holes have three doors – small, medium, and large, so that they can film different sized humans in front of them to make the people seem larger or smaller as need be. And as a movie spoiler: the sunset that they filmed there with Bilbo and Gandolf smoking their pipes was actually a sunrise. The hill just doesn’t face West. Also, the tree on top of Bag End is fake. The Party Tree, however, is very real, very big, and the main reason they chose that farm.

While we were at the Hobbiton tour, Erin took the boys to a museum (which they liked!) and a wildlife park where they got to pet lion cubs! I’m kinda jealous.

We all met back up at the hotel and went down to a Fish and Chips/hamburger/Chinese place for lunch. It was run by a Chinese family. The fries had won awards. It was pretty good.
Next we drove out to the Redwood forest. Yes, Californian Redwoods in New Zealand. They were brought in and planted to become a money-making industry. I was very impressed. I don’t care where they came from. These were some awesome trees! We did the ol’ “see how many of us it takes to reach around this tree” thing, which was fun.
After the Redwoods, we went back to the hotel to be picked up by the Te Puia shuttle van. Te Puia (Used to be known by it’s longer name: Whakarewarewa Pronounced “Fa kar ay wahr ay wah”.) Fortunately for all concerned, they shortened it. We were shown the traditional carving and weaving schools. The carvers were working on some gigantic pieces of wood for a new stage they were building. They really have some talent in both of those schools.
Next we walked out to see the boiling mud pits. These were great. I don’t know why they struck me as funny, but there ya go. I enjoyed standing there watching the mud bubble up and make ‘bloop’ sounds. I took a video on my camera, but I’m not sure if I can load it on FB or not.
After the mud pits, we walked on up to the geyser. It wasn’t quite ready to show it’s stuff, so we went to the kiwi enclosure instead. We were able to get a rare glimpse of a couple of kiwi birds. They are flightless and lay the largest eggs (by body ratio) of any bird. The birds themselves are about ¾ the size of your average chicken.
After looking at the kiwis the geyser was ready to do it’s thing. We got to watch the earth spew water straight up for about 50 ft. It’s more impressive than it sounds. There was a lot of steam coming out as well. In fact, it looked like all of the water was turning to steam instead of falling back down to the ground. We know this isn’t true, because we got wet when we walked around the side.
Next it was time for us to go to our official Maori (pronounced “My or ee” or “May or ee” or “mar ay” I heard all three.) welcome ceremony. We had been forewarned that even though the traditional things might look silly to us, we should not laugh or make fun. These guys take their culture very seriously, and tourists have been beaten up for laughing at their ceremonies. (!) We didn’t see anything like that, but we were all very polite.

A chief was chosen from among the tourists to represent all of us. Next an emissary from the Maori chief came down the path to challenge us. He did some threatening things and then decided that we had come in peace. He reported back to the chief who then welcomed us to come inside the meeting hall. Once inside, they did some dancing and singing. Here’s a video clip about one of the dances called the Haka. (….Insert your own joke about the name here…)

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3BoNmpvkavo

New Zealand has one predominant sports team – the All Blacks (rugby). They also do a version of this dance before their matches. You can find All Blacks merchandise throughout NZ about like you can find orange in Knoxville.

After the show, we went out and they showed us how our dinner had been cooking over hot rocks in a pit in the ground. Their pit was not a traditional pit, unless they invented steel and concrete long before white people, but we got the idea. Likewise, some of the singing in the show had a distinct Opera tone, which was just weird for an indigenous show. (But hey, their voices were superb.) I read on the internet that they actually do have Opera performances there sometimes. I just don’t put Opera and indigenous together in my mind very often.
Dinner was excellent. There was a buffet of all sorts of meat and veggies. It was one of the better meals we had on the trip for sure.
After dinner, they gave us a ride in a tram back up to see the geyser at night under the lights. It was quite cold outside by then. They gave us hot chocolate and told us we could have a seat on “the warm rocks over there”. I was the first one over there. I didn’t really have a lot of faith in “the warm rocks” on such a cold night, but it only took about 5 seconds for me to become a believer. I really enjoyed recommending the rocks to people and listening to their reactions as they sat down. “Oh! Ohhhh. Ahhhhhh…” The rocks were heated from below by the general geo-thermal-ness of the valley. They were just the right temperature for warming your bee-hind without making you want to get up too soon. Nice ending to a long but really good day.

The next morning, we had to be at the airport at 10 to fly to Queenstown. We had to stop at Christchurch long enough to get off the plane and get back on. The Rotorua airport is probably the smallest one I’ve ever been in as a passenger. There was no x-ray for us, or our carry-on bags. I guess they don’t do international flights from there. We had a pretty good lunch there, though. Once we arrived at Queenstown. We had to wait a while for the rental car to be ready. But it finally did come. We decided to go check out a shopping center that was almost on the airport property. BUT, I got lost. Well, not really lost per se… The gps said to take the second exit from the roundabout, but that was a driveway into a private airline. So I took the 3rd exit and the gps thought we were then skipping our first destination and going on to our hotel. So it didn’t bother to say, “No, you dummy, turn around”. It just kept on with turn left, turn right, etc. Oh well. We called the others and told them that we’d checked in to the hotel and we’d catch up with them in a few minutes. (Queenstown isn’t that big.) Our hotel was pretty nice. I’m not much for stairs, or I’d give it a higher rating. We were in small townhouses, with all the bedrooms upstairs. We again had all 5 of us in one suite, which we liked. Mattress warmers – check!
The folks in my car and I went back down to the shopping center and met up with the others. We tried to find a place to eat there, but after we finally picked one, it was closing. Ah well. Instead, we decided to drive to the downtown-est part of Queenstown and just walk around ‘till we found something. The gps found a pizza/pasta place and we drove towards that. It was drizzling rain, so we were happy to take ‘first available’ that sounded decent. We came to a place offering a variety of dishes including pasta. I think it was geared more toward the younger and alcohol-drinking type person. But we were early for that scene, so we got a good meal without the disturbances.
The next morning we left for our excursion to Milford Sound. This is the one place where I really didn’t investigate enough! I guess I was busy looking at things to do in each city. When I saw that they had us down for a full day tour, I thought, “Oh good. I don’t need to plan anything for that whole day!”. So I told the kids “I think it’s like a 2 hour bus ride, and then an all day cruise and then we come back.” Wrong! It was a 5 hour bus ride, a 2 hour cruise, and then a long 5 hours back. Oops. I have to say, though, I thoroughly enjoyed the trip over. The bus driver kept up an interesting commentary about the things we were passing. The bus had a glass top, so we could see how high the mountains were above us without straining our necks. Cool. We stopped about ½ way for some hot chocolate and snacks. We drove past 32,000 or more sheep, and several hundred deer (on farms). The scenery was breathtaking! There was still snow on the mountaintops, and we could see where several avalanches had come down. The roads were very narrow and curvy. There were several places where we weren’t allowed to stop. Those places were called “avalanche zones”. Hmmm. We stopped in several places to get out and walk around a little. One place was called “mirror lake”. They had a sign there that was written backwards, so that when it reflected on the surface of the water you could read it the right way. Erin spotted an eel in the water there. We stopped at another stream that was flowing pretty good. It was mostly snow-melt from the surrounding mountains. The water was ice cold, but very pure and tasted great. We also saw a Kea bird in the parking lot.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Kea

He was cool. Look at the picture of him in flight – you can see the orange color only when they fly. He was very friendly, and came to see what all the people were doing.

I can’t say enough about how beautiful the scenery was on the drive. New Zealand in general is just full of beautiful scenery. It is so sparsely populated that in many places you can drive for hours without seeing a house. But you’ll see lots and lots of sheep, brilliant green grass, rolling hills (if not snow-topped mountains), streams, rivers, and breath-taking views. It’s a beautiful place.

Once we arrived at Milford Sound, we boarded the cruise ship. We were a little underwhelmed by this. First, we found out (surprise!) lunch was not included in this all-day excursion of ours. We had to buy sandwiches (only choice) on board. A little warning would’ve been nice. Secondly, the 5 of us sailed down the Yangtze River last year, and this looked similar, but maybe not so high. However, there were many waterfalls coming into the Fjord, so that was nice. They sailed the boat right up to the waterfall. We put on our rain jackets and stood in the spray. (It was very cold!) We wore jackets, hats, scarves, and gloves. We sailed all the way out to the Sea. On the way back, we saw a dozen or so seals sunning themselves on the rocks. Erin and I also saw a couple of little blue penguins swimming on top of the water. Neat-o!

After the cruise, I don’t think anyone was really looking forward to the long drive back. I stayed awake the whole time and at first we could enjoy the scenery again, but then the sun went down and it got kinda boring. The boys played “sheep” instead of “cows”. We had to do gross estimates. I’d say things like, “O.k. you can have 200 for that pasture” or “There’s probably 500 in there.” Etc. They quit when they both reached 16,000 about the same time. So that’s 32,000 for that stretch of road. One stat says there are 3 million people in NZ, and 60 million sheep. I believe it. Although I think there are more of both.
We got back to the hotel (after missing our bus stop!) too tired to care about supper. I can’t remember if anyone ate supper that night or not.
The next day was the day that H and A had been looking forward to for months – “Lord of the Rings Tour” day. O. decided that it wasn’t really his thing, so he went with Granny and Grandpa and Aneita and Uncle Gary to go to Arrowtown. Arrowtown is a former gold mining boom town. So they got to pan for gold and eat ice cream. He had a good time. The rest of us enjoyed our tour as well. Our guide was a local man who auditioned for a role as an extra in the movie. He played several roles including an Urukai, a Ranger, and an Orc. He had a lot on insight into how they filmed the movies. He had stills from the movies that he showed us at each location to prove that we were in the exact spot that the camera filmed from. You could really spend your whole vacation trooping around NZ to see the locations. (Some people do!) It’s amazing the amount of different terrain to be found there. The movies have really added to NZ’s tourism economy. There’s a rumor that the NZ govt. is going to mint a coin with a scene from the Hobbit if that tells you anything. In the airport it says, “Welcome to Middle Earth!”

http://www.lordoftheringstours.co.nz/trails_of_middle_earth.htm

We had a private tour with just the four of us. We got to stay at each location as long as we wanted. They took us to a nice restaurant in Queenstown for lunch. (The same restaurant we’d passed up on the first night because it was too expensive. I told you Queenstown isn’t that big.) We got to play with some replica weapons from the movie (my least favorite part, and everyone else’s favorite part). It was a very fun day for anyone who’s seen the movies. Now we want to see the extended versions! We’ve already gone back and watched a few scenes so we can say, “There’s Dean’s foot!” or “Great death, Dean-o!”, or “We’ve been there!”

It was a fun day. I recommend the movies (to anyone over the age of 12) even if they’re not normally your kind of thing. There are some violent/scary parts, but you can always fast forward through those.

That night we went to a burger joint called Fergburger. It is the current rage in Queenstown. No wonder! The burgers are huge – dinner plate size! While waiting for the burgers (we got them to go), I went next door to the bakery. Their “napoleans” were also excellent! We took the burgers (and napolean) back to the hotel to eat.
The next morning we decided to leave as early as we could get moving, so as to get to Christchurch in time to see the city. We had heard various time estimates on how long it takes to drive from Queenstown to Christchurch – everything from 5 hours to 9 hours. We decided to skip the turn off to go closer to Mt. Cook (NZ’s tallest mountain). I’m sure it would’ve been interesting to see the things over there, including the info. on how people use Mt. Cook to train for Mt. Everest and for going to Antartica. There’s also a place over there where you can take a guided tour out on the glacier. But the turn off was 45 min. one way, so it would’ve added quite a lot of driving and time to our trip.
Instead, we saw Mt. Cook from a distance. The final actual drive time was closer to 5 ½ hours. We stopped in the little town of Ashburton near Christchurch for lunch. The café (named “Platters”) was run by a few ladies, and the food was excellent. I think the cookie I had there was called a “Gypsy Cream” but I’m not sure. The internet is not yielding photos that match what I ate. I may be remembering the name wrong.
After lunch, we weren’t too far from Christchurch. We drove on into town and parked at the Botanic Gardens. We walked through there and found a museum that had a lot of brochures. I found one that said, “Drive a real Army Tank!” I quickly called to see if they’d allow a 12 year old to do it, and if so did they have any more times available for that afternoon. They said, “Does he have any experience driving a lawnmower, go-cart, etc.?” “Since he’d just driven a go-cart a few days ago, and I’d let him drive the truck in the pasture in Louisiana when he was much younger (in my lap as a matter of fact), I said, yes. So Erin took the boys and H. out to drive the tank. #1 son is the only one who got to drive. The others merely got to watch. But it was a thrill of a lifetime for #1 son, believe you me!! He was so happy!!
Meanwhile, the rest of us looked around the museum and learned more about the big Feb. 2011 earthquake and numerous aftershocks that Christchurch is still trying to recover from. A large chunk of downtown is still closed off to the public. The museum really had a good display with first-hand accounts, and security camera footage. I’m glad that O. didn’t see it though. He’s in that stage where he worries about things he (or his parents) can’t control. I don’t think he would’ve slept that night knowing that there were many aftershocks each week. There were some while we were there, but I didn’t feel any. Uncle Gary was awakened by one, though.

For supper, we walked down the street to Subway and had sandwiches. This was our only meal in Christchurch. Our flight the next morning to Sydney was very early. We had to arrange it that way in order to make our flight from Sydney back to Singapore. So all in all, the flights on this trip were not exactly what we wanted, but we sacrificed time and convenience for saving money – which I’m in favor of.

When we arrived in Sydney, I did my best to convince people to come out of the airport with me. We had an 8 hour layover! I felt like sitting in the airport would be a prison sentence. I’d rather sit on a park bench. At least that way you can enjoy the sunshine. But no one was willing. Erin came with me so I wouldn’t be alone. (Again, “Greatest Man on the Planet” , 20th year running!) That stupid airport tax got us again as we paid for our subway tickets. It ended up being much more expensive than I’d thought it would be. Oh well. We went down to the Australia Museum. It was well done. I wish the kids had gone with us. They had several interesting exhibits. Lots of aboriginal things. They also had stuffed animals (the kind that have been through the taxidermist) that you could touch. So I got to touch an echidna, dingo, wombat, etc. I enjoyed the museum thoroughly. Then we went out and found a café across the street on the corner of Hyde Park. We bought a couple of sandwiches and enjoyed the beautiful day. The sun was shining and it had to have been 72 perfect degrees. Ahhhhh. We had a lovely date. We spotted the Krispy Kreme sign across the street and had a good dessert as we walked toward the Chinese Garden. When we got down there, we found it was closed because they were filming a movie there called, “The Wolverine”.

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1430132/

So if you see something that looks like a Chinese Garden – it was filmed in Sydney Australia! Ha ha.

Oh well. We didn’t have much time left, so we headed for the subway. When we got there we heard an announcement that the airport line was closed due to an accident. Huh? We asked the station man. He said there’d been a fatality on the tracks at the airport. Uh oh. We called Erin’s folks to let them know we weren’t involved. We had to take an indirect route via bus. We barely made it back to the airport in time to qualify as 2 hours before our international flight. I think we gave the rest of the group a scare. The lady checking us in was a trainee, and it took her forever. So by the time we got to the gate, it was nearly boarding time.

The flight back to Singapore was much better than any of the other flights. We had entertainment, and didn’t need to try to sleep. But we slept well when we got home!

Erin’s folks stayed a few more days and we went around to some of the things they wanted to see like the Singapore Eye, Gardens by the Bay, Chinatown, Arab St., etc. I know we were all worn out by all the touring around!

Erin is amazed that this journal entry is 22 pages long. I’m just amazed that anyone wants to read it! :-P