Travel Woes and Catching Up

OK so the Blackberry kind of dies on me, I assualt it with a paper clip to no avail. Maybe it's an issue back home. So blogging is likely to be sparodic and based on net cafes for a bit. Apologies. So to catch up.

Rotorua or Hot It's the Trots

Sulpher City and it smells of rotten eggs. With my notoriously insensitive hooter its fine, I notice the smell but it doesn't exactly over power me. Some muttering from Monst and Cal though. See sometimes it pays to have an insensitive sense organ.

First night in town we crash, except my stomach is suffering, and as the blackberry at this stage was behaving mails fly back and forth to blighty. Tracy if you read this can you get a message to Jon Dailey at the Heaf', Cathy Stuart at Gateway House and Frank Andrews at Preston that we need their collated LDP returns for a geezer called Stuart Jeffrey.

Morning and I've hardly slept a wink but what the heck we're on holiday and Monst decides to ease us into the day, so post breakfast we hit a spa that uses geothermally heated water and Cal and I swim in a pool naturally heated to just below a bath temperature. Odd but relaxing. Monst meanwhile heads for a massage.

Next stop old culture vulture me drags the folks to Te Wairoa a buried vilage the result of an eruption in 1886. It's sort of a polite Pompeii (well it involves the Victorians so prudish they reputedly covered up the legs of the piano, while at the same time having an estimated 100,000 prostitutes avaialbel in the UK alone!). Fascinating as it illustrates both Maori and European life together at a single moment in time. We grab lunch there and I eat but sparingly.

Post lunch it's off to Whakarewarewa because I insist we see some geothermal action. Our guide round the village is local of somewhat advancing years with an extremely young attitude Chris. She is what Monst describes as a character as she tells us the geothermal action predicts the weather, volcanic events in the Northern Hemisphere, in fact just about everything apart from next weeks lottery numbers. The village itself is fascinating too, the deal with the Chief who turned it over to tourism was he wanted flush toilets in return for allowing various strangers to wander in. Fair deal. The houses are small because there are a set of geothermal baths so no need for bathrooms and the cooking can be done in the boiling water too. Throw in the odd mud pool and a sulphurous good time was had by all.

I am by this stage knackered but my day is not done. We have booked to go to the Tamaki Maori Village which recreates pre-european Maori life. OK jazzed up a bit so that tourists will like it and you get a Maori Concert and Hangi meal thrown in. Monst loves it, Cal loves it, I find bits fascinating but also have the nagging doubt that I have with all re-enactors ever since meeting the Brummy SS in Bury, what's in it for them. Still the food was good, the concert bit was fun if you liek that sort of thing but the village recreation for me at least gave me a glimpse into the past. We meet a crane driver from Perth in Oz, some Japanese tourists and a geezer and family who works in construction somewhere round Stratford. I struggle to keep my eyes open on the bus home so the communal singing does not sit well with me.

Napier and the Scary Ladies

From Rotorua, the next port of call is Napier, capital of Art Deco as a result of an earthquake in 1931. But we get to see that late in the day. We arrive around lunch time and Monst is determined she and Cal are gonna swim with a dolphin. Now the wild ones at the Bay of Islands sensibly hid. She has a plan though, at Napier there is Marineland, a place where the Dolphin can't escape. Actually it was OK not a bad place and the staff care deeply about their charges. I'm still not certain about dolphin shows though. The water despite wet suits (photos taken of Monst in rubber - had to be done, Ooh! Er! Mrs Mopp! If for no other reason for blackmail purposes!) Was apparently freezing. Me taking the pics didn't feel a thing. Both enjoyed the experience and Kelly the Dolphin suruvived it so that was cool.

Leave Marineland and go to the chippy. Eat Al Fresco (poor Al) and then back for the show. Actually this provided Cal who is an avowed lover of penguins the opportunity to have a photo taken with a little blue penguin. The penguin in question is named Alfred and is blind. Cal found out that Penguins are both soft and warm, Monst then repeated the experience. So there you go, cold hands, pick up-a-pick up a penguin!

Then I persuade them into town, much photos and both Monst and I come away slightly uneasy. Napier is lovely, the Art Deco is great but you have a feeling you are on a Hollywood set. Quick game of Mini Golf which Cal claims to win because he took more hits. I fail to put him right.

Dinner at a local Indian (I was hungry by then no thought of stomach safety but actually all was well). Then I'm sent out for a pint and to write the postcards. I head to the Sports Bar of the Blue Water where we're staying. I'm drinking Tui and writing postcards, the femaile bar staff are meanwhile smacking hell out of a puch bag machine, there is some sort of karaoke going on (no Nicola no reprise of 'Blockbuster') and 'Man I Feel Like a Woman' prompts table top dancing at which point it is noticed I'm writing postcards and I have the piss taken out of me (fair enough).

Back to the room and kip.

Not a Brainy Womble or a Boot

Head down State Highway 2 for the longest drive so far. Stop for Brekkie at the Paper Mulberry Cafe at Pukehou and very good it was too. Porridge, toast, nice cuban coffee (is Fidel out and about yet?) Then onwards. Arrive here at 3.00'ish, Monst hits the laundrette, Cal stays in the room, I head to the National Museum and blog at a cyber cafe. Cool, tomorrow the dreaded ferry. Will no doubt expand this bit when I get a chance and I have the map to remind me where we stopped.

Two stops, one because there was a kiddies slide made out of an old Harvard trainer which I had to stop to let Cal use. Well cool.

Second for lunch where we met a lovely couple who chatted away with us who have a son who lives in Earley (Reading - I was born in Reading because I was awkward and breach not my home town Wallingford and there is always a Reading connection somewhere, wherever I go!)