Round the World

Arghhhhhhhhh! It's overrrrrr!
So the biggest trip I've ever done is over and I'm in London ('home') for a while.
Now I'm trying to find a job. In banking. In a recession. Smart move. I would have stayed in Fiji and dived for the rest of the year, but that costs money, so I had to head back.

So it was 11 months to the day that this all came to an end. 11 months between my arrival in Bangkok, til my departure from JFK in New York. Around the world in 335 days. I saw a lot.

My last stop along the way was in New York City. I flew from Vancouver via Toronto to NYC and made it just in time to join my sister Margot, au pairing north of the city, for New Years celebrations. What a blast! Margot organised to go to Bryant Park Grill - a popular night spot a few blocks from Times Square, where the crowds were fewer and the drinks prepaid, and we had a blast of a new years party. It was still a bit jam-packed, but I guess what can you expect from NYC on New Years. As the ball dropped in Times Square clouds of confetti came floating down to earth. The wind brought bellowing plumes of the stuff down onto the nightclub's glass roof. It was great partying with my sister, who I hadn't seen in over a year, since Christmas last year, back in South Africa.

Before I left NYC the two of us managed to see quite a bit of the city together - Brooklyn Bridge, down-town Manhattan - including ground zero, Wall Street, uptown-Manhattan and all its skyscrapers. Its a phenominal city - just huge and so busy. A bit too busy for my liking, but still a fascinating place. I think it was perhaps the time of year that I was there - there were just huge crowds of people everywhere - the year-end sales may have dragged the masses from their living rooms.

In many ways I wasn't all that excited about New York. I couldn't figure out why that was. Every country I had been to previously, had filled me with energy and an ambition to read as much about the place before I got there, but here I was in NYC and I just wasn't all that excited. Was it the cold? Don't think so - Canada and New Zealand were colder. The masses of crowds? I'd been in some busy places already - like the tourist crowds in Thailand, the train systems of Singapore, or the Christmas crowds of Oxford Circus in London. So what was it? I was boarding the plane at JFK, departing for London, and it was now pretty clear: I had been away long enough. I had seen enough. I had met enough people. Made enough friends. Re-packed my bag enough times. I wanted to go back to familiarity. To my old friends. Any random job. I wanted routine. And most of all - my own bedroom!!

So here I am in London now and its time to get real and find a job! Wish me luck!

I'll produce a final blognote on the stats of my trip sometime soon and I think that'll probably be it. Hope you enjoyed it

Totsiens!

Hollywood in all its glory

Unknown to most tourists, Hollywood is spectacularly dodgy. Its full of creeps. Still confused with the city layout after being in LA for 8 days, I decided I'd buy an illustrated map of the city. A couple of crazies glared at me as I crossed the street on the way to the gimmicky little map shop. One even tried to shoulder - charge me, but he seemed to change his mind when he was a foot away from me and stopped right in front of me. I kept walking down Hollywood Boulevard. I picked up the map and walked over to the cashier to pay. At that moment, another crazy ran passed the shop screaming and flinging his arms above his head. He had a long beard and old clothes on. The cashier says "He's high on crack. They all high on crack. Do you know what crack is?" I was still focusing on the crazy but when I looked at him and his raised eyebrows, it seemed he was trying to lull me into some sort of drug deal. I mumbled something about having to go, and took the map. I also witnessed some oscar worthy performances from some bird and her pimp (I think) and some guy trying to get a free drink at McDonalds which led to the outlet closing down for the next 10 minutes as the cops where called and the drinks machines put on hold.
There are definitely more crazies in America than anywhere else. Apparently there is a story about bums and beggars being dropped off in LA by other city metropoles in California and Arizona. There definitely seemed to be a lot of bums around.

Los Angeles: "The Angels"

LA is a mega-city. It is absolutely huge. There are a vast amount of freeways throughout the city, and cars everywhere. Its extremely cosmopolitan, and suprisingly, given the political climate with Iran, there is a large Iranian presence in the city too. Even more of a suprise, is that large parts of Beverley Hills are dominated by the Iranian community. The city, and all of southern California as well as Arizona, is supported by the Colorado River. It never rains in LA, perhaps only a dozen days a year. As a result, I was wearing shorts everyday, despite it being near the height of winter. Perfect weather.

My old pal Keith Davis met me at the airport. Its been 9 years since we last saw each other when I was back in first year at varsity in Grahamstown. Keith had been on exchange for a semester and we've kept up ever since. There was a lot of catching up to be done. Keith's a great host - he took me to so many of the famous places in LA - Venice Beach (bumped into a drugged-out hippie party on the beach, and saw all the famous basketball courts where street teams compete aggresively for the courts), Santa Monica Boulevard (street musicians as well as the famous pier), Mulholland Drive (where James Dean crashed his bike), Manhattan Beach, Bel Air (unbelievable mansions), Beverley Hills and the San Fernando valley (full of all the famous studio houses). When Keith was working I cruised about the Hollywood area, and wandered up to the Hollyood Hills, or the various boulevards - Sunset Blvd especially. There is a lot to see in the city - its truely massive. The day I went up to the Hollywood Hills I found the view even smoggier than expected - the fires at Yorba Linda (outlying district) were creating such a haze that I couldn't see downtown LA. The entire valley was grey and the next day ash was falling over Hollywood. Being in LA was a surreal experience - especially for someone from outside the US - all the names, places, buildings - are familiar - I've seen them in so many movies and shows that it feels like I've been there already. I kept saying "This is just like the movies!" and then Keith would mock me. Keith was always pointing out something from some movie.

Dr Phil, my hero

I did a day trip to Universal Studios, but found it less than impressive, its one of those places where you need to be with mates, or perhaps just 15 years younger I also went to Paramount Studios for a studio tour - that was great. Unfortunately we had to witness Dr Phil rounding off one of his shows with his legion of bored housewife fans. This was excruciatingly painful to say the least. Dr Phil was walking along this fan-filled aisle up to his studio stairs and his legion were just cheering and cheering. There were guys hanging just out of sight from the camera's who were revving up the crowd every 30 seconds or so. Dr Phil looked in our direction, aknowledged us, and then made some corny, lame-ass joke to his die-hard legion, who erupted into hysterics (some of the fans almost did some Beatles-mania faint maneauvres). Yuuurghh. Anyway, the rest of the tour was great. We saw a few famous people on set, between takes (well I didn't recognise them, but apparently they're big news).

Living the dream: Roadtrip into the American South West

Keith got a week off from work over the Thanksgiving break, and we headed out west from LA, with the intention of hitting some of the the national parks in California, Arizona, and Utah, with a final fling in Las Vegas, where his folks live. We hit Joshua Tree National Park just outside of LA. This was a symbolic moment for me as I've been a big U2 fan for years, thanks to old school mates. Like hardened U2 fans, we played their greatest album - The Joshua Tree - at full volume. Fortunately there weren't any tourists about. After about half an hour we came across our first Joshua Tree. It looked like a big cactus... We took some pics and moved on! The build up was better than the real thing!

Our first night was in Phoenix, a massive, sprawling city - seemingly endless, and with random suburbs spreading for many miles beyond the downtown area. Its fascinating to see - the city is quite literally built in the desert. Another example of the the wonders of the Colorado River and the Hoover dam. I couldn't help but wonder how this city would deal with a massive petrol price hike - its so spread out that building any public transport system would cost a vast fortune. I reckon a massive price hike would cripple the city, and LA, for that matter.
Its so spread out that we struggled to find a hotel. When we finally did, we found ourselves in Tempe, considered completely seperate from Phoenix city. We dropped off our stuff and headed into the Tempe area of Phoenix, which is the home of Arizona University students. No problem! We ended up in Hooters, which was quiet anyway.
Phoenix is a little strange in my opinion - its so spread out that I think it loses a lot of character.

We rose late and cruised north to the Grand Canyon, passing a few small towns along the way. Keith stopped at a typical Diner and there was some great people watching in order. It was like another world. Guys were even arriving in hunting gear with rifles strapped to the backs of their "buggies." Later, we stopped off at some old Native American cliff dwellings and at Sunset Crater national park. Both were absolutely gorgeous. Sunset Crater is a large dried out lava field - a total moonscape. Arriving late at night at the Grand Canyon, we almost hit an elk caught in our spotlights. Keith freaked out. (Maybe it was all the long hours on the open, desert roads) Still, it was pretty funny. I was also freaking out, but mostly because Keith was making me listen to Annie Lennox. Roadtrips are one thing, but inviting Annie Lennox to the party is something else altogether. He's a borderline Annie fan, which is shameful. Day 3 and we did a small trail into the Canyon. Its unbelievably huge. You start to feel that you are looking at a painting, because it just doesn't feel real. Its that big. There are some great walks and viewpoints along the ridge and we cruised along the edge stopping every now and then to get some pics. The sunset was great - the canyon went bright red and I got some great pics.

Utah: Bryce Canyon and Zion National Parks

Another day, another state. Utah was next, and the deserts kept rolling in. We crossed the north-eastern point of the Grand Canyon, and went over the Colorado River, which was stunning with its bright green waters. Keith and I even met a Navajo woman later, on the rim of the Canyon. She was pretty engaging and told us lots about the culture and the squaw dances they still do every year. We managed to reach Bryce Canyon as the sun was setting, which was fortunate because the next morning it began to snow. We managed to walk a trail down into the canyon and get out as the weather turned icily cold and the snow started to come down quite hard. Bryce is spectaclar. It is a small canyon with bright red rocky pinnacles surrounding its rim. It has a planet Mars feel to it. The viewpoints, once again, were great.

Zion is spectacular, but in a different way. The highlight of the park is a cliff viewpoint that looks out over enormous domed mountains. There is a stream and valley below the viewpoint, and the entire place just makes you feel so insignificant. Its one of the most amazing viewpoints I've been too. I think that says a lot taking into account this year of travel so far. I could have sat there all day staring at the domed mountains ahead of the viewpoint.

Viva Las Vegas!

Vegas is unreal. As you can imagine, its all the glitz and glamour of the casinos world, along with as much sleaze and as many slimeballs as you could possible have in one place. The city has plenty of character! I think half of Mexico is there too. Keith gave me a few tours of the city and its famous casino's, but the highlight for me was spending my first thanksgiving in America, with his family. It was great doing the whole turkey thing, and staying in the comforts of your own bedroom, if only for while! Hostels get to you eventually! Keith's brother and sister-in-law came through from New York and it was great meeting them too.

So I'm in Portland, Oregan now. I've just been in San Francisco for three days, and they were epic. The city is definitely a place I could live, if the oportunity ever presented itself. Golden Gate was magnificent. I've only been in Portland for a few hours and it looks nice too. Its meant to be the micro-brewery capital of the US, so I'll have to conduct some firm investigations into this statement.

Til next time, ciao.

Brendan Sparg and I met in Auckland. Brendan moved there a few years ago and it was just great catching up.

Sunsets and Parties in the Mamanuca's

The chief at Bounty Island. When he isn't singing he's teaching you how to open coconuts, clean turtles(?!), cook taro, etc.

Thats Castaway Island on the right. This is the view from Mana Island, my favourite - what a place, what a crowd.

View of the pier from Mana Island.

Drinking games, and the English are unstoppable.

Contemplation as the games get underway... what DID they put in my cup?

Don and Fred - local legends. Fred can make you believe anything.

After 2 weeks marooned on a little island I turned around and saw another island. Freedom!

The Journey to Taveuni

Yes, that is a loader that fell over during the voyage. All the trucks couldn't get out, except by squeezing through on the far left, which meant putting a few dings in the trucks. It took them three hours to sort this out. The MV Sophie.. never again.

The gents - pictures can't describe the horror I felt when I walked in here. And shock. And horror. Then the army of cockroaches arrived in our cabin.

Bus trips are always entertaining and the kids often take great interest in you.

Taveuni: Beauty above and below the sea

Taveuni is full of dense greenery, and deep blue seas filled with coral reefs.

Vuna Lagoon, always beautiful.

Jerry has a phobia for buses and little kids. This did not bode well for our trip.

The fireflies are just massive in Fiji. Wait til you see the bats.

Buzzy, a pro golfer in hiding, putting for glory, with Bruce our Instructor watching. M'Ok.

Jerry was always having a bit of "Jerry-time," as he called it. He'd go for little wanders down the beach and skip stones on the water and things like that.

Tracker is the puppy at Vuna Lagoon that has in excess of 1000 fleas. So we called him Fleabag.

Vanua Levu and Dolphin Bay

I spent 16 nights camped 10 meters from these waters. Paradise.

Out on the boat.

Studies were made difficulty thanks to the attentions of Carrycat, one of nine cats at Dolphin Bay.

A local Scottish-Fijian Tribesman with his Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtle partner on Halloween.

Rose - abusing animals again. She was always throwing them off tables or something. The ginger cat is foxy and is the greatest cat in the world.

The Levena Coastal Walk. The entire coastline is covered in coral reef. If you walk out to them and peer over the edge, it drops off into big coral walls. There must be so much life down there cos there is very little fishing in the area.

Tovoro Falls, Taveuni. This is where one of the famous scenes from Return to the Blue Lagoon was filmed. I kept waiting for a naked Milla Jovovich to arrive but she never did.

One of the first things you notice with the people in Fiji is the sheer size of your average Fijian. The Indo-Fijians (Indian immigrants) are pretty normal, but the native Fijians are just huge. Even the women are really big. You notice it when shake big, tough hands, when you see the size of their footwear while standing in a queue, and simply the height of men as you walk down a crowded street. Fijians are big people. They're happy too, and generally very easy-going. I'm always getting a "Bula!" (Hello) from across the street. People often ask where you're from.
"South Africa," I say.
"Ah.....! Ah! The world cup!!"
"Yep, we won."
"But Fiji almost beat you!" they exclaim.
"Ya I know, best game of the tournament, that quarter-final."
Fiji did almost beat the Springboks in that game, and if they had, we wouldn't have won the World Cup. Most Fijians will bring up rugby when I tell them where I'm from, and its obvious that that game did a lot for South African rugby here. I've seen more Fijians wearing green and gold replica jerseys than any other nationality, including New Zealand, who currently have a number of star players from Fiji. Rugby is big here, and on one day, I joined some guys for a game of touch rugby on a battered field near the beach. The guys played an immensely fast-paced, exciting game, and I could hardly keep up. My fitness was lacking too, I think. But eventually I stopped playing because of the field - there were gaping holes all over - twice I almost sprained my ankle. I asked one of the guys later why they don't put sand in the holes, to prevent injuries.
"We all know where the holes are - we just run around them. Its fine like that."
"So no one gets injured? Haven't you been injured by one of the holes before?" I asked.
"Oh yes, two months ago. I couldn't walk and didn't sleep that night, but its fine now."
Hmmm. Island life - perhaps it makes you idle.

Island - hopping and kava -drinking in paradise

A mate of mine in London recommended that as soon as you get to Fiji you should book a trip out to the Yasawa's and Mamanuca's island groups. Ferries go every day, dropping people off at their preferred island and then they hop on again for a few more days at another island.
So I took the Yasawa's Flyer ferry, getting off at the second stop - Bounty Island. Its quiet and chilled there, and the chief (I think) greets you wearing a floral shirt and a guitar in hand as you jump onto the beach from the transfer boat. I spent loads of time reading, and doing very little other than kayak and snorkel. One night, the chief decided it was time for some kava. Kava is the drink of the south Pacific, its available on most island groups from the Solomon's to Tonga. Its ground up from roots and mixed with water inside a large kava bowl, and looks and tastes like very dirty dishwater! The correct way to drink it is to clap your hands before receiving the kava cup, to thank your host after downing it ("Vinaka!"), and to clap three times afterwards again - to show appreciation. It has a fierce reputation. Although, in Fiji, it is a mild drink. It does not contain alcohol, but instead is a form of hallucinogenic. Although I had quite a few cups on several occasions, I never really felt much of an effect. What you DO feel is a dullness of your senses and a dead mouth and tongue - sort of like the feeling you may get after you've been to the dentist and had a local anesthetic injection somewhere in your mouth. Its not like beer, but it does leave you very relaxed and not too keen to do anything really. Perfect!

Two days of relaxation and I headed to Beachcomber Island, the so-called 'party island.' What you can do here is tan, tan some more, tan again, and then party from happy hour each night. Standard routine. It simply amazed me how much time some of the girls spent in the sun - perhaps 6 hours, through midday, and often until the sun goes down. There were a lot of pink people there. The sun in Fiji is as fierce as I've ever experienced.
Since I don't tan very well, I started reading again during the day (shady spots only), and hit the bar in the evening. I walked around the island in five minutes - its tiny. There is only one dorm, and it takes 130 people, boys on one side, girls on the other. If you had cash to spare, you could stay in a bure, complete with hammocks and a patio looking onto your own little section of the beach. I splashed out and went jet-skiing, since I hadn't done it before. Over-rated, I reckon. I got chatting to the manager of the island, Vince - a local Fijian of British descent, and it was fascinating hearing his stories of the filming of the Tom Hanks' film Castaway. He recommended the island that they ultimately filmed on, met Steven Spielberg during filming, and even baby-sat Tom's kids.
After blowing the budget on over-priced beers for 2 days, I decided it was time to head to Mana Island - which I had heard so much about from my Irish mate Gary in New Zealand.

Mana is the perfect destination for "chillaxing", one of the Irish girls, Siobhan (pro. Chevon) told me. I stayed at Mana Lagoon Backpackers, and what a classic backpacker place. The crowd was awesome, the food filling, the drinks cold, the beach straight out of a postcard, and the hill views at sunset - unbeatable. On one of the days, a big crowd of us - from Maryland, Holland, UK, Ireland, Sweden, France, Germany and all sorts of other places - headed up and witnessed the most amazing sunset. It was a champagne moment - but where do you get champagne in a place like this?! The sun set not far away from the cliffs of Hanks' movie, and it was a perfect setting. (In the movie they make out as though there are no islands in view of castaway island, but there are in fact half a dozen all around it).

The MV Sophie, aka Noah's Arc

After lazing about about for days, and literally missing the boat a couple of times (its that chilled out) I decided it was time to focus on diving. So I headed back to Nadi, amidst sad farewells and many facebook promises, and booked a trip on the MV Sophie from the capital Suva to Savusavu, on the other big island, Vanua Levu. Little did I know that the trip would be classified as my worst after 8 months of travel. Luckily, I shared a cabin with Brits Holly and Rachel. We took first class - basically you get a cabin. Anything less, and its the big seated area with screaming kids, indoor picnics, and snoring old men everywhere. We got into our cabin, and there were cockroaches crawling out of the beds. We moved cabins. Still cockroaches in the beds. We then saw that there were rust holes linking all the cabins, and that one way or another we would have a couple of friendly little cockroaches sleeping with us tonight. Then we departed, and the boat started to roll about in the rough seas. A few people spewed on the deck outside the cabins. I needed the toilet later, and came across the most decrepit, unhealthy, uncared for, men's bathroom I have ever seen. The toilets seats could not even open because the doors blocked them (difficult to explain). Sleep was difficult - all the lolling about gave Rachel and Holly sleepless nights.

In the morning I bade them farewell - I would continue with the ferry to Taveuni, and the Brits got off at Savusavu. Little did I know that downstairs in the cargo hold, there was a problem. The construction loader had fallen off its transport truck and was preventing all the other trucks from getting off. They literally had to squeeze through a small gap to get out, creating nice little dents on each truck.
I asked one of the cargo guys: "How long til we go?"
"One hour perhaps," came the reply.

One hour later and no progress. I picked up my bag, bade the MV Sophie a tearful goodbye, and headed into town. I met the Brits again, and 2 hours later during breakfast, the MV Sophie departed. Incredible ship that.
While in Savusavu we headed out to the town of Lembasa, home of Lonely Planet's highly-rated Monolithic Gods site. After a 3 hour bus journey (average of 10km/h) we got to the site. I must admit, its times like these you want to wring Lonely Planet's neck. Why on earth has this place received so much coverage in their guide book???!! It was quite literally a long rock sticking out of the ground, and a few other rocks showing evidence of ancient cannibalism, and what must have been a stone village once, but resembled someone's nicely laid out rock garden. Pathetic. Anyway, the villagers were friendly enough. We then had a 3 hour bus journey to look forward to again...
After a couple of days I headed over to Taveuni, where my dive courses began.

I'll try update with some pics soon - don't hold your breathe though, this internet cafe can't even load up facebook.

New Zealand (Aotearoa) is magnificently beautiful. I've been traveling with a company called the Magic bus - a sort of backpacker tour company. Along the way, both in the north and south islands, I have seen so many amazing viewpoints that I feel too guilty to try and get some sleep. Staring out the window is just so worth it
New Zealander's are generally a pretty good, easy-going, down-to-earth bunch. Except during Tri-nations rugby! I had to watch the Wallabies go down on Saturday and see the All Blacks clinch the Tr-Nations trophy for the 4th consecutive year. They're killing the tournament... but Kiwi's don't care!

My visit started in Auckland. I was pretty suprised at the size of the city - its much smaller than I expected. In fact, that pretty much sums up NZ - large parts of the country almost feel deserted - there is often not a soul around, especially in the south island. Auckland's Sky Tower is impressive - the views of the Auckland area are something else. The city centre is pretty small - I saw most of it in under an hour. My backpacker's room was eventually ok; I decided to move to my own room after coming across two fly-infested dorms (some funky, ripe old food in some bags I think). I met up with old East London mate Brendon Sparg on the waterfront for some drinks. It was great catching up, and Brendon introduced me to a few great Kiwi brews.

Without going into detailed daily accounts, I'll give you some of my highlights from the last three weeks in New Zealand:

Rotorua and the Maori cultural show:
So a bus picks you up for a cultural show, and before you know it, some massive Maori guys are just about decapitating our selected 'chief' and sticking their tongues out at us, doing the whole eyeball thing, and generally making every tourist squirm, as we are challenged to enter their 'village.' Then you go into the village, have a fat chat with these guys who have just threatened us with our lives, and eat 'hangi' - a kind of stew cooked under the ground with hot rocks/coal. A good experience, but unavoidably touristy.
Rotorua is also something of a hot spring capital, with various areas throughout the town closed off to public access because of boiling mud and geysers. There was a field of geysers just outside our YHA backpackers. As it turned out, the YHA is run by the grumpiest staff in New Zealand, and upon enquiring as to why the bar and restaurant closed at 7pm ("If there's no one in the bar, we close!"), they directed Irishman Gary and myself to another eatery. We didn't know as we set out in the dark, but the owner had directed us straight through the geyser field. We barely escaped with our lives. She probably sends all complainants there. That's were all the missing backpackers in New Zealand can be found, I reckon...

The Magic Bus:
The Magic Bus (www.magicbus.co.nz) is full of characters. The most interesting are the bus drivers, mostly because they are partly crazy. Since they are tour guides, they fill us in with interesting facts, such as the story of the possums: apparently there are either 19 million, 25 million, or 80 million possums in New Zealand, they are destroying the forests and they came from Australia. I didn't know this. Other fascinating facts are that you cannot sue in New Zealand, a Japanese guy once fell into 200 degree boiling mud and died, NZ is the most dangerous country in the world, and other facts. Sarcasm aside, the bus guides are pretty good blokes and apart from the occasional questionable fact, give you some pretty interesting stories about New Zealand, which keeps the trip pretty well entertained. They also stop off at great lookouts for photo opportunities, which lets you see so many great spots as you journey through the countryside. There are interesting passengers on the bus - I've met loads of Irish, English and Australian travellers.

Tramping in New Zealand
NZ is great for terkking, or tramping, as they say here. So far I have done walks through Tongariro National Park (Mordor from Lord of the Rings), Abel Tasman National Park and a little trip out to the Franz Josef glacier. All have been spectacularly beautiful. I've also done a bit of cycling - hiring bikes at Rotorua to see the Blue and Green lakes just outside the town. Like I said, and as you can see, NZ is spectacularly beautful.
Summitting Mt Ngauruhoe (Tongariro Crossing) felt like quite an achievement, but unfortunately the weather had closed in for most of the day, and the spectacular views that it is famous for were completely blocked by mist and sleet, which was worsened by the bitter, cold wind. It was still pretty cool seeing the area where the Mordor scenes were filmed though.

Wine tour and rugby in Napier:
I visited my mates from Nepal, Jason and Philippa Readpath, in Napier. What a great town. Pip took me on a cycling wine tour (hmm....poor combination?) on her day off. We mountain-biked through farm backroads and ended up on a Pacific beach. It was pretty weird seeing an old concrete World War 2 bunker on a quiet, desolate beach near Napier - built for the expected Japanese invasion back in 1942. You kind of forget just how far-reaching the 'world wars' were sometimes.
Pips and I then headed off to the vineyards, where we sampled some great white wines, and added knowledgable comments such as 'clearly an autumn harvest,' and 'yes, 2004 - a great year' to taster conversations. The Mission is a great little winery.
On the way home, Jason called to announce that a rugby match would be on later that night. Hometeam Hawke's Bay v Taranaki, the big, superior rivals!! And, big suprise... the hometeam won! It was a great game, and the local provincial rugby scene reminded me a lot of the domestic rugby atmosphere back home in South Africa.
Overall, I really liked Napier - its a great town.

Windy Wellington
I met up with my old Wimbledon housemate Gen Talbot in Wellington, and she took me all over the place - Wellington, although often cold and chilly, seems to have quite a trendy arts scene. Its headed up by the most amazing museam - Te Papa. Personally, I think its far better than any museum I've seen in London. I was really impressed. The city is spread out and runs along a large bay. Fortunately, the weather cleared and we managed to walk up to a great viewpoint on my last day in Eastbourne, Wellington to get some photos of the bay.

Snowboarding in Queenstown
Wow wow wow!! Well, what can I say - snowboarding is just awesome. I love the sport, and may well be addicted now. If you've done it before, you'll know how cool it is. I went to the Remarkables Ski Resort for two days. Queenstown is also unbelievably beautiful - the views from the hillside down to the town, and up to all the surrounding mountains are really incredible. I stayed at another YHA, along with the Irish and Aussie crowd from the Magic Bus. I'm kind of glad to be leaving tomorrow - this town sure can break the bank!

Til next time when I'm in Fiji, adios!