Wednesday, January 25, 2012

Quickly Finishing the North Island

I booked a bus ticket to Rotorua which is about a third of the way down the North Island situated next to a big lake (Lake Rotorua). It is famous for its level of geothermal activity with all sorts of sulfurous gases and hot springs leaking up from the ground, which gives much of the area a somewhat eggy stench. 


Upon arriving there I had somewhat vague notions of walking round the entirety of the lake itself. I quickly decided against it as it was (and still is) fucking huge, and would have taken me a month. Instead I ended up hiking to a very small village next to another small lake and camping by the shore for a night. Unfortunately I had managed to fall asleep in a logging area and I was woken about 5am by the sound of huge trucks and diggers arriving in my area to tear the place apart, so I quickly retreated to a safe distance and set off back to Rotorua. The area isn't great for hiking and camping, so I decided to move south to Taupo which is in many ways quite similar. Its a town located on the north of the largest lake in New Zealand, Lake Taupo. 



There I was hit by another stroke of bad luck, I had arrived just before the start of an apparently famous Iron Man competition which is a bit like a marathon around the lake. This meant finding a site to pitch my tent was a bitch but eventually I managed to find a somewhere and sampled the local fish and chips. 


A comment is necessary about New Zealand fish and chips as, frankly, they are disappointing. A lot of the time the chips are more like fries (I like my chips chunky damnit!) and they do not have ANY vinegar there! Just salt, and they tend to put too much of it on the chips. They do not have cod or haddock there in large quantities (usually) and instead have a variety of other local fishes, which are just not quite up to the task. On the plus side, they are comparatively cheap (one of the few things in New Zealand that I could consider less expensive than the UK) and the portion sizes are reasonable. Still, being able to travel to the other side of the world to stand in line waiting for fish and chips is a delight of sorts, God Bless the former British Empire.


After staying a few days there I once again become bored, it wasn't really what I was after in New Zealand, although the air was lovely and fresh there. I once again got on a bus to small village right at the south of the lake whose name I have forgotten. I camped there for a few nights and ate cake whilst finishing off the second Lord of the Rings book (The Two Towers). This brings me on to a point about books and backpacking. Books weigh far too much to carry around for any period of time, except for maybe smaller paperbacks. This means that as soon as you finish a book you have to leave it behind, which for me is heartbreaking. Fun fact: floating around New Zealand somewhere is a copy of The Fellowship of the Ring I bought in a Waterstones next to Trafalgar Square. In retrospect a Kindle would have been a godsend but they were still fairly expensive back then. Books over there tend to cost a great deal more than in the UK, best sticking to second hand works if at all possible. A new book can set you back around $30 or more, sometimes $40 which is a lot of money to have to leave behind on a regular basis. That said, it was often possible to pick up new books from hostels and campsites for free as other like minded backpackers would also cast off their own literary wares upon completion.

Next I decided to head off to Wellington at the bottom of the North Island, which despite being only the second biggest city in New Zealand is the capital city. Its population is less than half that of Leeds, New Zealand has very few substantial urban areas (especially in the South Island). From there I was going to start my backpacking proper, as I prepared to take a night ferry across the Cook Sound to Picton, at the top of the South Island.

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