Getting Lost…. (Part 3)

The main tour….originally pplanned to start right away once I arrived in NZ, but got postpones due to my friend’s hectic schedule. Though cut short, the journey I can tell you was none less short than . . . breathtaking .

Okay, we woke up early that day, had some simple breakfast than headed out. But first of all, we picked up our rented car, had my ozzy dollar exchanged for kiwi money, filled the gas and of we were on the roads. Our estimation to the first town which was Lake Taupo, was around 4 hours. Our first stop was around 2 hours after driving, stopping for some peeing and a grab at a KFC. Next was at an army museum which we wanted to visit, but eventually turned out to cost $12. Did we enter?hell no mate :D….we’re only looking for free grabs here xD.

After that supposed visit on the museum, we hit the road. At first, it was all deserts and nothing but complete sand and dust. It wasn’t until ½ hour later on that we finally started to encounter some breathtaking views of this country. And it all started with the landscape of Lake Taupo. What really made me startled was the fact that Erwin mentioned about this lake being as large as Singapore. Though I doubted it for a moment, it waned away once I took a look at the real deal. The scenery was like endless, as if you were actually looking at an ocean not a lake. Once we encountered a stopping place, we briefly took some photos and rest before heading on to the town.

As we entered the town, another awesome scenery came in, pine trees side by side on the road. It all felt fantastic and serene, luckily the sky was blue, so I would say that moment passing thru the trees was like an eternity. At the town, it suddenly went a bit cloudy, but the scenery of the lake from the town was still fabulous, and endless landscape of waters. Once we parked our car, we headed on to the i-site, some sort of information center that NZ has in most of its town tourist related. There, we got an idea on what place we would be visiting at oru short visit of the town. Next stop…was obviously lunch :P.

Having enough of fast foods, we thought of having a fancy meal. So we went shopping around in the main bistro streets to search for some fancy but affordable food. Our hunger landed ourselves at a decent café rite in front of the lake. I myself ordered a lamb rack with some sort of Lebanese sauce. The taste was delicous :D. After the meal, we took some photos of ourselves at the edge of the lake before heading to the town’s tourist attractions.

The first was a place called Huka Falls. At first, I was expecting some water falls the scale of Coban Rondo. But hey…it just ended as a mere imagination with fact that the falls were only 5 meters high >_>. And they called it a fall???luckily, despite the unmatching name, the water was just clear blue, blue enough that it was almost clean and clear. The water speeds were said to be suitable for rafting. Next and last place was a Glass making store. At first, we intended to just take a look at the glass product exhibited. But we ended up paying to see how the glasses were made. Not to bad, the experience was cool as we had a first eye view on how glass was made and coloured to make those fabulous masterpieces. Too bad I had little money as I wanted to buy one small item. But the prices itself were way beyond my reach >.< .

The next town was called Rotorua, and for the first time, I had the chance to drive the car there. Handling an automatic car, I had to really pay attention to not use my left foot as I’m accustomed on using manual cars that require the use of both foot. Luckily the trip went easily without any sudden use of my left foot. The shortcoming of the journey was that it started to drizzle and the view was all road breaking hills . The journey to Rotorua lasted around 1.5 hours, so it was a good start for me to get to know the roads in Kiwi here.

At Rotorua, the weather developed itself to become a full fledged rain <_<. Hence, we headed straight to the nearest supermarket, bought some food for us to make (face it…we had to do so being a backpacker tourist) and then checked in to the hotel. The room itself was quite decent…except the bathroom….which turned out to be for the disabled…So…the interior of the bathroom was pretty much filled with aids and grips intended for disabled use. Eniwei…we took a short rest and shower before finding ourseleves some dinner.

As for dinner, well, same as like in Taupo, no fast food mate. Hence we had to roam for some classy yet cheap stuff. Our choice this time was an Italian bistro. Nothing much was ordered besides our personal dishes and pizza. Our journey back to the hotel was a bit postponed as we took a strool to the lake and browsed the inet for some fresh ideas on where to head off the next day. On the journey home, I had to handle the car as Erwin drank and I possible couldn’t let him behind the wheel :P. The nite was only spent by watching Hangover at Asep’s lappie. But I had to go to bed early as I really felt tired. Asep stayed up a bit later despite being a little drunk.

The next day, he did indeed wake up a little late due to the drukness :P. But we managed to head out in time. The only bad thing was that that morning started of with quite the rain. We intended to head of to a place called Skyride, but postponed it till the weather got a little reasonable. So as starters, we went to a local Maori village called Whakarewarewa. The place here was all about how Maori’s lived there lives and their cultures. Even though under the umbrella, the tour around the village was quite cool. Not only we managed to see the geysers and the process of making some sort of Maori dress, we also had the chance to eat corn cooked in an oven that was heated by earth heat. And surely…it did taste delicious :D .

Too bad, even after the tour, rain still poured heavily. Nevertheless, we were still eminent on going to skyride. At the site, we bought the combo package. But then, it turned out that we wouldn’t hop on the sky swing as it would cause us some heart attack ). Despite so, we still enjoyed the luge ride twice in the midst of the drizzle. The view of Rotorua from the top of the hill was also spectacular even though covered with heavy clouds ;).

Our last stop was supposed to ride the famous Zorbit. But being costed at $50 above, we surely hadn’t had that much money just for one ride upside down inside a giant ball down thru a hill. Not to mention the need to wear a wet clothes sort of thing. So, of we went to the Bay of Plenty, in particular…Tauranga city.

The whole journey was still covered in rain. And we didn’t have our lunch until we finally reached the city. In terms of crowdiness, this was the second crowded one after Welly…minus any tall buildings though. After filling our tummies, we booked into our designated hostel. The place was quite decent despite being a bit cramped. Well…there’s always first times for things and this first timey on hostel was not that bad ;). The rest of the was intended for sight seeing. But since the rain didn’t seem to cease itself, we just cruised down the roads with the car. Finished with the cruising, we browsed the inet on an inet café than headed out for dinner.

Ah yeah…I forgot to mention one thing, we encountered a mosque rite on the outer parts of Tauranga before we checked in. Hence, we tried locating the place, which did took us some time. After some attempts, we finally found it and had our Zhuhur and Asar prayers. To fill in time in the middle of the rain barren times in this city, we also decided to have Maghrib and Isya here when night came that day. But surely we had a dinner first before having our prayers ;). The nite at the hostel wasn’t to bad, except by the fact that the girl that slept below me wobbled all night long, making me think that there was an earth quake or something :P. But in short, the sleep was sound and we were ready for our next day.