"Wai" the "Heke" did we go to Rotorua?

New Zealand was a journey of big ups and downs.  Not since my Dartmouth Football career have I seen something experience such a brilliant meteoric rise abruptly followed by a complete and utter demise.  But before we get into our New Zealand trip, we must discuss how we got there. 

Being one of the longest legs of our 60 day trip, the journey from Cusco to Auckland involved three separate flights and 30 straight hours of flying and layovers.  On this grueling trip we managed to survive 2 crying babies, 5 hours at the Santiago Ruby Tuesdays Airport Bar, and one crazed Peruvian man who only spoke Ketchwa (the ancient Incan language) and violently shook me awake to try and inform me that the whole plane was going down if I did not turn off my iPod.  One would think that arriving in Auckland at 430am after such an ordeal would be the low point of our trip, but in fact this was the beginning of one of our favorite days thus far.

Check in at our hostel was not until 2pm, and since we had over 9 hours till then, we decided to drop off our bags and seize the day.  After receiving a great recommendation from our friend Duncan Hall, as well as our Fijian cab driver who drove us from the airport,

we hopped on the 7:20 ferry to Waiheke (pronounced why-heekee) Island.  After 30 hours in airplanes and airports, it was an incredible feeling to sit on the top deck, breathing in the fresh sea air while watching a beautiful sunrise on our 45 minute ferry ride to Waiheke.

Upon arrival, we walked to the small town of Oneroa and stumbled into the quaint Delight Café, which was perched on a cliff overlooking the ocean.  We were welcomed with warm greetings from the owners (we would find out that Kiwis might be the friendliest people in the world) and got two orders of eggs benedict.   

The combination of the beautiful views, warm local atmosphere, the best eggs benedict Alex has ever had (which I second), as well as the James Blunt cd playing in the background gave us the best start to a day we could have asked for.

After this fulfilling meal, we were feeling ambitious and decided to rent bikes in order to see the island and make our way to Onetangi Beach.  The woman at the bike rental store told us it was a fairly easy ride with only two hills.  She either used to dope with Lance Armstrong and ride in the Tour de France, or she just really wanted to rent us those two bikes because five minutes into the ride we found ourselves dripping in sweat and walking our bikes up what felt like Mount Everest.  We didn’t expect this ride to be round two fo the Prouty, but atleast we were getting good exercise.  Although as Alex put it, “just because it’s good for me doesn’t mean I have to like it.”  Despite its difficulty, it was a rewarding ride that gaves us wonderful views of many little inlets and coves before we collapsed on Onetangi Beach and let the sun and surf was away our pain.

 We stayed at Onetangi for about 4 hours and struck up a conversation with Ian, a local painter who has his summer house right on the beach.  When we asked for suggestions of what to do after the beach, he told us about his old friend Nick Jones.  Back when they were in their twenties, all Nick wanted to do was “drink booze and smoke drugs” so he moved out to Waiheke which was much less developed back then.  Today Nick Jones is a multi millionaire and owns Mudbrick Vineyards, arguably the best winery on Waiheke.  Trusting Ian’s opinion, we hopped on our bikes and rode back across the Himalayas to Mudbrick for a wine tasting.

We certainly looked a little out of placed showing up on bikes in a cloud of sweat and dirt while the civilized people were peacefully enjoying the views of the bay from the terrace while sipping on Sauvignon Blanc.  But that didn’t matter as we quickly fell into the good graces of Bobby, the man running the wine tastings.   

There was an option of either a $10 tasting, or a $15 premium tasting, and given the arduous journey to Mudbrick, we obviously had to do both.  We spent the next hour taking in the Waiheke scenery and enjoying the different wines we sampled.  Following the tasting we took the ferry back to Auckland and put a great first day in New Zealand in the books.

Our trip quickly took a turn for the worst when we caught the 730am bus to Rotorua the next morning.  We were very happy to get the last two seats on the bus, according to the travel desk at our hostel.  We wondered why this bus was $50 more than the return bus, but didn’t question it because we felt so “lucky” to be able to get transportation to Rotorua.  The reason for this extra cost quickly became apparent as we pulled out of the bus station to find that this was a guided tour that included a 3 hour detour to the Waitomo glow worm caves.  This guided tour was just what we needed at 730 in the morning.  Kenny the bus driver made sleep an impossibility by talking for the entire 3 hours, spewing out useless facts about the commercial forestry industry, the lengths farmers are allowed to grow corn, and the percentage breakdown of where the money from a traffic ticket goes. 

By the time we reached the glow worm caves we were so excited to get off the bus, escape the clutches of Kenny, and hopefully see something of interest.  At the start of our tour, we were told that photography was not allowed inside the caves.  Given our already sour moods, we took this as a direct challenge to take as many pictures as we could inside the caves without getting caught.

While we were able to snap numerous photos, none of them were of value.  The caves were an enormous let down.  I think that I could have started my own glow worm caves in 1^st grade by turning off the lights in my bedroom and giving people tours of the glow in the dark starts that covered my ceiling.  Following the tour, we got back on the bus and had to endure two more hours of Kenny’s annoying banter before reaching Rotorua.

Determined not to let this six hour trip from hell impact our time in Rotorua, we decided to live a little and headed to the Rotorua bungy.   

The 143 foot bungy was just what we needed, and we had a great time hanging out with BJ and George, the two guys running the bungy.  

 They even threw us a free “swoop” ride after our bungys were over.  As you can tell from the following video, Alex talks a lot when he's nervous so I tried to have a little fun with him just before pulling the ripcord:

With our adrenaline still pumping we headed to the mountain luge, which turned out to be a lot more fun than we anticipated.  Although we clearly belonged on the advanced track, we almost had more fun flying down the scenic route weaving through and cutting off other riders that got in our way.  The bungy and luge was an oasis from the giant disappointment that was Rotorua.  Alex felt so strongly about Rotorua that he asked for a few sentences to express his dislike for the town:

“Rotorua is set upon a suppurating sore in the Earth’s crust, causing it to be shrouded in a steaming cloud of putrefaction from the sulfuric shit that spews from the center o the Earth up through its geothermal mud pools.  The smell of eggs benedict on Waiheke was inversely proportional to the roteen egg odor that assualuts one’s nostrils in Rotorua.”

While some of the geothermal pools did look somewhat cool, this feeling evaporated quickly due to the aforementioned smell. 

Rotorua was not the lakeside paradise we had envisioned.  To add insult to injury, we found that because it was good Friday, alcohol could only be consumed or purchased while eating a meal.  Any night time plans of salvaging Rotorua went out the window, so we went back to our hostel defeated.

At 6am we were awoken by the feeling that Iran had started World War III by engaging in chemical warfare with New Zealand.  Sulfuric gas was pouring through the sky light in our room, and we both decided it was time to leave this godforsaken town.  Our bus wasn’t scheduled to elave until 3:30pm, but we headed to the bus station anyway and gladly paid the $16 to switch to an 8am bus and try and enjoy the rest of our time in New Zealand with a full day in Auckland.

Feeling the full effects of our jet lag, we spent the extra time in Auckland relaxing and recovering.  We went to the Blue Stone Room for happy hour and had a nice dinner while enjoying a few Monteith's Original Ales.  Being the day before Easter, every bar we went to after was closing at around 11:30pm, so we had a fairly early night and headed back to our hostel.

On this beautiful Easter morning we look forward to a hearty brunch in the Auckland Airport.  Who could think of a better way to spend Easter than being on a plane!  Hopefully we make up for it with a nice Easter dinner in Fiji.  With absolutely no plans upon our arrival, hopefully our next spontaneous decision turns out to be a better choice than going to Rotorua.