boltsintotheblue   Le mariage and beyond

My jaw literally hit the floor when we turned up to “Elephant Village” about 15km outside Luang Prabang in Laos. There they were, right there, totally accessible, not behind bars or to be viewed from afar using binoculars – right there! We were both giggling like school girls as we approached (Clive especially).

The site of the Elephant Village was astounding in itself. Set high on an hill above the Mekong, ringed with what seemed to be layer after layer of mountains in the distance, almost like stage props that had been wheeled in and overlapped to give an impression of depth.

We started off with a simple elephant ride which was basically designed to get us on the beast and encouraging it to move the way that we wanted it to move. At all times you’re accompanied by a Mahout, an experienced elephant handler, but it’s still a long way up as demonstrated when I tried to get on. The elephant bends its front leg on a certain command which is supposed to give you the step up to swing your leg over its back – not so when you’re only 5’3″ and your elephant is a little half arsed in how much they want to help you out. In the end I was unceremoniously shoved up there from below by two hands on my butt from our guide – so elegant.

Being up on the elephants neck was just amazing. They have incredibly coarse hair on their heads which could honestly use some conditioner and while their hides are tough, the skin behind their ears is really quite soft. When they move they are obviously incredibly deliberate and surprisingly sure footed considering they can’t actually see the ground directly in front of them. This little fact made me all the more anxious when we had to access the river by a very narrow steep path that had a number of us with our eyes closed as we anticipated the tumble down the slope. Thankfully the elephants seem to know what they’re doing and even managed to turn at 90 degrees to the narrow path when a particular tree caught their fancy and they decided to stop for a bite, reaching in with their trunks and wrenching out enormous amounts of foliage. At these points no matter what the Mahout did the elephant would finish its snack before continuing and to be honest I got the impression that the elephants were indulging the Mahouts rather than taking orders from them.

As part of the trip we went on an hour’s ride down the river where we sat on wooden seats that were attached to their backs, rather like the old colonial explorers, though we really were missing our all white explorers outfit and domed helmet. The pace of the trip was very sedate and we had plenty of time to take turns on the neck of the elephant and have about a million pictures so beware of the picture show when we get back!

The highlight of the day was definitely getting to bathe them in the river. This involved another trip down the vertigo inducing path, except this time on the neck of the elephant – I may have closed my eyes at one point, before we head straight into the river and the Mahout gets the elephant to sit down so that we can splash water over their heads and give them a good scrub. I absolutely loved this part particularly because I had a feisty specimen who seemed to take umbrage at whatever the Mahout wanted her to do once we were in the water, so she proceeded to lift her head and trunk and smash them down into the river multiple times as well as sink lower down on her haunches so that he got wet as well. Good on her I thought.

The whole experience was a fantastic one but I do struggle with the idea of using such magnificent animals as a tourist attraction. I was somewhat reassured though because these elephants were rescued from logging operations where they’d previously been pumped full of steroids to make them stronger and forced to carry huge loads for many hours at at time. Now they get medical attention, they do a couple of circuits of the river each day and sit in the river while they get scrubbed, which I’ve got to assume is a much better life for them.

Interesting elephant factoids:
– The gestation period of an elephant can be up to 24 months!
– Elephants communicate using a series of grumbles and growls as well as the infamous trumpeting. Humans can only hear some of their sounds, but I can assure you when they growl while you’re on top, you certainly feel it!
– Their teeth alone weight 5kg
– They can sense water up to 50km away
– Elephants can get sunburned – I know the feeling 😦

We finished the day with a trip up the river to a local waterfall similar to the Kwang Si fall we had visited in Luang Prabang but this time we hiked up stream a bit and managed to grab a swim in a totally deserted pool. Just heaven.

The vast expanse of the Mekong surges past, brown and impressively wide – the workhorse river- lush vegetation surrounds our guesthouse, vivid greens that seem to be unique to tropical climes. The heat is tangible, pressing on your skin as you step outdoors and yet this isn’t even the hot season. Cars, bikes, mopeds and the omnipresent tuktuks swarm the dusty streets with no obvious organization, going as slow or as fast as pleases the driver and turning with no warning and at the last moment. On the pavements locals and tourists mix among travel agents, restaurants and a multitude of eateries, next to market stalls selling vibrantly coloured textiles, millions of styles of hammer pants (I could make a killing in the UK on the way home if that trend sticks around), local foods, woven baskets and random snakes and scorpions in jars of rice whiskey. This is Luang Prabang and we’ve fallen in love with the place.

We came here at the suggestion of our good friends Rob and Hannah because Rob’s sister has been living here for the last eleven years and has set up a business built around the local weaving traditions, employing local weavers and making beautiful textiles by hand. From nothing, she and her business partner have grown an enterprise that boasts three shops, a living craft centre, a guest house and cafe and still they’re looking into new areas all the time. Their setup is just beautiful, just 2km from the centre of LP and we had the pleasure of staying there for a few days and getting to know both Jo, Rob’s elder sister and Heather, his younger sister while we were there. They were such gracious hosts and gave us their time and insight into the town. I’d recommend anyone thinking of coming to LP to look up ock pop tok either to stay or learn more about weaving traditions. Beware of the shops though, they’re dangerous places for your budget as you’ll just want to buy everything!

We were very much taken by the Lao pace of life and slowed everything down to fit right in. We spent a lot of time in Luang Prabang enjoying the multitude of cafes and restaurants, people watching from various perches around the city – my Grandmas would have been proud of how long I can ensconce myself in a cafe to observe the tide of humanity flowing past.

We did manage to see some of the sights in amongst our cafe breaks and there’s plenty to be seen. The Kwang Si waterfalls are about 30km outside Luang Prabang and are beautiful stepped waterfalls and pool that are formed from Limestone deposits. The water is a beautiful milky blue and we though it would just be rude to not have a swim. There was also a rope swing into one of the pools which Clive of course had to have a go at. I made it about half way up the branch before being put off by the very slippy and wobbly struts that you had to walk on. Clive wanted to take a picture of me part way up so that we could pretend I’d done it – not a chance, we do not take pictures of FAILURE!

In town we made the hike up Pho Si hill to the temple at the top which is a favourite for sunset, although of course we chose the one night when the sun went down behind a cloud to make the slog up but still the view is fabulous and serves to remind you of the amazing surroundings in which Luang Prabang lies nestled.

Wat Xieng Thong was another stop on our itinerary, which can be found at the tip of the peninsula that Luang Prabang occupies. The word “Wat” means temple in Lao and Wat Xieng Thong is one of the most important temples in the country and translates as the Temple of the Golden City. Wat Xieng Thong was built around 1560 by King Setthathirat, a patron of Buddhism, who ruled Laos from 1548 to 1571. Mental. It’s a place of incredible peace even despite the throngs of tourists, with amazing mosaics and intricate carving. Makes me wish I was better with a camera. Actually, everything about this trip makes me wish I was better with a camera.

Massage is obviously a big thing in Laos so we gave a traditional Lao massage a try. Clive opted for the full body massage whereas I went for a head and foot massage. I have to confess my head massage felt like a large ape was pawing me and then the for the foot massage she actually started pummeling me with her fists and pinching me so at one point I finally had to let out a strangled “soft, soft, soft!” Apparently we had “enjoyed” a traditional Khmu massage which is known for the somewhat aggressive approach to relaxation. Noted.

We eventually arrived in Franz Josef village, well more a tourist village designed to serve the many hikers and backpackers that pass through here, full of motels, campsites, touring outfits and a few bars and restaurants. With Jo already having done a hike on the glacier when she was here 10 years ago, we were keen to do something different and new to both of us, so we settled on a full day of Ice-climbing up on the glacier. This would involve hiking up into the heart of the ice field before setting up ropes and attacking slippery routes with full-on crampons and ice axes. (I just wanted to do it because I actually got to use an ice axe properly rather than just longingly test swing them in our local Mountain Equipment store in Vancouver….)

So the next day we were in for an early start and met the guides at 7:30am for kit-out before beginning the Trek up the glacier, passing over the moraine deposits left as the glacier retreated. as we crossed over the river before getting on to the glacier proper. Before long we were tooled up with crampons on and followed our guides into the depths, with them expertly cutting steps with their pick axes (yes they looked like they were heading off to the mines when we first met them!).

I have to say that getting right down into the crevasses surrounded by walls of translucent blue ice and narrow passages was amazing, before popping up over brittle little ice ridges. We really felt like we were in the glacier not just on it. After about 30mins clawing our way through and over our guides found a good spot to set up in a small crevasse maybe 40ft deep. Ropes were set, and our first foray into ice-climbing began. I have to say that despite the fact that you are only ever attached by tiny little spikes on your feet or ice axes, I actually felt more secure than I have done rock climbing in the past (this may just be because I’m a rubbish rock climber as I’ve only done it a handful of times).

Towards the end of our day and having tried a few different routes including a very challenging overhang, we heard the rumble of thunder overhead. This wasn’t unexpected as the forecast was for rain in the afternoon and we’d already had a few spits. We carried on packing up and were just on the verge of leaving when we heard another giant thunder roll. Our guides quickly advised us this was no thunder but was actually a rockfall. We couldn’t see it from the bottom of our crevasse but the earlier “thunder” had been small rockfalls. Now we had the big one and the deep raucous noise reverberated menacingly around the valley. We were told to keep our heads down and eyes closed – my first thought being that by acting like a child hiding behind their hands and pretending that it wasn’t there didn’t actually protect us from it was actually false – we were soon engulfed by a dark black cloud of billowing rock dust.

This was serious, a huge slab on the north side of the valley had come crashing down probably less than 200ft from where we were. There was a scurry of activity on the radios as our guides radio’d in our position and safety condition and listened in on reports from other tour groups elsewhere on the glacier. We were given the all clear to move and to get on down the glacier as quickly as was safely possible. We got cracking but even on the way down there were smaller chunks of mountain still crashing down and I managed to get a few shots of one of the small ones and it’s after effects. We were climbing almost directly in the line of the rockfall but thankfully towards the right hand side of the valley as you look at the picture so the rocks would have had to crash through a multitude of large crevasses to get to us. We descended safely off the glacier but for some of the “lucky?” groups that were higher up and above the rockfall it was deemed too unsafe for them to cross below it so there was a flurry of helicopters shuttling them off the ice – I have to say I was a bit gutted to not be getting a free jellywopper ride but glad to be safe and lived to tell the tale.

Upon return to the office our guides told us that that was the biggest slide that the valley had seen in over 3 decades.

So from the wine tastings in Blenheim we cruised on down the east coast through Kaikoura and on towards Christchurch constantly surprised by the raw beauty of the rugged coastline. After a last minute overnight stay in the outskirts of Christchurch where we saw only brief pockets of the devastation caused by the huge Earthquake that leveled virtually the whole city centre, we pushed on towards our next destination – the Franz Josef glacier over on the West Coast. To get there we had to cross over the Southern Alps, taking the renowned Arthurs Pass route, a twisting, winding, majestic road that wiggles through the heart of the Southern Alps following a route discovered by Arthur Dobson in 1864. Apparently when he first encountered the precipitous Otira Gorge, the pass was almost impassable – he had to leave his horse at the top and lower his dog on a rope! This is one of the truly great roads to drive in New Zealand and we hit it with gusto in our little Toyota hire car, it was just a shame the car didn’t have the same guts in return as it struggled up the hills.

In the middle we stopped at Arthurs Pass Village for a quick hike up to the Devils Punch Bowl waterfall, and had lunch in the Wobbly Kea, first founded by German immigrant Oscar Coberger in 1929 who was a successful mountain guide and ski instructor as well selling imported European climbing equipment – apparently Sir Edmund Hillary bought his first ice axe from him.

We would have loved to stay and do some more hikes but our hurried schedule meant we had to push on as we had some miles to cover to get to Franz Josef before end of day. The Arthurs Pass road is also an impressive feat of engineering with many bridges, viaducts, rockfall shelters and diverted waterfalls all testament to man’s achievements in bringing civilization to remote inaccessible areas. Just outside of AP village we came across “Death’s Corner” lookout. This was where the original road had crossed right through the middle of a giant scree slope as at the time the road was first built it was the only logical way through but entirely bonkers given the ever-present danger of rockslides. Thankfully a new viaduct has been built safely out of the line of rock fire but a quick stop to walk on the old road brought home what an imposing pass it was.

After another hour or so of driving and we had crossed the country from coast to coast and turned South toward Franz Josef. The coastline here was still impressive but for me at least didn’t quite have the same untamed rawness and drama of the east coast. Still a sea view is a sea view and I’ll take it any day 🙂 !

“Probably the best one day hike in New Zealand” – proclaimed the guide book so we duly booked ourselves in for a guided trek. With NZ just coming into spring there was still snow at the top and we were told the route might not be clear and that we probably would need crampons and ice axes so we erred on the side of caution and went for a guided option with equipment supplied.

This promised to be a hike of ardour, 19km across a volcanic range, with a climb of over 1600 vertical meters over Mt Tongariro, a multi-cratered volcano last active in 1975. We were told that we could expect an eruption at any time as it usually erupted every nine years since records began and was now long overdue for the next one. In this event our only advice was to head away from the lava and gain ground as quickly as possible whilst protecting our heads from falling rocks the size of camper vans. This I thought sounded a little futile but I was on board with the running away to higher ground bit!

As we approached the start of the trek we passed by Mt Doom, a free standing volcano that appeared exactly as any child would draw a mountain, complete with a snow covered cap and ominously swirling clouds around it’s peak. No matter, we started out along our trek on level ground, passing amongst proverbial babbling brooks bouncing energetically through the ancient lava flows. Surrounding us were traditional kiwi mountain flora of heath and sway grasses, and impressive jagged ridge lines.

After a few hours of slogging punctuated by short little snack breaks we’d made it up on onto one of Mt Tongariro’s ridges and were rewarded with fierce blustering winds coupled with stunning mountain vistas. Another hour or so and we were up on the peak and stopped for lunch on a thermal ridge. This was a bizaar natural phenomenon where the steam vents from the volcano seep up through the rock and melt the snow from underneath. So here we were, buffeted by frigid mountain winds whilst munching through our home made sandwiches with our bums being gently steamed by the warm ground! Of course we had brought our England flag and had the obligatory photo on the top to remind the locals that NZ is still just one of the colonies…..

From there it was technically all down hill, but it still took another 3.5hrs, crabbing across ice crusted off camber slopes desperately trying to avoid a slip and tumble down the slope below. I nearly went whilst trying to chisel steps with my ice axe for the benefit of the unsteady looking Ozzy couple behind me. Thats what you get for helping the Aussies! Another little highlight was bum-sliding down these little narrow gullies just before the hut towards the end of the pass. The chutes created looked like a mini bobsled run and was well worth the wet soggy trousers for the rest of the trek.

Eventually, we descended from the snow line and back down through the open grass-studded slopes before dropping into the final stretch through a forested gully following a stream to the end. We arrived at our pick-up point tired but fulfilled and having conquered the crossing in the much the same way that Hannibal crossed the Alps (except without the elephants and 4000 soldiers in accompaniment).

So onwards from the putrid stench of Rotorua (even the sewage treatment plant in Twickenham that I worked at for 3 years didn’t smell as bad as Stinky Town) to Taupo. A laid back town situated on the shores of the massive volcanic Lake Taupo surrounded by beautiful rolling hills. We were here for a few nights again staying at another fantastically equipped campsite where we bumped into a couple of South Africans who we had met at our Orewa campsite – NZ is a small country with a well worn tourist route!

En route into Taupo we stopped for a picnic lunch at Huka Falls, a picturesque little stop where the natural change in rock funnels the river through a narrow channel about 200m long and 10m wide before it charges over the falls into the wider river amid a ranging torrent of foaming white water. After that we stopped at the Huka Honey Hive for some delectable and varied tastings of the local nectar in both sticky and liquid forms – honey beer and mead (wine) was also on the menu. Here we also learned that newly married couples were traditionally given enough honey mead for a month to ensure happiness and fertility in the future lives – hence the term honeymoon. Since we drank about a month’s worth of wine in France over the 2 day wedding extravaganza we felt that we were happy and fertile enough to carry on without purchasing any more….

The next day I had booked in to do my first skydive. This was to be a tandem jump from 15,000ft -high enough to see both east and west coast apparently – with about 30 seconds of freefall. I have to say in the build-up, watching the safety video, getting into my jumpsuit and harness etc I was remarkably calm and not filled with the kind of nervous trepidation that one should have before throwing themselves out of a perfectly good aeroplane. It was of a bizaar coincidence that I was sharing this jump with Cyrille a French guy only days before the England-France QF encounter who was working for Bouygues (the company I had just quit in Vancouver) in one of their Paris offices . I am proud to say that I was representing Queen and Country well by wearing my England shirt and feeling quietly confident that we would beat the French (how painfully wrong that turned out to be) so we had a bit of friendly banter about the upcoming contest. We were blessed with a glorious day and up in the plane the views over the lake and countryside were stunning.

Now for those of you who don’t know, tandem skydiving is not jumping out of a plane holding hands, it is a far more intimate affair than that. Effectively, you have another man (in my case the rather too unconcerned “I’ve done this a million times before” kiwi Cole) strapped to your back and waist. As we sat in the plane straddling the bench they had replaced the seats with, my time came. Still no nerves. The door went up and Cyrille was out first along with his camera man. Next up was me. At this point, I got a little nudge from behind. This is not a feeling I’m familiar with. It appeared that my skydive escort was hip-thrusting me towards the door with all the gusto of those desperate sheep molesters that we all like to joke about. Once a Kiwi, always a Kiwi I guess.

As I swung my legs out dangling into the turbulent air I looked out and saw the ground 15,000ft below. Still no nerves. We rocked back once, then a second time, then HOLY FUUUUUUUCK!!! My stomach shot to my mouth, the sheer speed of acceleration and wind buffeting took my breath away, literally, I couldn’t breathe, it was like being winded and I had this strange conflicting sensation of falling to my death whilst feeling like I was suffocating. After what seemed like a minute, but in reality was probably only a few seconds, I managed to suck in some air and regain some composure. The camera man who was jumping with us to record my terrifying moments for posterity was gesticulating at me to do something for the camera. I grinned as best I could and gave him my trade mark two thumbs salute, then reverted back to panic – I was out of breath and suffocating again. Another huge effort to suck in air and I was back on track. After that the adrenaline kicked in and I experienced this amazing buzz, an almost unfathomable overload of sensory feedback, cold temperature, rushing air buffeting me, loud white noise booming in my ears, wide-eyed dancing as I tried to take in everything below and around me at break-neck speed. I was free falling over this incredible vista on a glorious sunny day and after the initial shock I was loving it!

At 5000ft Cole deployed the chute and we arrested enough to properly take in the surroundings. At this point, Cole said to me “I’m just going to make you feel more comfortable, OK?”. Little did I know that this was his euphemism for “I’m going to make it feel like I’m unclipping you from my harness and you will feel like you’re about to be released to drop to your death”. Two pops and I dropped two inches. My heart stopped a moment, then we were all good as Cole maneuvered us in tightly swirling arcs down to the landing zone. When we hit terra firma I kissed the ground. Then I kissed my wife. Another experience ticked off the bucket list.

Clive is going to do a post about our time in Taupo but in the meantime we’re going to jump ahead a bit. I’m too impatient to wait for him – not like me eh?

We ended up flying from Auckland after the semis (the less said about those the better) down to Nelson where we rented a car for our week on the South Island. We spent the afternoon in Nelson, checking out the art deco cathedral which was a little grey and depressing for my taste, and then heading to the Founders Heritage Park which is a replica historical village where you can also sample the local organically certified brews which were quite delicious. We happened to be visiting at the same time as an exhibition of urban art with pieces from Banksy and others of a similar school – I haven’t seen a great deal of this type of art and I don’t pretend to understand the meaning behind all of it but the exhibition was fascinating.

One final piece of important business we had to attend to before we left Nelson was to visit a location of extreme historical importance – the site of the first ever rugby match in New Zealand, which was played at the foot of Botanical Hill on 14th May 1870 where Nelson rugby club trounced the lily-livered pansies from Nelson College 2-0. For those of you that don’t follow rugby, Clive and I are striking a ‘line out’ pose in the photo below.

From Nelson we drove to Picton along some of the most stunning coastal road I’ve ever seen (our photos don’t even come close to doing it justice). Picton is nestled in one of the many bays formed by the various fjords that are part of the Queen Charlotte Sound on the NE coast of the South Island and the views are breathtaking. We were hoping to do some of the famous Queen Charlotte track while we were in the area, which you can walk or bike, but the weather on our one full day there was awful so we had to knock the idea on the head (we’ll be back) and instead we headed down to Blenheim and the South Island’s wine country – hoorah!

On the way to the wineries and because the weather as still awful we decided to stop in at the Omaka Aviation Heritage museum which has a good portion of planes from the personal collection of Peter Jackson who also helped design the exhibit. The result is an incredibly engaging display of original and replica first world war fighter planes made from wood and fabric which frankly boggle the mind. One of the most famous displays depicts the downfall of Baron Von Richthofen, the infamous Red Baron, including the original canvas swastika that was cut from the wing of his downed plane. Another that sticks in my mind shows the different ways that the two different sides in the war solved the issue of wanting to mount guns to planes that were flown by one person and were powered by propellers at the front. How to prevent the pilot from shooting his own propellor?! One company completely changed the design of the plane and mounted the propeller behind the pilot which frankly looked very odd but in my opinion was preferable to the second option of relying on a design that set the timing on the machine gun to ensure that it missed the propeller blades, at least most of the time…

And then it was time for wine tasting, probably one of my favourite pastimes 🙂 We head first to the evocatively named Spy Valley winery (you can imagine why we headed here first) where we tasted about 8 of their wines which were frankly delicious, made all the more frustrating by the fact that we couldn’t buy much because we’d have to drink it all before we left NZ. From here we went for lunch at the Herzog winery where we ate delicious pork belly and lamb in a formal garden in the sunshine which had finally appeared. Simply blissful. The pork was nearly as good as Mum’s it was that good. Another glass of wine with lunch then some more tasting at St Clair via a detour for some handmade chocolate at an unexpected chocolate factory stop meant I was pretty tipsy by the time we got to Cloudy Bay, the final stop on our tour. We rationalized our multiple purchases here by making them gifts for Clive’s family in Queenstown – there’s always an excuse if you look hard enough.

From hot water beach we headed a little further up the coast to Cathedral Cove to finally be greeted with some beautiful weather showing off the lovely beach and archway to its fullest. There is a short walk down to the cove which the signs say takes about 40 minutes – the Lonely Planet disagrees and says that only those on a ventilator should take that long – in our case thankfully the LP was spot on 🙂

Cathedral Cove is a rock formation that has been formed by the erosion of the sea. I last went there 10 years ago and not a great deal has changed since then apart from a big sign that warns you not to go under the archway for fear of falling rock and a yellow tape that is incredibly easy to hop over. I guess they feel like they’ve done their bit in warning you and if anything happens you can’t sue.

After the obligatory photo shoot we headed on down the coast to Rotorua to check out some steaming mud pools and shooting geysers that draw over 3 million tourists to the area every year. I have to say apart from the weirdly lunar landscape in the Wai-O-Tapu park and the insane natural thermal phenomenons in the area that definitely capture the imagination, none of us were particularly taken with Rotorua. I have no idea why anyone would choose to live in the town – the entire place smells like rotten eggs. And I mean the whole town.

We set off in convoy from Orewa with me driving the bus and Jo charged with navigating us through the rugby mayhem of Auckland and onwards to the wilds of the Coromandel Peninsular. This is a rugged coastline on the east side of the North Island, marked by tiny towns and endlessly serpentine roads barely hugging hillsides or at other times barely above the lapping waves. I loved it although was disturbed by the distinct lack of sheep. Don’t get me wrong, I’m not a Welshman or anything but I’d read that NZ has over 30m sheep and I was looking to get my teeth stuck into some fine lamb chops.

A highlight of our first day road trip was deciding to take a “short cut” across the peninsular along what the guide book told us was the legendary 309. In fact, this was essentially a 30km gravel road that took us into the heart of Jurassic Park, a bonkers twisting, undulating, deserted road-to-nowhere fringed with a dense thicket of tropical lushness that threatened to produce monkeys and veloceraptors at any point. In my mind we were pioneers discovering an ancient route to hidden treasure, Jo just told me to keep my eyes and our camper on the road as we swayed from bend to bend with my “enthusiastic” driving. Along the way, there were vague signs of life – a very disturbing hillbilly compound notable for it’s ramshackle dwelling and array of rusting vehicles (either abandoned, or hijacked and burnt out as far as we could tell). At this point I had the dueling banjo scene from Deliverance playing in my head and we sped on whilst being chased away by several mangey hounds of death salivating with great gobs of Satan’s rabid slobber.

Eventually, we emerged on the other coast and half an hour later arrived at our campsite destination. Despite the inclement weather (read lashing rain and gale force winds) we donned our swimwear and headed to the beach with a few borrowed spades. No we were not in training for the British sand castle championships, we were after the thermal springs of hot water beach, an infamous NZ phenomenon where hot springs seep up through the sand to provide warm pools akin to natural hot tubs. During the frigid 20 minute walk down to the beach we mused that this could just be a cruel kiwi joke to send unsuspecting Brits down to dig up the beach just for shits and giggles but as we rounded a rocky outcrop there were several others lounging in their little sandy hot tubs. We quickly set to work with our spades and before long realized this was no joke, the water coming up through the sand was so hot we actually had to dig with flip-flops on to stop our feet being scalded. After a few minutes we were basking like seals in the sun as our own pool was complete, although with the tide on the turn our time was limited. Still, it was a very surreal (and uniquely cool/hot?) experience to have a steaming bath actually on the beach in the midst of chill winds and frigid waters!

So, Mr B here, after 6 weeks Mrs B has given up the iPad to a far less skilled and gifted scribe to give his take on the travels. The arrival in Auckland was somewhat of a second homecoming for me and after jumping in a taxi at Auckland airport to go and pick up our paradoxically named “Space-Ship”, I insisted on stopping at the first sign indicating we were on George Bolt Memorial Drive. For those of you who haven’t been bored by my tales of the family pioneering aviator, Great Uncle George, as I affectionately call him, was a bit a legend and held many flying records in NZ after buying the first plane built by the Boeing brothers out of Seattle. He then went on to start the first official airmail service and later became Chief Engineer to what was to become New Zealand Airways – a bit of an all round hero who’s exploits inspire me but as yet I’ve failed in anyway to match (there’s still time I hear you silently yell at your computers….)

On to our home for the next 4 days a brilliant campsite north of Auckland in a little beach side town called Orewa. A simply stunning seaside location with a crescent expanse of golden sand and freezing surf! Here we settled in and met some Canadians from our own Vancouver in the campsite kitchen on the first night and promptly shared an evening of beers and laughs and in Jo’s case 3/4 of our 16 year old fine scotch whiskey recently purchased in duty free. A good start to our Kiwi adventure and indicative of the friendliness and camaraderie that typified everywhere we went in NZ, not just from the host nation but everyone visiting for the tournament. It’s amazing how much a big sporting event such as the RWC brings out the human side of humanity and we experienced a very similar vibe in Vancouver during the 2010 winter Olympics.

Our first games were South Africa v Samoa followed by England v Scotland the next day. One match was closely fought, a joy to watch featuring open running rugby and for 60 mins at least an exhilarating contest of rambunctious rugby. The other was England laboring to a fortunate last minute win over the “Auld” enemy. Don’t get me wrong it was great to see our boys in action but they gave us scarcely little to shout about and the chants of Swing Low were easily drowned out by the Scottish fans baying for a big upset. Of course being NZ all the locals were vociferous in their support for Scotland – pom bashing being a favorite pastime after supporting the All Blacks. Still we scraped through and a win is a win at the World Cup and I was more than consoled about our poor performance by the fact that we put Scotland on the plane home, few things in life are more satisfying than beating the Scots!

Over these days we had also met a lovely English couple Dean and Lorna who were at the beginning of their 3 year working travels….it put our paltry 4 months into perspective! We resolved to explore the North Island together over the next few days before returning to Auckland for the 1/4 Final matches.