Adventures in Kiwi Land - Wonderful Wellington (Pt. 2)

The next day, we went back into Wellington to take the cable car up to the Wellington Botanical Gardens. Our first challenge was finding a place to park.

After trying to park on the road (forget that), we decided we should try to get in a parking garage. The first one we entered had a car waiting in front of a closed arm-gate. Why wasn't it letting us in? All of the sudden, two or three cars pulled in behind us, wondering why we weren't going in. Now, we weren't going anywhere!

We were there for about 20 minutes, until the manager came down and started yelling at the attendant. The lot was full--he just forgot to put the sign up.


After this experience, and backing out onto busy Wellington streets (I had no intention of getting into a fender-bender; not with the low insurance we got on the rental car), I dropped Jessi and Jaydn off in front of the cable car, and went to find parking all by myself. Be it near, or far, I'd find it.

The first lot I tried was on the wharf. They let me enter, and I got a ticket, but I spend another 20 minutes looking for a spot! And guess what--there was no open spot! The lot was full! I drove back out, gave the guy my ticket, and said, "this lot is full, so why did I get a ticket?" He just shrugged his shoulders, as he gave the next guy a ticket to get in.


I finally found a spot in the Te Papa museum parking lot, which was smart, because it was so cheap. But was not smart, because it was almost a mile away from Jessi and Jaydn. I got out and booked it across town.

Finally, we were able to take the cable car up to the gardens. And the view from the top was beautiful.



We wandered through the endless gardens, stopping, of course, at the playground. One interesting thing at the playground was a zip-cord ride. Even the grown-ups liked it!

The slides looked like giant waterslides.

In the gardens, we stopped in front of a large plant that looked like a month's-worth of asparagus.


The herb garden could've cured a lifetime of sickness and diseases, I'm sure. I thought it was neat that each of the hundreds of herbs they had planted in this garden had a sign that explained the uses of the herb. Just like it says in the Book of Mormon, "And there were some who died with fevers, which at some seasons of the year were very frequent in the land--but not so much with fevers, because of the excellent qualities of the many plants and roots which God had prepared to remove the cause of diseases, to which men were subject by the nature of the climate--" Yes, we are a big fan of herbs.

By the way, you're probably starting to wonder if we have any other clothes, or if we just wore the same tops every day. But you need to remember--we moved to Samoa! We only brought one long sleeve winter shirt or jacket for each of us! So, yes, we did wear the same overshirt every day.
Back to the gardens. The next sight was the beautiful rose garden, which kind of reminded us of the rose garden in Elizabeth Park, in Hartford, Connecticut, where we used to live:
Jessi and Jaydn have really sensitive noses, much more so than I do. So they hate smelly stuff, and love "smelling" things that smell nice. They walked around the garden smelling roses.
A highlight for Jaydn was a mother duck walking by with her baby chicks.

A highlight for me were these strikingly beautiful purple flowers inside the greenhouse.

Once we were finished, we took the cable car back down into the city.

In the city I realized something. As we were walking down the sidewalk and going to the local shops, people were walking on the left side of the sidewalk. Interesting!

Well, we didn't have much time to dilly-dally on our trip--we had seven 1/2 days to see a lot of countryside, so we got back in the car and headed off to our next destination, the Waitomo Glow Worm Caves.

Adventures in Kiwi Land - Wonderful Wellington

The skies just seemed to open when we arrived in Wellington. It was nice to see the ocean again. Wellington, the capitol of New Zealand, is a city of about 300,000+ people (compared to Auckland's near 1.4 million people), and there are many outlying suburbs and towns that we drove through on the way into Wellington. Wellington itself is a harbor town, just like Auckland, but everything is pushed together so the actual land mass is much smaller than Auckland. It's also set somewhat on a hill, so you can get great shots from of the city from the top. I found that I really came to like Wellington in the short time that we were there.

We first went to our backpacker hotel, however, which is in a suburb of Wellington. I picked a nice one this time; it was set right on the waterfront, and was beautifully and comfortably decorated. And very quaint. It's called Moana Lodge, www.moanalodge.co.nz, and if you ever visit Wellington, I'd recommend you stay there. You wouldn't believe the amount of work it took for the owners to get it to where it is now!

Across the bay from our hotel, and right out our room window, there was a grassy hill that was used as an org battle ground in Lord of the Rings. This was really the extent of our LOTR sightseeing, however, and it was done from afar.

Here's a better view:

After stopping at our hotel, we went straight to the Wellington Te Papa museum. I think that "Te Papa" means "our place" in Maori. This museum is dedicated to all things not only New Zealand, but Maori as well.

We visited everything from wonderfully carved Maori huts,

To equally beautiful Maori long boats,

and colorful buildings that I-don't-know-what-you-do in.

Outside the museum we walked through a really neat garden, and on a little bridge. Jaydn started acting like a monkey.

The city was nice.

On the way home, I had to stop by a pizza place with a devil of a name.

(Later on, I did see a business named, "Heaven Furniture," and another store just called "Heaven." I don't know if the businesses were in competition with "Hell.").

Adventures in Kiwi Land - All Rained Out

So here we were, in Tongariro National Park, the home of Mordor. It was here that I realized that I needed to make a quick change in accomodations for the night before we visited the Waitomo Glow Worm Caves. So I tried to make some phone calls.


This is where one of my gripes about New Zealand comes in. In America, you can put two quarters in a payphone and make a phone call. Not here, however. In order to make a call, you HAVE to buy at least a $5 phone card. And how many minutes does a phone card have? $5 = 15 minutes! You have got to be kidding me!

So I bought one. But after 15 minutes of making hurry-up phone calls, I had accomplished nothing. Luckily, I was able to make a reservation on the internet, which the backpacker hotels here in New Zealand provide you at a rate of $2 for 20 minutes. You can imagine we spent a lot of money on that little luxury as well!

The night we arrived in Tongariro, we had the best dinner we would have on the trip. It was a ski / climber pub-type place, with nice atmosphere, and wonderful food! It really reminded me of the kind of place that my brother Matt would probably put together, if he wanted to. There was so much creativity and character in the place; you just wanted to walk around and look at all the decor while you were eating. But it was the food that really made me think of Matt. We paid a pretty penny for this meal, but it was worth it to get at least one excellent meal on the trip.


We slept well that night, until we heard the rain. It rained really hard, and I lay in bed wondering how we were going to go on our hike of Mt. Doom. The answer was--we weren't.

The next morning, the rain just kept coming. There were so many clouds and so much fog that you couldn't see what was happening a block away. How were we going to see a mountain, then? And we were woefully underdressed for a hike. We only brought so many items of clothing to Samoa, and only a few things were appropriate for New Zealand.

So, our backpackers had a huge climbing wall room inside. We went climbing for about 1 1/2 hours instead of hiking. Jessi has been climbing many times before (on dates with other guys), so she decided not to climb and just be the anchorwoman.

I am kind of afraid of heights, so it took some guts to get up there. But once I had done it one time I loved it, and went again and again (until I was just too tired to ty again!).

(Jaydn took that picture. He's a good photographer!) Jaydn got into the act as well. He enjoyed climbing, even though it was difficult. He's always climbing on things at home, so this was second-nature to him.

I can't explain how unbelievably frustrating it is to plan out a vacation day by day and then have one full day be rained out. We even tried to drive into the park and see if we could see the volcanoes, but to no avail. God had planned for rain on this day, and who was I to say it shouldn't be so?

We did get a postcard, and I was going to at least take a picture of the card to show you, as pitiful as that is. But, this is probably better (what we should have seen):


Oh, well. I did find one thing amusing. You know how you frequently will see children crossing signs or deer crossing signs on the highway? In New Zealand, the "crossing" signs look like this:

(This sign is in Tongariro, by the way--hence, the volcano in the background). It's a Kiwi Bird crossing sign. We continued our voyage to Wellington when we couldn't see the volcanoes. We stopped at McDonalds for lunch. Bad idea!


McDonalds apparently is campaigning to be the healthiest "fast, greasy, fattening food" place. With every happy meal, they are giving out a toy that plays a popular song. With the toy, they give you a paper that explains how to do hip-hop dance moves to the song. Apparently, this is to help kids get fit (after they eat their McDonalds hamburger, fries, soda, and ice cream, mind you).


To my dismay, Jaydn's toy played "Mambo No. 5," an annoying song that came out in about 2000. Jaydn enjoyed pushing the button over and over and over, and I quickly explained my aggravation with the song and the toy. This, of course, led to more playing of the song. "One, two, three four five . . ." I would hear for the rest of the trip. (Unfortunately, we made another stop to McDonalds later in the trip, Jaydn got another Happy Meal, and another "Mambo No. 5" toy. He especially liked pushing the button on both toys at different moments so the tunes didn't quite match each other, just to get on my nerves. Over and over and over. Of course, I wasn't REALLY annoyed with Jaydn, I just played along to make him laugh).


The drive to Wellington was filled with stops at small towns, each of which had their own strange "large" sculpture. A carrot, a cookie-airplane, a huge santa claus, etc.--we saw just about everything.

Super large carrot...

Full size cookie airplane. Jaydn liked this one the best.

When you get rained out, you look for anything to entertain. Thank goodness driving in New Zealand is never boring.

Adventures in Kiwi-Land - So You Think You Can Swim With Dolphins?

The next morning, we boarded the Kings Dolphin Cruises boat to go out into the Bay of Islands. Jaydn was happy just sitting in the boat waiting--he saw his first two jellyfish.

Although we were set to spend the day on this boat, the main reason why people come on these boat trips is to be able to swim with dolphins. We had been told that there was about a 50/50 chance we would be able to.

Once we were out in the water, we got the word--the dolphins are in the water, and we can swim with them. Everyone was anxious to jump right in, so we got on the wetsuits and got our snorkel gear. The crew put half of us in a large net on the side of the boat. This was to include me, as well as Jessi and Jaydn, but once Jessi and Jaydn had jumped in, Jaydn couldn't handle it. The water was just too cold for him. We grabbed him out of the net and he watched from the boat.

The crew then pulled the boat out further into the water, with about 15 people holding on tightly to the net as water splashed up over them. The water was freezing! Once the dolphins were in range, the boat stopped, and the crew yelled for the people in the net to swim out to the dolphins. There were two rules: no touching, and... now I can't remember the other rule.

Jessi tried to take a picture, but it was too difficult to swim, find the dolphins, and take a picture all at once. Plus, the water was just too murky. She did get within arms length of the dolphins, and even had one swim right under her. But the dolphins really weren't in a super-playful mood.

Everyone in the net then got back up on the boat, and the next group of us--including myself--jumped into the net to swim with the dolphins. I had the camera, and I was determined to take a good picture.

Once the dolphins were within range, everyone yelled, "go, go, go!!!" We sped out of the net at, I'm sure, less than 3 mph, as our bodies were like ice. I swam to the dolphins, and they swam away. I turned to the boat to see where they went, and everyone pointed to the dolphins. We all swam toward them again, and they swam away. Who were we kidding? We couldn't catch them! These were dolphins for crying out loud! All of the sudden, as my body slowly developed ice crystals and my lungs gasped for the brisk air, I couldn't help but start laughing inside. I felt like a dumb tourist who would do anything for a good picture. I thought of the dolphin song at the beginning of the movie "Hitchhiker's Guide to the Galaxy," when the dolphins sing to the humans before leaving the earth so it can be destroyed:

So long and thanks for all the fish

So sad that it should come to this

We tried to warn you all but oh dear?

You may not share our intellect

Which might explain your disrespect

For all the natural wonders that

grow around you

So long, so long and thanks

for all the fish

Yes, I felt like a stupid human.

And the only picture we got of the dolphins was this one:

So much for keeping up with the greater intelligences. Our next stop was the hole in the rock. Our boat went through the hole and then went on to different islands.

For lunch, we were dropped off on a beach for sunbathing and cold-water snorkeling (sounds fun, huh?). Not your everyday beach, mind you. This beach had sheep farms on its rolling hills. How did sheep get out to this island, you might ask? Maybe we could have caught swimming sheep better than the dolphins. The beach and the island was beautiful--a classic mix of New Zealand and the Pacific. Jaydn enjoyed playing in the sand. He was done with the cold water.

After lunch, we went whale watching because the crew got word that a whale was in the Bay. We drove around with no luck, however. But the hunt was fun.

Finally, at a loss for things to do, the captain suggested we get in the net again and he would speed around the bay really fast, similar to waterskiing, but nothing like waterskiing. Sounds like fun, huh? No one volunteered at first--everyone had a not-too-fond memory of bitter-cold water. But, there were some few, brave, crazy ones of us that decided that that sounded like just the thing to do. Jessi and I jumped back in with four others. What were we thinking?!

Right before we jumped back in, I asked someone to videotape us. I've seen the video, and boy, do we look silly! We move from the front of the large net (shown above) to the back, and all around in between. We went under several times, glugging until we could get our footing again. I tried to stand up and hold on to the sides, but lost it and caught a mouthful of salt water. Then Jessi and I tried to push ourselves up to our feet while the boat was moving at full speed. Jaydn was laughing so hard I thought he'd fall in. So was everyone else. Getting back onboard, I felt like the class clown. But I had fun.

After we came back into harbor, we pulled out on our trek to Rotorua, our next stop on the trip. Swimming with dolphins (or swimming after dolphins) took all our energy, and we were ready for a nice day in a stinky city. We got just that in Rotorua.

Adventures in Kiwi-Land - Smelly Rotorua

After our dolphin swim, we had a LONG drive to Rotorua. Imagine Yellowstone, then place a city right on top of it. This, is Rotorua.

I told our backpacker hostel that we would be there at 11:00 pm. We hurried, and were there at 11:20 pm. No one was there. I was mad, and kept looking.

Most hotels were either full or had closed their main office for the night. Finally, we were saved by the Koreans. I found a place that seemed like it was open, and when I peeked inside, I could see that a Korean family owned the hotel. The couple who owned it were watching TV when I knocked on the door. They were of course surprised that I spoke Korean.

The next morning, Jaydn was ecstatic that our hotel had a jacuzzi bathtub. He had a blast in it.



In the morning I realized I hadn't planned as well as I thought I had. I was all ready to go to Rotorua, but where in Rotorua? There were about 101 places to visit, only a few of them free. We took a time out at the park by Rotorua Lake while we decided.

We visited a local park that was filled with bubbling, gooey, smelly mush. It was great! Jaydn ran around sniffing each one, saying "eeeew, this one stinks more."

The whole city was just one big smouldering, stinky, beautiful town. Smoke clouds billowed from all over town from crevasses in the ground. If you're from Rotorua, and you happen to go to Auckland or Wellington or somewhere else in New Zealand, all someone would have to do is smell you . . . sniff sniff . . . and, "yep, he's from Rotorua." In the middle of this olfactory wonderland, we thought we'd test it out on our sense of touch as well. I got in first. Jaydn thought my feet would melt off.

Once he saw my feet were ok, he and Jessi warmed their feet as well. We'd never think of doing this in Samoa!!! (too hot).

On our way out of Rotorua, we decided to stop by Huka Falls. The falls was really more like rapids than a waterfall. I don't think I'd ever seen water move so fast.

After miles and miles, we finally made it to our next destination. (I planned too much time driving!) We were too tired to do anything, except jump on the beds.


Our next day we would be visiting the land of the "One Ring to Rule them All." The place where the orgs prepared for the destruction of the human race. Where Gollum met his maker. Yes, we were ready to visit Mordor. Or, as Kiwis call it, Tongariro National Park.

Adventures in Kiwi-Land - A Tired Day in Auckland

We finally arrived! And on went the sweaters! Soon would come the long pants! Yes, New Zealand was cold and dry! And we loved it, because we were sick and tired of 84 degrees, 80% humidity!!!

Our first challenge was learning to drive on the wrong side of the road. The steering wheel is on the right side of the car. You drive on the left side of the road. You pass people on the right. Your turn signal is on the left of the steering wheel, and your windshield wipers are on the right. The gear shift is on the left. So, every time I hit my right hand on the driver's side door, I was really trying to change gears. And every time I hit the windshield wipers, I was really trying to turn. I was all messed up!

But what was really hard was remembering to turn onto the left side of the road! If we were turning left at a stop sign, I would get the strong inclination to turn far out into the right lane. Wrong! And my first thought was, "what traffic is coming from my left side?" Wrong again! These thoughts almost got us into more than a few fender-benders. For some reason, we made it through.

Our first stop was "Kelly Tarlton's Underwater World and Antarctic Adventure." Jaydn loved this place! We first went on a tram ride through a large room filled with penguins! Then, we saw sting rays, sharks, and numerous other fun fish in a large walk-through aquarium. It was really dark, so I didn't get very many good pictures here.

Next, we headed over to the Auckland Museum. This place reminded me of three of the big Smithsonian museums in Washington D.C. in one building--it was huge! It never ended, and increased my appreciation for the creativity of people who put together museums!

That was about all we could do--except get lost. We were so tired! We had been awake on Saturday until about 2:00 am on Sunday, and then two hours later when we passed the International Date Line, it was Monday!! We had to wake up and go at it again! And without really good maps, we were so confused in Auckland, a city of 1 million plus people. I've been told that Auckland is the second largest city (by land mass) in the world. I don't know if that is true, but it sure felt like it!

So we got a good $30 map book, and made our way north to the Bay of Islands. This was easily the windiest, craziest road we had driven on in a long time. Add the fact that we were tired, and driving on the left side of the road, and we desperately needed a driving rest!

The Bay of Islands is situated off the coast of Paihia, which is a beautiful tourist town!! Our first hotel was the first of many backpackers. What are backpackers? Well, they are somewhat like hostels; they have a shared bathroom and shower area, and your room is pretty-bare bones. But they were nice--they had laundry, internet access, free use of kayaks and bicycles, and a full-service kitchen. Most of them also had a large screen TV with tons of movies. Nevermind that for us; we were so tired we crashed the instant we got the chance!! The next day was to be one of our funnest--Day in the Bay/Swimming with Dolphins.

Adventures in Kiwi-Land - Our Stop in Apia

Well, we're back from our whirlwind tour of the northern island of New Zealand! On Saturday, November 25, 2006, we departed from the Pago Pago Airport, landing shortly thereafter in Apia, Samoa, en route to NZ.

What ensued was one of the longest, most agonizing delays in our traveling history. We had a nearly 12-hour layover in Apia! Which was my fault, of course, because I booked the tickets!

The first part of the layover wasn't so bad. We decided we wanted to get into the city. The only problem was that I had only exchanged so much money, and I didn't want to spend a third of it on a stupid taxi!

So we decided to brave the bus. We'd been on buses in American Samoa, so we were quite sure we could handle a Western Samoa bus. While we were waiting at the side of the street, the taxi drivers passed us by, laughing and taunting us for being so foolish as to take a jam-packed bus, luggage and all, for 30-minutes into Apia. After some waiting, we were wondering if we weren't foolish after all.

All of the sudden, a woman pulled her vehicle over to the side of the road and asked us if we wanted a ride. We were hesitant at first, but soon accepted her offer. As we were driving, we introduced ourselves, and she reciprocated. She told us she was originally from American Samoa, and that her brother still lives there and works as the Chief Justice at the Courthouse. Huh?! "Hey, you mean that your brother is the Chief Justice of American Samoa? The same Chief Justice that I work for and with day in and day out?" Yep, that would be the one. Talk about a coincidence!

She took us into town, where we ate lunch at the "Gourmet Seafoot n' Grill". Our waiter, an ambitious young Samoan rugby player named Joe, became the highlight of our lunch hour. Joe was more than a waiter--he was good company. He explained how he was the youngest in his family, and he felt that it was his job to take care of his parents. After all, that was the custom, and he loved his parents very much. However, he wanted to help his parents and siblings by becoming a professional rugby player, either in NZ or Australia. He already played for the Samoan national team, and he told us that he was considered one of the best players on the team, or in Samoa for that matter. (On a side note, I met an avid rugby fan a few days later in New Zealand who told me the Samoan rugby team was the "worst team in the world." Not being a rugby fan, I could neither agree with nor dispute his statement.) Joe wanted to make money to take care of his parents. But he was conflicted--he could not leave his parents.

I don't think I have met many people like Joe. Joe had a vision of what his life could be like, but an overwhelming sense of duty controlled that vision. I can't tell if Joe's decision to forego professional sports was the right decision. I respected him, however, for making a difficult decision that I knew most people in our "nursing home world" would never make in their lifetime. I hope to run into Joe again on a return trip to Apia.


After lunch, I wasn't feeling so well. We were pulling our luggage back into town, when two missionaries drove past us in their van. We knew them! It was Elder Jesmer and Elder Butterworth! We met Elder Jesmer in our Mesepa International Ward, and we met Elder Butterworth in Olesega. So, for all you Aussies out there reading our blog, we ran across your boy again! Both seemed to be doing great in Apia.

The Elders took our luggage around the corner to a church where we could rest for a while. Jessi and Jaydn got some local ice cream, and we caught a cab for the airport. Samoa's a funny place--the cab driver, Mui, asked us right off if we were Mormons. He hadn't any reason to know who we were, however. He had served a mission for the church as well. Small world!

Back at the airport, we were in for one of the longest nights of our lives. Our plane didn't leave from Apia until late--really late--approximately 1:30 am. And it was only 6:00 pm!

So, we played cards. Lots of cards. And it was hot. Really hot!! There were no shops open, no drinking fountains, and at about 9:00 pm, they turned on the Christmas tree lights. Four sets of different lights, the same tune, only each were at different measures of the tune. So it sort of sounded like "Jingle be--Jing--Jin--lls--le bel--jin--all--jin--the wa--jin--bell--all--gle be--the way..." I came down the stairs and looked for a way to inconspicuously turn off three of the "Jingle Bells" songs on the Christmas lights so we could actually hear a real melody, when a boy asked me, "it's very beautiful music, isn't it?" Actually, it was mind-numbing. I didn't have the guts to get under the tree and fix it, although my headache cursed me for not doing so. I also didn't have it in me to tell the boy it sounded terrible. So I headed back up to the card game Jessi, Jaydn and I were playing.

About half way into our game, some kids came up to watch us. These kids (six of them; had to be ages 4 through 11) weren't headed anywhere; in fact, their parents weren't even at the airport. They were selling things to people to make money. They were all siblings. They were ragged and dirty, but cute as can be. I could tell that they had worn their clothes multiple days in a row, and some had some very evident skin diseases. Eventually, the oldest two started playing the card game with us. They could barely speak English, but did well enough to play Skip-Bo.

About an hour later, the two youngest kids (about 4 and 5) started hitting me up for money! The youngest one hit my pockets, and I had a lot of change in my pockets! For the next hour they were grabbing my leg, pinching me, hitting me, and telling me to "give money!" I didn't want to; they were becoming extremely annoying! But I wanted to help. So I gave 5 tala (which is probably 3 dollars) to the oldest girl.

Later, the oldest girl (the one I gave the money to) pulled out a huge wad of money in front of Jessi, and said that they had a lot of money! I had been duped! Oh, it doesn't matter anyway. I saw what they had bought--a cup of Korean ramen. So I don't really know what to believe. I just know it's important to give, whatever the circumstances. I just don't like tricky kids! And I knew better when we passed through Apia airport on the way back home and they tried again!

A few more hours of Jaydn sleeping on our laps was enough for us. We were ready to get on the plane and go to NZ!