Tuesday, January 22, 2013

New Zealand

This is going to be an adventure!  We only drove on the wrong side of the road 3 times!  But we realized we were on the wrong side because there were cars coming directly at us.  But other than that...
The blinker and the windsheild wipers are also reversed so every time Marshall went to signal the wipers went on.  He finally got it figured out the last day and then when we came home he was doing it the New Zealand way in his car, ha ha, can't win for losin'.

View from our hotel in Auckland.

Auckland

We had dinner at the Sky Tower to celebrate our 3 year anniversary.  Epic.
The resterant slowly revolved so we got awesome views during dinner.  Everytime we looked up we had a new view.

The Bay of Islands


Swimming with the dolphins!



Rotoura

Waitomo

The biggest "adventure" that we went on while in New Zealand was selected by my mountain goat husband.  It was a 7 hour "Lost World" caving trip.

We started by doing a 100 meter abseil into the "Lost World".  No big deal.




Seriously, maybe 5 minutes some He-man woman hater decided to point out this giant spider.  I was considering my options of escape at that moment, also trying to find a sharp object to throw at the dummy.  

We get down there and it was amazing.  Like nothing I have ever seen before.  Then we walk along for  a few minutes then climb down some rocks into a riverish thing.  We walk about 5 minutes then we get to a wall with a small Alice in Wonderland like hole at the bottom with a layer of water and we are supposed to crawl through that.  That was the moment I thought I was going to die.  I was half way in and it got worse, I started getting so claustrophobic but I knew I just had to make it to the other side, which obviously, I did.



Then the light was gone, only us and the cave.  We then trecked on for 7 hours.  Under rocks, over rocks, swimming at some points because we could not touch the bottom, jumping out of tunnels, you get the drift.  

Marshall is clearly enjoying himself so I can post his picture.  I look like I am on the brink of crying and screaming in mine so I decided to leave it out so that I looked more like a bad ass as you get an image of what we were doing.  

At a few points we would all turn our head lamps off and look up to see the amazing glow worms.  This picture is at the very end, we just all laid on this big rock and looked up.  It was out of this world!  I have never seen anything like it.  
If you want to see more pictures so you can get a better idea of what we actually did you can go here: http://www.tripadvisor.com/Attraction_Review-g616349-d1902231-Reviews-Waitomo_Adventures_Lost_World_7_Hr_Epic-Waitomo_Caves_North_Island.html

Picture 18 out of 26 is a video that does a pretty good job of showing you what it is actually like.  If you know how much I like diamonds, lace and bows I would highly recommend watching the video.  You will have a new respect for me.  I assure you.


Hiking to Marakopa Falls



The Bay of Plenty
90 mile beach

The country side - rolling hills on hills on hills.  Got car sick a few times myself.


Again, not the best pictures but I guess they will have to do.