"My precious"

New Zealand is beautiful....Wellington being the capitol, was our first stop, is just so full of wondrous terrain, glistening lakes, rolling hillsides, clumpy Forrest's and a whole lot more besides. What a great place...closing my eyes I can conger vivid colours of green...and the hazy horizon of baby blue mixed with the splendid hue of soft hay. Totally different from Mildura and the generally flat Australia. Its not as warm and in further contrast to that I can still picture the deep vast ocean surrounded by the red, yellow and terracotta roof tops of dainty wooden houses, dotted about the rocky mountains and Forrest's of birch, pine and oak. Even the suburban structure of wellington seems to live in harmony with the natural formations of the countryside. As in Australia and for different reasons, I definitely got the 'right vibe' from this place.

Wellington:
First of all (and this for my lord of the rings nerddie's...sorry fans) we managed to stay at a backpackers hostel (after a rather late check in at midnight) where the 'ring' conversation only took about 30 seconds to commence. Turns out the hostel was occupied by a lot of the extras from the films. A unanimous "Cool" we replied and after some room juggling they found us a couple of beds in the staff quarters...a room I have on good authority, has been occupied by some of those extras." Double cool" indeed! So off to sleep I went my dreams escaping into whimsical fantasy and faraway lands...my head lay softly on a spongy pillow that may once had supported the Blondie main of a handsome wood elf....but knowing my luck I'd parked my bonce on the greasy spot of an stinking orc!

So after a lot of frustrated mucking about and spending far too much cash on the Internet, Simon and I set to work on our course of action and adventure. Realising (due to our unhappy purchase of return tickets) that we could not join a hop on hop off bus as we didn't have enough days to get round to the pick ups and they were pretty pricey anyway. We instead came up with our own itinerary (must add this was after we spent long minutes staring at each other, then at the computer, then the brochures, then back again) until finally we gave in and before Simon experienced my impatient fork tongue any further (once again, being prisoner to forward planning getting right on my tits) we said "fuck it", lets get the dude on reception to sort it out.

Excursion name: Movie Tours
Duration: 3 hours
Location: Wellington

Best bits:
Small bus. Air con. Five Germans. Banter with drive. Cool lotr footage. Reenactments. King Kong boat. Lots of film jargon like dollies and digi guys, background info on Peter Jackson (who incidentally owns most of wellington by the looks of it) Watching Simon pretend to be a horse. Fits of laughter over Easter egg DVD footage. Standing on scene locations while watching laptop playback of the scenes and last but not least getting into full hobbit humiliation mode, laying on the ground facing a turd.

Excursion name: Tongariro alpine crossing
Location: National Park Village
Duration: 7 hours

Best bits:
Getting in a backpackers with decent Internet. Walking...no..stop.stop...this was no walk..all fours were required on this one. Climbing up rock face after rock face. Casting our eyes over an incredible Panama of volcanic mountains, endless Forrest's, hot springs and emerald lakes. Eggy wafts in the breeze. (that's the springs..not me). Sliding down a steep decent...which incidentally felt like you were treading and trying to avoid a near cliff edge fall on power balls. Giggling at our rubbish mountaineering skills and our almost 2 minutely trips and stumbles. Realising that Mother earth doesn't give up her treasures lightly and so without effort there can be no reward and finally finishing it..sweating like a monkeys chuff and looking forward to a hot shower.