Well, it’s been a while, and not getting any less so, thence I will make a futile attempt to be brief.
We left LA on the 20th of January (more than a month ago, eep!), and skipped the 21st to arrive in Auckland, NZ on the 22nd. We checked into a hostel for a couple of days to get ourselves sorted out, then stayed with a couchsurfer named Andy. We did a bit of sightseeing there, and also met up with our parents’ friends’ sister’s daughter-in-law Susannah, who among other things introduced us to a great Korean pancake spot on Lorne St. Check it out if you want a cheap snack in Auckland. We also went to a great CS (couchsurfing) meetup with about 80 people in attendance! Everyone was getting organized for a big trip to the Tongariro crossing, a famous hike on the North Island. It was a lot of new people to meet all at once, but a friendly crowd if ever there was one.

View of Auckland from Mt Eden

Local foliage in Mt Eden.

Nice palm trees in Auckland

Andy's funny house-sit cat.

Korean pancake spot in Auckland.
We had also signed up for the crossing, and left Auckland with our respective rides on Friday (the 28th). We were all staying (mostly camping) at a hostel in Turangi, a small town a few hours drive south of Auckland. There were something like 120 of us altogether to do the crossing and some other sight-seeing that had been lined up by the organizers. The hostel (A+ Backpackers) was a nice spot, but the owner was some sort of weird demon spawn prone to strange outbursts of hostility and treating his guests like 10 year-olds. I recommend you stay away if you don’t like being shouted at, racially discriminated against, and told that the bathrooms are closed during the night (yes he actually tried to tell us that, what exactly were we paying for if we couldn’t even use the bathrooms?).
Much more meeting of people was had throughout the weekend, including a healthy mix of locals and travellers from all over. Saturday we toured some local sights including some really cool hot pools in Taupo, a big(ger) town on across the lake from Turangi. The pools were formed where geothermal heated water flows into the Waikato river, which gave the great combination of very hot water and very cold water separated by everything in between. They’re completely free, and located in the Spa Thermal Park off Spa Rd. We also did a short hike around a small lake. As a hike it wasn’t particularly interesting, but the forest we walked through was way much interesting. Since being in New Zealand we have found the diversity of tree species here to be fascinating, and have been doing our best to try to learn a few of the names.

The Taupo hot pools.

A neat waterfall near Taupo.

Couchsurfers on the lake-beach.

Fern Tree. It's pretty much exactly what the name suggests.
After another evening of socializing and harassment from the management, we dragged ourselves out of bed at 6:00 for the big day. Our big caravan of about 30 cars was surprising effective, and we left several cars at the end of the trail for shuttling. With so many people involved, faffing inevitably happens, but we eventually made it onto the trail. Len and I powered ahead, leaving slower hiking newbs behind. The crossing goes by Mt Ngauruhoe, a.k.a. “Mt Doom” from the recent Lord of the Rings films. A few of us had discussed climbing it, which seemed like a moderately easy scramble, however we were dissuaded by dire warnings from various organiser type people. It was also supposed to be another 3 hours extra so it seemed like it might be too much extra time. After testing that my super hiking powers were in order, I decided to head up. Brian, another keen hiker from Ohio, joined me, but I was going fast to avoid falling behind the group so he said I should go ahead. The climb was lots of fun, steep with some loose rocks that made think about my helmet left back home, but no close calls. Basically just a straight scramble up the side of the cone. The views were great as well; on the way up clouds would roll in intermittently but eventually I got above them and from the top had a great view in all directions. I made it up in about 45 minutes, hung around taking pictures for 10, then back down in another 20. The route down was a lot of fun; basically one long straight slide down a path of soft scree. I jogged for a bit after rejoining the regular path, and caught up with the tail of our group not long after. I stayed for a while with the main party, which was going pretty slow and taking lots of breaks, then Len and I continued ahead again. When we arrived at the end there were a few others there ahead of us, and we relaxed and socialized for a few hours as people trickled in.

The convoy en route to Tongariro.

A small cone near the Tongariro car park.

Getting ready to start the crossing.

A random on the way up Ngauruhoe

Me at the top!

Misty crater crossing.

Ngauruhoe in the background.

Some CSers with a lake.

Emerald lakes.

A cool lava flow.

A big steam vent. There is still some volcanic activity in the area.
We have been warned numerous times by the locals about the intensity of UV light here in New Zealand, and thankfully so. In Canada the UV rating scale goes from 1 to 10, and here it goes up to 14! During the crossing I diligently applied sunscreen whenever I though of it, and managed to get away with only some minor redness on my face and neck. Getting a tan is certainly no struggle here!
That evening was spent playing cards and socializing around a camp fire, then the following day we left Turangi to go to Rotorua to see boiling mud pools and relax in a hot stream. By the weekend my person and most of my clothes had a noticeable sulfur smell. Gabriel, a couchsurfer from the hike who lives in Rotorua, graciously agreed to put up those of us with no urgent commitments nor a desire to end a wonderful weekend. About 15 people ended up staying in his place, mostly packed like crayons into his living room.

Bubbly mud pools in Rotorua.

Kerosene creek, another hot stream.

Packed into Gabriel's place.
On Tuesday (the 1st) we took a bus down to Wellington for a brief stay with Ben, another contact from the weekend. We had intended to stay for a couple of days, but upon investigating the cost of flights south decided to leave the next day. We flew down to Christchurch, where we arranged to stay with another host named Anna. She lived in a great big apartment in the city centre, that judging by the layout was formerly an office building. Her and her roommates were wonderfully nerdy (although Anna herself was a bit reluctant to admit it) and we had a good time staying there for a few days. We started to look into purchasing a vehicle, which we had been waiting to do because of rumours that it would be cheaper in Christchurch than in Auckland. Looking up and testing cars took up a surprising amount of time and effort, but we also managed to meet some of Anna’s friends and check out a few bars. We stopped for lunch a couple of times at the yummy Krishna Cafe on Colombo St, where you can get a plate of food for $5 (NZD) and a refill for only $2! The server always seemed to be inexplicably sullen, but the food was quite good.

Getting some work done at a free concert in Chch.

Anna's place where in stayed in Christchurch.
On Friday (the 4th) I felt my first earthquake! It was pretty small, reportedly a 4.6 about 20 kms away, but relatively shallow so I felt the whole building shake slightly. Christchurch is still recovering from a big 7.1 quake in September and 5.something aftershock on boxing day that caused quite a bit of damage. There were still quite a few fenced off buildings and gaps from demolitions, but things were showing signs of being rebuilt.
That evening we went to a party with some of Anna’s roommates and friends and there we met Rory, another friend of theirs, who said he’d be happy to put us up for a while. We didn’t want to impose on Anna any longer so we went over to Rory’s the next day and ended up staying there for almost a week. He seemed to enjoy having us around and we had a great time with him and his brother (who also lived there) and various friends that came by. We continued our car hunting and after looking at about seven cars, and having two deemed not worth it by a mechanic, we finally found a keeper. 1400 NZD later we were the proud owners of an as-yet-unnamed silver 1990 VW Golf (photos coming later). We were still a bit unsure, but it seemed like it would sell pretty quickly so we went ahead and bought it. So far it’s worked out great! It’s nice and small so it’s pretty good on gas despite the slightly big engine (1780cc) which does give it plenty of power for getting up hills and such things. Not having to carry all of our things on our back meant we could get a bit better outfitted, so we bought a cooler (which they call a chilly-bin here), a tent, some camp chairs, and various other dishes and things. We also bought an inverter (converts 12V cigarette lighter to a regular outlet) which has been great for keeping our electronics going.

Sitting down with Rory for a French toast breakfast.
On Wednesday (the 9th) I went out to the suburb of Sumner to visit Kathrin and Rainer, a pair of orienteers that live in Lions Bay (near Vancouver) for part of the year, and NZ for the other. Kathrin took me out Boogie boarding (like body surfing on a small surf board) at a nearby beach called Taylor’s mistake. It was a beautiful sunny day, the water was pleasantly warm, and the waves were just the right size for a beginner such as myself. After the beach we went back to their house, which is up on a hill above the water and has great views of the coast and back toward the city. We spent a while looking at maps and trail guides, and I came away with a wealth of knowledge of places to go and hikes to do (and a bag of maps to go along with it). Afterwards they fed me a yummy dinner and Kathrin gave me a lift back in to town. I realized that Kathrin and Rainer were the first people I had seen in New Zealand that I knew previously (other than of course my sister), and it was a lot of fun to catch up with them!

View of the hill that Kathrin and Rainer live on, with Christchurch in the background.
Throughout the rest of the week we met up with some other couchsurfers, spent time with Rory, and I managed to get a decent amount of work done on a calculation I was running for the ol’ thesis. I was trying find an analytical form for a distribution of residual couplings that would fit several different buildup curves, but didn’t have any luck. Oh well, at least a null result is still a result right?
On Friday (the 11th) we said goodbye to Christchurch and headed south toward Dunedin. We’re trying to get south before it gets too cold, and then we’ll make our way north.
The rest will have to wait!
Until next time…