On Boxing Day, H, Rod and I headed into Auckland to show Rod the sights.
He celebrated by jumping off the sky tower (maddness!). It's a bit like base jump, but you are attached to two wires so you have a regulated fall speed of about 86kmph, but you are harnessed so there is no free fall like a bungee. That said, it all looked pretty scary to me!
We then headed to Kelly Tarlton's Aquarium, and admired the penguins, Sting Rays, and sharks from close quarters. The eels were not Conga eels as they were not joined in a line singing (da da da da da da!)
The next day Rod and I hired a car and bade farewell to H as she is off to a family wedding in the Cook Islands. We set off south in the rain to Waitomo, where the weather didn't matter as we would be spending the afternoon underground - caving!
There were 8 of us in our party, a couple from OZ, a kiwi couple and a couple from Argentina. The latter provided me with much entertainment, as it would seem to us that the guy had booked the trip (called the Black Abyss) and the girlfriend had not known what it entailed. She was certainly not happy about being there and there were a few hasty exchanges in Spanish. Not a time for the El Pato joke, I fear!
Now in my third outing in a wetsuit this trip I can confirm that I do not look good! Especially as this time they gave me a stripey blue and pink balaclava.... everyone else had black ones and could pretend to be the milk tray man, I look like a dodgy Where's Wally!
Our first adventure was rappelling/abseiling into the cave which is shaped like an hour glass. I have only abseiled down a flat wall before so having to abseil down in a sitting position prooved a bit more difficult, plus the instructions of letting the rope glide through your hand went against everything that my body was telling me... ie "hold on as tight as you can or you will die". I wish I could say that I was smooth and graceful adn will be featuring as the next Bond Girl.... but I would be lying. It was not pretty, but I made it down!
From here we had to zip line in the dark... again, hesitation made for a bumpy start, a little more like a flying elephant than a flying fox, but who's counting?!
We then jumped, with rubber ring, into a freezing underground river (complete with eels!) - this took me two attempts until I was brave enough to jump, and then we pulled ourselves upstream along a rope to admire the glowworms in the cave.
From here we walked, swam and squeezed our way through tight gaps (stopping for hot orange and chocolate to warm us up en route) before choosing the "doom" option, of climbing out of the cave via two fast flowing waterfalls.
As you can see by the photo, several hours underground turned me into Gollum, as I emerged from the cave!!!
Awesome fun, and despite what you might think, the Argentinian girl would have got the top marks for wussiness so I still came out with my head held high!
He celebrated by jumping off the sky tower (maddness!). It's a bit like base jump, but you are attached to two wires so you have a regulated fall speed of about 86kmph, but you are harnessed so there is no free fall like a bungee. That said, it all looked pretty scary to me!
We then headed to Kelly Tarlton's Aquarium, and admired the penguins, Sting Rays, and sharks from close quarters. The eels were not Conga eels as they were not joined in a line singing (da da da da da da!)
The next day Rod and I hired a car and bade farewell to H as she is off to a family wedding in the Cook Islands. We set off south in the rain to Waitomo, where the weather didn't matter as we would be spending the afternoon underground - caving!
There were 8 of us in our party, a couple from OZ, a kiwi couple and a couple from Argentina. The latter provided me with much entertainment, as it would seem to us that the guy had booked the trip (called the Black Abyss) and the girlfriend had not known what it entailed. She was certainly not happy about being there and there were a few hasty exchanges in Spanish. Not a time for the El Pato joke, I fear!
Now in my third outing in a wetsuit this trip I can confirm that I do not look good! Especially as this time they gave me a stripey blue and pink balaclava.... everyone else had black ones and could pretend to be the milk tray man, I look like a dodgy Where's Wally!
Our first adventure was rappelling/abseiling into the cave which is shaped like an hour glass. I have only abseiled down a flat wall before so having to abseil down in a sitting position prooved a bit more difficult, plus the instructions of letting the rope glide through your hand went against everything that my body was telling me... ie "hold on as tight as you can or you will die". I wish I could say that I was smooth and graceful adn will be featuring as the next Bond Girl.... but I would be lying. It was not pretty, but I made it down!From here we had to zip line in the dark... again, hesitation made for a bumpy start, a little more like a flying elephant than a flying fox, but who's counting?!
We then jumped, with rubber ring, into a freezing underground river (complete with eels!) - this took me two attempts until I was brave enough to jump, and then we pulled ourselves upstream along a rope to admire the glowworms in the cave.
From here we walked, swam and squeezed our way through tight gaps (stopping for hot orange and chocolate to warm us up en route) before choosing the "doom" option, of climbing out of the cave via two fast flowing waterfalls.
As you can see by the photo, several hours underground turned me into Gollum, as I emerged from the cave!!!
Awesome fun, and despite what you might think, the Argentinian girl would have got the top marks for wussiness so I still came out with my head held high!
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