Stray-ing around the North Islands

Well, I've now been Stray-ing for almost a week and am a bit behind on blog posts. I guess that's a good thing - too busy adventuring around to actually sit down and write posts. However, thanks to my inability to sleep in, I have a few hours before everyone else wakes up and the bus takes off, so time to play catch-up with my blog entries.

The bus tour started off in Auckland, and we've been slowly moving South towards Wellington (and then we will cross to the South island and continue there). On our way there has been plenty of time for adventures. Rather than give a long post about what we've been up to, I'll just let the photos speak for themselves. (ok, and then I'll write a long caption explaining each, so I guess we'll have a little bit of both.)

Swingin' high in Hahei: the first place we stayed was Hahei. We walked to this one beach (pictured to the left) where we tried our luck at body surfing the 6-8 foot waves. I found that all that Surfing School last year in Costa Rica paid off, and helped me understand how to time the waves. I still got tossed around on a couple of the bigger waves, but luckily I'm good at holding my breath. On the way we found a rope swing on the beach, and of course I had to give it a shot (below).

Chili con carne feast: all that traveling builds up a big appetite! One night I made up a huge Chili con carne feast with Coca and Annika, two girls from the Stray bus. (they're the ones in the picture to the left as we sit down to enjoy our feast). There was a bit of a debacle with the kidney beans because the dried ones I suggested we got didn't 100% hydrated in time(which Annika is quick to remind me is my fault because she suggested some canned ones and I vetoed), but it turned out well nonetheless. We did end up hauling several tupperwares of chili con carne and kidney beans for days. And this is the amazing part - the girls were willing to eat the chili even after I stopped because I thought it was too old (and had warmed on the bus) - I'd never found someone less worried about food spoilage than I am (except my dad) until that moment.

Spelunking the glow-worm caves! On Wednesday we went to the Waitomo glow worm caves. Basically, you go into the cave and there are a bunch of glowing dots on the wall / ceiling - kind of like fireflies that never blink. I went on the adventure version where we rappelled down several cliff faces (once was right through a waterfall), and crawled throughout the cave. In the picture to the right I'm poking through one of the tighter fits we had to crawl through.

Culture night! The Maori were the original inhabitants of New Zealand, and on Wednesday we were treated to "Maori Culture night". We had a feast, and learned (well, attempted to learn) the Maori Hakka, a dance meant to intimidate one's enemies. Pictured: the whole Stray group shows off their Maori intimidation faces: guys bulge out their eyes and stick out their tongues, and girls bulge out their eyes. It really is intimidating when done right.

Thermal fun: Since New Zealand is on an active fault line, there is a lot of geothermal activity. At one place we stopped to check out the boiling mud (left), and at another we were actually able to go swimming in the pool(see below). there was a cold stream running in one direction, and the hot water came from another, so you could pick your temperature based on how close to the hot stream you went. Very cool. (well, hot).

Well, that's all for now - check back soon for info on my rafting adventure, and my hike of Tongariro crossing.