On the 10th, I left Auckland and got a coach to Tauranga, on the east coast of the North Island. Alex - a friend of mine from school who moved over here a couple of years ago with his family - met me off the bus and I stayed at his house for the next 18 days. Tauranga is one of the fastest growing towns in the country, home to about 100,000 people.
Alex and his brother Jeff go to university in Wellington (NZ) and Southampton (UK) respectively, so they spend most of the time away from their parents' large house which overlooks Tauranga and neighbouring Mount Maunganui. Kai, Kane and Pennie, their relatives, also came to stay at the house a couple of times.
As well as a nice house, Alex's family have got a Sunseeker boat which we went out on a couple of times to fish in. The first time, we had four rods going for five hours, and didn't catch a thing! The second time we were a bit luckier and caught a couple of fish, but there was a mild panic when Jeff jumped in the water after Alex's glasses and promptly got swept a quarter of a mile away by the current. Thankfully, he got them and returned unharmed, but it just shows how powerful the water can be.
We also went Blokarting twice in Tauranga, which basically involves you piloting a three-wheeled buggy which has a 3m sail on top. You steer with one hand and control the tension in the sail with the other. What's really cool about it is that it takes a while to get the hang of sailing and it throws your preconceptions of driving around a track straight out of the window. Instead of going for the best line into a corner as you would in a car, you have to look at the wind direction and position yourself so that you can catch it best. It's one of the most enjoyable things I've done recently, especially the second time we went, when the wind really picked up and we were almost flying round.
On the 19th, we went to Rotorua and met up with their relatives, making 14 of us in all. We went up to the gondola, with takes you up the side of the crater overlooking Rotorua Lake. As well as a buffet restaurant which we had lunch at, there's a luge there. You ride down one of three different concrete tracks on a small plastic cart which you can steer and control the brakes of. I don't know how many times we broke the "no group racing" rule, but it was a lot of fun.
For Christmas, I spent the morning of the 25th at Alex's, and then the rest of Christmas and Boxing Day at their relatives in Taupo, the same that I met in Rotorua. They've got a fairly large farm, so there was plenty of space for us all and we spent the two days stuffing ourselves full of festive food and enjoying the sunshine. It was strange not having family around me at Christmas, but the hot weather made it even weirder. In a way, it just didn't feel like Christmas. That said, I had a great time and it was good to spend Christmas with people I know.
On the 27th, I planned what I would be doing next, then Alex and I went off to take advantage of the good weather. We drive to McLaren Falls Park, where we went for a walk and took a few photos of the surrounding rainforest.
