Then I’ll begin.

Once upon a time there was a bloke called Pat. He used to enjoy writing a blog every day in preparation for his Big Adventure. Then he went on his Big Adventure and became a slacker.

Yep, once again due to loads of other activities, Pat and myself haven’t had the time or inclanation to sit in front of a computer and blog for several days.

What does that mean? It means I’m now going to be blogging about the past 11 days of our Big Adventure.

It’ll be something of a trip down memory lane for me. For you it’ll probably be tedious.

(Thanks by the way to Chris and Mette for taking some photos for Pat during the period of camera-knackeredness, twas much appreciated! And yep, it’s now alive again… will explain how later)

Sunday 26th November: River Valley -> Wellington
After a somewhat iffy sleep on the slightly uncomfortable Orgy Dorm bed, Pat fell out of bed at 9and made his way downstairs for a “continental breakfast” (i.e. toast and cereal), which combined with coffee actually allowed him to open his eyes fully and begin functioning for the day.

With a pick up time of 1pm, we had plenty of time to have a wander around the gorgeous landscape surrounding River Valley hostel, so Pat, Mette, Hardy and myself made our way to the walk up the side of the valley for a big of exercise.

The first step was to cross the river via the bridge Pat’d been told about by the hostel owner. He’d mentioned something about watching out for the mechanism, which sounded a bit odd until we got to the “bridge” and realised what he’d meant:

After pulleying each other across the river, a tough walk up the steep path ensued – but the view from the top of the path was certainly worth it:

(Thanks Mette for the photos :-) )

After a failed attempt to sketch the valley (he’s a bit out of practice) Pat and the gang wandered back down the valley, had some more pulley-based entertainment and chilled out in the hostel for a while (Pat unable to resist the temptation to be a nerd and help out Flea with her laptop (just a bit of space saving / file relocation… I think he misses Technical Services. Possibly)).

After what seemed like a neverending trek up a steep road to the coach, a seemingly neverending (well, about 4 hour) coach journey ensued, the highlight of which being going to a town whose every wall appeared to be covered in some cow/bull related drawings. This was probably the best:

Pat didn’t realise the cow had love hearts coming out of it until after this, in case you’re wondering.

Once in Wellington we got to Base Backpackers hostel and settled into our rooms (following the usual half an hour check in as the hostel staff barely cope with the mass of people arriving (give them their due, I mean it’s not as though they get bus-loads of people coming to the hostel EVERY DAY, is it? It is? Oh yes, so it is)).

After a freshen up Pat and the gang took a long walk to a bar called the Basement (can you guess which hostel this sat beneath) and drank the night away – culminating in a drunk doubles game of pool, which Pat thinks Chris and he won but can’t quite remember.

I swear Pat thinks he’s a student again.

Monday 27th November: Wellington
Quite a chilled out day today. After a late wake up to the sound of rain on the window, Pat had a wander around town to see if anyone would be able to fix his camera but to no avail (the best offered was a 3 to 4 week turnaround time, which wasn’t *entirely* ideal), then met up with Chris, Jen, Kate, Jersey and Mette for a wander around the Te Papa museum.

It was actually quite an interesting place to go… but I think you need to be a bit less hungover to fully appreciate it.

There were all sorts of interesting things to see – loads of Maori building mock-ups and historical info, plenty of impressive paintings, lots of info on volcanos and earthquakes and the occasional disturbing human creation (such as the “condom helmet”, which does what it says on the tin and was designed to catch the sperm of a certain type of bird in New Zealand that likes to hump people’s heads… how normal).

As it was, Jersey, Jen and Pat found that their hungover/tired minds enjoyed the kids’ areas a bit more:

(Some day she might be your lawyer)

After a walk back to the hostel in the pouring rain, we all dried off and prepared for yet another walk in the rain – this time to go and see Borat. Pat’d seen it already, but it was a choice between seeing that or The Devil Wears Prada so he decided familiarity would be preferable to f***ing dire.

Twas very funny yet again, but again Pat felt that there were a few too many areas that looked fully staged… also his face keeps turning white whenever something to do with a naked fight is mentioned.

How odd.

Tuesday 28th November: Wellington -> Nelson
Despite a fairly early night, Pat woke up very tired today. Possibily this had something to do with waking up at 6:30am in order to catch the ferry over to Picton on the South Island. More likely it was due to having burned the candle at both ends for over two weeks…

Anyway, after a short coach journey to the ferry port, Pat and the rest of the Kiwi bus trundled onto the ferry (quite a large beast, complete with a (not actually finished) cinema, a couple of restaurants and a bar).

Through feeling tired, Pat spent most of the time resting in one of the many comfy recliners on the 8th deck (whilst listening to Dirty Si’s amazing “End of Uni 2001” dance set, which brought back so many great memories of dancing like a fool – sorry Pat, I mean like a professional (…idiot)) but made it on deck to take some photos of Marlborough Sounds as we entered the long channel into Picton on the South Island:

It was quite a lovely day for it as you can see. Not sure the mobile phone pictures quite do the views justice (who’d’ve thought? A shit mobile phone camera!).

Once off the ferry at the other side, Flea noticed that there’d been a mix up meaning that there were too many people to get on the coach to Nelson… so Pat and some of the gang kindly volunteered to wait around and get in a minibus for the trip to Nelson instead. Little did they know that this’d be the last time they’d be on the bus with Flea (and miss out on a couple of activities in the following days because of being on a “smaller” bus)… still, mustn’t grumble.

The minibus driver was a guy called Royal, who’s one of those people you can happily label a “character”. He’s got a slightly odd sense of humour and… er… likes cross dressing.

Yes.

On the way to Nelson, the buses stopped at at little wine shop in the middle of a mass of vinyards (unsurprisingly) and were treated to some wine tasting and then the great opportunity to spend lots of money buying wine! They were, um, “interesting” wines, which might’ve been nice to send back home were they a bit less, er, “interesting”.

We got into Nelson and our smaller bus went into the Accent on the Park hostel, which was a really nice little place – although away from the main group of folk who we’d finally started to get to know a bit better (not that this is a point of bitterness, of course) – it certainly made a change from the large Backpacker Factory that was Base in Wellington.

A lovely hostel meal in the evening (served by the guy who was on reception a few hours beforehand) was accompanied by a bit of telly watching in the cosy hostel lounge, before Pat decided he was knackered and went to bed.

———–

Yet again I’ve written too much detail and am knackered. Tell you what, from now on I’m just going to do a bullet point thing for “what happened on this or that day” and just do some more detail on asides here and there. I’m also going to stop writing my thoughts out in the blog for others to read. :-)

Wednesday 29th November: Nelson -> Westport

• Went for a walk around Nelson Lakes – a bit foggy so couldn’t see mountain tops, but a nice wander none the less (Kate and Pat wandered further than the others and were pleased they did, as there was a cool looking wardrobe, which they had a look in onto to find that it didn’t have a back but rather some snow-covered trees. Anyway, to cut a long story short they became King and Queen of Narnia and lived there for (say) 20 years, before deciding to come back to New Zealand having not aged a day and with no time passed. Strangely the other guys didn’t believe us either)
• Had lunch at a little town called Murchison – some “tasty” Vegemite sarnies, the Vegemite spread with Pat’s fingers as he didn’t have any cutlery on him (and felt a touch stupid when Jen went into the cafe they were eating by and grabbed some)
• Went horse riding – Pat found it ok but a little frustrating, as his horse (Locky) wanted to eat all the time and whenever he’d started eating, Pat had a lot of trouble getting him to move again. Pat was annoyed as he felt that Locky knew he was a learner and hence could just get away with being a pain in the ass. The phrase “You know, for all the damage they do to the environment, cars are SUCH a great invention” was uttered at least 10 times throughout the 2 hour trip around the country paths
• Got into Westport – a tiny little place, where you’d imagine some kind of horror film could be made. Really nice character though, but it may aswell have had tumbleweed rolling across the empty, wide streets for all the people who were around.
• Hostel – Can’t remember the name but Pat changed from a dorm (which was unheated in a separate block in the back yard) to sharing a double room (which was heated, in the house, with lovely comfy beds and free towels (trust me, that’s awesome for a hostel)) for $3 extra.
• During the Evening – Pat and Jersey went to a pizza bar (as recommended by a local) and had some LOVELY pizza, enjoyed a couple of pints of the local brew (Miners) and chatted with a couple of friendly locals. After that they came back to the hostel, shared some vodka & coke with Chris whilst watching the first Lord of the Rings film on a crap 4:3 TV (doesn’t really do the film justice) and then headed out with others back to the same pizza bar to continue chatting, drinking and playing pool until the early hours (Dex – the bar owner – kept the pub open just because he was enjoying chatting with us – and bought Katie (a canadian lass from Flea’s bus) a free beer because he was amazed she’d had 5 pints and not fallen over… nice)

Hmm, that wasn’t much less detailed than before. All that’s happened is that there’s a load of bullet points surrounding the endless blurb. Let’s try again with Thursday the 30th of November – the trip to the Poo Pub:

Thursday 30th November: Westport -> Mahinapua

• Pat woke up nice and refreshed
• Went for a walk along Cape Foulwind – mentally windy place and possibly the wrong time for Pat to test drive his hat (which amazingly stayed on – just). Walked along the cliff tops looking out to the sea and the huge impressive waves battering the shore. Certainly a good way to wake up if you’re tired!
• Visited the Punakaiki Pancake rocks – very impressive scenery, with lots of splashing waves. They’re called the Pancake rocks because they’re made of egg, flour and milk. We also had some pancakes in a nice little restaurant, which are limestone formations that began forming 30 million years ago, when lime-rich fragments of dead marine creatures were deposited on the seabed, then overlaid by weaker layers of soft mud and clay. The seabed was raised above sealevel by earthquakes to form the coastal cliffs and coastline. The sea, wind and rain have since etched out the soft layers to form the unusual rock formations we see today.
• Told we had a fancy dress party in the evening – A “P” Party. Pat was told he couldn’t get away with just being “Pat”
• Stopped in Graymouth – a small town with about 1 street – to get some fancy dress gear. Pat tore his hair out trying to find something good before coming across an amazing discovery:

  

  Frankly I think the idea of wandering around with stupid soft toys rather pathetic, but there we go.

• Hostel – a THL-owned pub called the “Poo Pub” in the middle of nowhere (well, by Mahinapua Lake) with some little dorm chalet things behind it. Lovely location:

  

  

  Shit dorm beds though. Still, that didn’t matter too much as Pat slept rather well after umpteen pints at the fancy dress party that evening. Some rather amusing photos were taken of some ace costumes:

  
  Plant and potato sack!

  
  Playboy Bunny!

  
  Pikachu!

  
  Present!

  There’s more in the usual place. As you can guess, Pat managed to fix his camera. It was a rather technical job (sticking some duct tape to the front of the camera to wedge the lens cap open) but Pat managed it in the end…

• Lots of beer, lots of playing about with puppets (still lovin’ them puppet dance moves, Sarah!), not quite enough sleep.

Friday 1st December: Mahinapua -> Franz Josef

• Pat woke up less refreshed than yesterday and more tired and hungover
• After a walk to the beach and back Pat felt a little better
• Lots of banter with Royal on the coach to do with puppets and drinking
• Stopped at the Bushman’s Centre (hunting lodge-type place) for breakfast, stopping for a mo to feed the deer:

  

  No doubt needing to be fattened up so they can’t run away too fast from the hunting folk…

• Visited a LOVELY beach on the way to Franz Josef – took the opportunity to grab some photos:

  

  

  Hard to believe it’s about 20k from a massive mountain range…

• Got some photos of a massive mountain range (Westland National Park):

  

  

• Got to Franz Josef – amoungst the awesome Westland National Park mountains and at the base of the Franz Josef Glacier (well, ok, about 10k away from it):

  

• Booked in for Glacier Exploring on Saturday and grabbed some supplies (sadly no Kendal Mint Cake could be found, which Pat was disappointed in – kept moaning about this clearly not being a proper mountain town. What, Pat, aside from the MOUNTAINS all around it? (Shut up and get on with it, Squage, I’m starving – Pat))
• Hostel – Nice place, good bunks, nice bar – all with a gorgeous mountain back drop (which Pat probably didn’t bother to notice (Shut it, ya bastad! – Pat) Sorry…)

Saturday 2nd December: Franz Josef

• Pat had a great night’s sleep – despite waking up at 3am thinking, in a half-asleep state that a distant rumbling might just be a huge avalanche (well, it’s good to see that Pat recognised there were mountains in Franz Josef after all (Someone’s about to get left in an Internet Cafe – Pat) ok, ok, I’ll stop)
• Pat and I put on our extra layers and made our way to the Glacier Walk Building – via a shop to get some sunglasses that Pat only just realised he might need whilst walking up a bright white glacier (…. – Pat) – which, er, is sensible. Yes.
• After getting into some soggy regulatory hiking shoes, some thick socks, a large jacket and some gloves + hat, Pat and the gang made their way to the glacier on the shuttle bus thing
• The glacier looked deceptively small from the other end of the valley, where we started our trek:

  

  You see that cave bit? That’s over 5 stories high. I KNOW!

• Pat was rather nervous at this point, as he was concerned that the glacier trek would involve walks up near-vertical slopes, with humongous drops to his side at many points and lots of horribly small bits to try and walk through…
• …and there were. Sort of. But it wasn’t bad enough to cause any fear. In fact, Pat really enjoyed trekking around, clambering up little steps and squeezing through tight ice caverns. Plenty of photos were taken:

  

  

  

  

  

  

• It’s SUCH an odd feeling being on the glacier. The views were stunning and it wasn’t really as cold in the air as expected (Pat didn’t have gloves or a hat on for any of it) – but the ice was FREEZING (No shit, sherlock – Pat)
• Twas very good exercise and flew by much faster than expected (the 4 hours on the ice went past in what felt like less than an hour) – I definitely recommend doing the Franz Josef Glacier Exploration if you get a chance – and do the 8 hour one, not the 6 hour one as Pat did, just because it’s not much more dosh and gives you a full 2 hours extra on the ice!
• That evening, after eating pizza with Jersey in a bar with the cricket on (and Pat having no idea what to add to the conversation that was being had about the sport, through being fairly clueless about either Oz or England’s teams (Oi! – Pat) Well? (Ok, actually, you’ve got me there – Pat) Uhuh), Pat had an early night…

Right, that brings you up to the last night in Franz Josef. What happened after that? Well, you’ll just have to wait and see, as Pat’s in need of some food and then we’re going out to the Ice Bar in Queenstown… so we’d better dash.

Tarrah for now!

(A very tired) Squage

# Let’s do a bungy,
# Throw myself off a ledge,
# Plummet down a valley!

Yep. After several hours of mild panic and a moment of “I can’t do this” whilst just walking onto the bungy bridge, I got the courage and finally went for it…

There was definitely something almost numbing about standing with the front of my feet over the edge of the tiny little ledge on the bridge, legs tied together at their base, staring at the water 43 metres below and knowing that I was about to lean forward and throw myself towards the river, accelerating at 9.8 metres per second.

I even managed a wave to the crowd and a nervous thumbs up to the camera:

(There’ll be better versions of these photos available shortly, as the AJ Hackett Bungy folk put them online within 48 hours but I couldn’t wait that long, hence the crap photo-of-a-photo jobby you’ve got here)

Straight after that, the dude who had secured my bungy chord counted down “5, 4, 3, 2, 1” – and by the “3” I was already ducking over the edge.

Wasn’t the world’s most gracious of jumps, but I tell you what – it felt UTTERLY AMAZING:

The feeling of acceleration was like nothing else, and watching the river flying towards me was the most mental thing ever – I *just* remembered to get my arms ahead of me in a diving position before my “head and shoulder dunk” in the water… which was actually more akin to “everything except my shoes dunk”.

After flying out of the river again (which was SO refreshing) I was sprung up to well over half the height of the bridge – and for a moment I thought I was going to come crashing onto some rocks (I suspect my head was facing some crazy direction but it was hard to tell) so a little bit of flailing arms occurred, before I safely zoomed back down to just above the river.

From then it was just a few bobs before I grabbed onto the post-bungy-untying dinghy’s support pole thing and fell into the dinghy, completely elated and completely exhausted.

Probably the most intense feeling, even beating Sky Diving probably because of the ground rush and crazy feeling of being tugged around by the rope. In other words, Sky Dive was a case of “Oh shit…oh shit… WHOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOH” whereas Bungy was more “Oh shit… oh shit… here goes… HOLY CRAP, WOOOAAAHHHH JEEZ, YEAAAARHRRRRGH, WOOOOOOOOOH, BLOOOODY HEEELLLLL, WOOAAAH”. Hopefully that clears things up.

Anyway, woot, that was amazing. I’m SO scared of heights but I’d do it again.

I just might have a rest first.

And a few beers. It is my birthday after all :-)

Toodles peeps!

Pat

Hi peeps. Just a quick one to let you know that I’m still actually here and haven’t forgotten about you. Squage is currently half way through a huuuuge blog entry, which’ll bring things up to date, but that might not get finished until Thursday so you’ll have to wait until then!

In the mean time, here’s a quick overview of things:

• I’ve been doing all sorts of stuff since Squage last blogged:
  • Horse Riding (frustrating)
  • Glacier Exploring (amazing)
  • Fancy Dressing (hilarious)
  • Film Watching (also hilarious)
  • Hill Trekking (great fun)
  • Eating (mmm)
  • Drinking (too much)
  • Sitting on coaches (far too much)
• I’ve been generally in great spirits, with only a day feeling rubbish through a lack of sleep
• I’m going to have to get rich and buy a place in Wanaka
• Small hostels are lovely
• Local pubs and bars in tiny towns have really friendly people in them
• Kiwi beer is gooood
• Being a Veggie in New Zealand’s surprisingly easy
• Duct tape is amazing…
• …and can be used to force a camera lens cap open
• Karaoke is hilarious
• The Poo Pub is cool
• The South Island is quite cold
• This country is the most beautiful place I’ve ever been. Apart from Tilbury.

Tomorrow is my 27th Birthday and I’m feeling very old. I keep thinking about the fact that I’m nearly going to be 28 when I return to England and that I really ought to be getting on with something… just what, I’m still not 100% sure of yet. Still, it’s early days, I’ve only been travelling a month!

To be honest, I don’t know why I’m worrying – I probably won’t last until tomorrow night anyway as, for some reason, I’ve signed up to do a Bungy Jump off the Kawarau Suspension Bridge tomorrow. It’s going to be amazing, but I’m not exactly looking forward to it :-)

Right, I’m off to get some lunch (it’s 3pm already and Squage has kept me here since about 12pm with his bleedin’ blogging) – do check out my photos as I’ve just uploaded about 200 of them. Hooray for having a working camera again!

I hope things are good back in the UK / Ireland (Paul n Em) / USA (Stu B) – I look forward to catch up with y’all as soon as I can!

Toodles,

Pat

Righty, in a VERY busy net place in a hostel in Frans Josef. Still a week behind on the blogging… here’s just one day’s worth cos there’s too many people waiting to do more than that.

Hopefully in the next few day’s we’ll get a proper chance to bring things up to date. But let’s just say this week has been awesome. We’re in the middle west of the South Island at the mo, having done such things as Horse Trekking and lots of hiking… oh and lots of drinking.

Anyway, just got time to do one entry, so here’s what happened a week ago:

Saturday 25th November
Today we woke up to the odd knowledge that we were only one month away til Pat’s first ever Christmas in the middle of summer.

For the first time, there’ll none of the dread of the 4 weeks of commercialised mess that is the UK in the build up to the once-meaningful event (ooh check my bitterness). I mean, we’ll be exposed to terrible Christm-sorry, Xmas advertising, but it’ll be Kiwi and Aussie advertising and thus a little more amusing.

Anyway, after falling out of bed, doing the three S’es and finally getting onto the coach, Pat enjoyed the views of Lake Taupo as Flea took our coach around the whole east coast… before we made our way into the roads enterting the Tongario National Park.

It’s one of the 100 great listed special protected uber heritage (N.B. I may have forgotten the real name) locations in the world and you can see why – it’s beautiful. Home, no less, to mount Ngaruahoe – a.k.a. Mount Doom – which Pat decided was a great excuse to start listening to the Lord of the Rings: Two Towers soundtrack on his iRiver… really added to the experience, Pat said. I thought it was a tiny bit sad :-)

Mount Doom looked AWESOME – cloud covering the top of it, but still looking massively impressive poking into the clouds. Still can’t imagine it? Don’t worry, allow me to illustrate using my elite M$Paint Skillz:

Who needs a working camera, eh?

That’s correct. Pat does.

Anyway, we all stopped close to it for a 2 hour hike across to the Taranski Falls, which were very pretty – Pat decided to get a photo of both of us standing at the bottom of it, which was, uh, refreeshing due to the freezing cloud of water at the base of the falls… sadly that photo’s on Chris’ camera and I’ve not got it off yet (oh and this net cafe doesn’t allow USB devices anyway, hooray!).

Just imagine what it’d look like – I’m not doing another rubbish drawing :-)

After the nice walk we got back in the bus and trundled all the way to River Valley hostel, which was surrounded by a whole lot of AMAZING scenery – in the low sun, the rolling hills and breathtaking valleys almost looked unreal.

The hostel itself was lovely, and included such things as a hot spa pool (complete with seedy underwater red light), which Kate, Jersey, Jenny and Pat enjoyed monging out in (for about an hour longer than we were supposed to… but hey, when you’re enjoying yourself, staring up at the beautiful starry skies, whilst being hot why would you want to get out to stand soaking in the fuh-kin freezing night air? You wouldn’t, as it’s rubbish. Trust me, Pat did NOT look warm on returning to his room.

Well, I say “room”… it was more “large dorm”. Called an “orgy dorm”, it consisted of two huge bunks, each with 16 matresses per level. Very funny, reall, just a little hard to get to sleep with all the bloody giggling going on.

I think Pat’s getting old and boring :-)

Right, that’ll do for now… bigger session on its way!!!

Sweet as,

Squage

Island that is. Yep, Pat, myself and the rest of the Kiwi Experience gang made our way into Wellington – New Zealand’s capital city and southern most dwelling on the north island – yesterday evening.

It’s a nice place. Smaller than Aukland yet with a feeling of more space as you walk around the streets. Probably because the streets are a bit wider here. Yes, I guess that’d explain it. (Note to self: delete this line, it makes you look like an idiot. As would leaving this bit in brackets in the blog entry).

Anyway, more about this place later but for now let’s catch up on the action since I left you last:

Friday 24th November: Taupo
Following a mammoth net cafe session Pat and I made our way back to the hostel for a lovely gourmet lunch: two succulent slices of the finest (cheap white) bread delicately toasted (until a bit burnt), with a mouth watering splash of soft fondant (cheap peanut butter) drizzled (spread with a crap plastic knife) on top of each slice.

Following that rather wholesome and filling meal, Pat had a chat with some of the other guys and gals before setting off with them to ANOTHER net cafe. This time to burn some CDs.

As soon as we got inside the net cafe it started chucking it down, but all was made good by the excellent selection of music pumping out courtesy of the English guy running it (Pat was merrily tapping his feet and singing badly-er, I mean beautifully). Eventually it stopped raining, luckily before we’d finished so after everybody’s CDs were done we trundled back to the hostel – via the delights of KFC and Subway.

Pat had a chance to use his slightly-broken-due-to-sand-getting-in-the-mechanism camera to take some lovely sunset shots of Lake Taupo (they’ll be online once Pat’s managed to catch up with his photos – currently he’s uploading ones from LAST Sunday… hooray for teh speedies internets!) before his camera decided the top half of the lens cap wasn’t going to open any more.

It’s still busted. Two camera shops haven’t been able to offer anything other than a four week turnaround. Pat’s planning on wedging it open… what could possibly go wrong?

Anyway, after a nice foot long Veggie Patty with all the extras (no olives though, thanks and can I have chilli sauce with that? Ta.) and back at the hostel the party commenced.

It was dutchie’s leaving do so, well, obviously we needed to have a party. Also, it was Friday. Also, it was a day.

Following everyone having their photo taken wearning Dutchie’s trademark hat, Pat had a few beers watching Duthie play a rather tipsy Chris (apparently having 8 beers whilst sitting in the sun can do that…) at pool. Rather than a typical, quiet pool audience Pat and t’others were having great fun cheering and jeering (slow, rising, goalie-about-to-boot-the-ball “ooohhhhhhhh”s being commonplace prior to each shot). Really added to the game – perhaps this should be incorporated into professional snooker touraments…

After that, we wandered to a bar called Mulligans, whereupon lots of slightly merry singing to the jukebox was performed (along with some consumption of fine ale (well, Tui)) and before long we were all in the wonderful club-type-place called Holy Cow!

Lots of drunk dancing was performed by all – despite the crap DJ whose idea of mixing was to just start the next song with 10 seconds to go on the current one (no beat matching) and whose idea of a playlist was to play songs in a seemingly random, genre-irrelevant order.

Pat, of course, didn’t complain as he never moans about DJs when he’s out. No.

Ahem.

Finally hitting the sack at 3:30am, we both looked forward to getting up at 8am…

Righty, I’m running out of time to carry on blogging, which is a bit sucky. So… I’ll have to fill you in on the details of Saturday and Sunday later on.

Until then… toodles!

Squage

How’re ya goin? Havin a cruisy day? Sweet as, bro (/sis).

Yes! Whilst Pat’s been spending most of his time doing crazy activities and drinking, I’ve been dedicating all my time to learning the intricacies of Kiwi colloquialism.

And blimey, what a load of stuff Pat’s been getting up to.

As you might’ve guessed, this blog is going to be a big one so I recommend going to grab yourself a beer, coffee, tea and make yourself comfortable on your chair, sofa or beanbag * before reading this.

* If that’s how you choose to life your life **
** By the way, anyone found any out of character easter eggs on the Dark Place DVD yet?

Done?

Excellent. Let’s start:

Wednesday 15th November: Aukland
After waking up to a lovely, sunny morning, Pat and I wandered into central Aukland (via a bus this time, rather than a 45 minute walk) with the intention of buying a nice new pair of shorts, having a couple of beers and sitting around in the sun.

After a short bus ride – whereupon we enjoyed some great New Zealand advertising (see below) – that’s basically what we did

The one addition being a wander into the cinema to watch Jackass 2. I’m not 100% sure why Pat decided this would be a good idea, but he seemed happy to accept the recommendation of the shop assistant in the shop he bought some shorts in (he mumbled something about “so fit” and “would” – not sure what he meant by that).

Was Jackass 2 funny? Well, if you call an hour and a half of watching people do wholey childish and dangerous stunts funny, then yes.

So: yes. Go and see it :-)

That evening Pat and I wandered back to the hostel – at around sunset:

We vegged in front of the telly – sadly, someone was watching White Chicks – and enjoying every moment of it(!!!!).

I almost didn’t blog this part because it’s so embarrassing to admit it was watched by us, however I feel you need to be made aware that if you watch it, you will hate the world. Gutter humour, shit acting, incomprehensible situations and characters… it was as if I was watching something written by a dirty minded 10 year old boy. STEER CLEAR!

After that mind numbing experience, we then headed off for an early night, to prepare for getting up at 5:45am in order to pack and catch the Kiwi Experience bus from central Aukland at 7:15am.

Thursday 16th November: Aukland – Bay of Islands
Upon waking up at Stupid O’Clock, Pat just about managed to pack all of his random bits and pieces (chucking out various things that he’d decided he no longer needed) and made his trek to the bus stop in the early morning sunshine.

We were slightly concerned by the mental woman who joined us at the bus stop just before we got on the bus, who spent a few moments mumbling then, on noticing her bus was running late, let out a wail.

Slightly disturbing.

Still, once the bus arrived and we’d got into the city centre, we had recovered from the slightly creepy experience and trudged from the central bus station to the Kiwi Experience pickup point, arriving *just* on time.

Bag thrown into the coach, we got on (saying hi to Ginny the coach driver) and vegged in a seat.

After a fairly quiet start of sitting going “nnngh I’m tired” in the coach, Pat got chatting with a few people on the coach. Some of the peeps:

• Matt – From Maldon in Essex (under 10 miles from Our Home Town™), who works as a fireman and who reminded me a lot of Iain – a mate of Pat’s from, you guessed it, Maldon.
• John (“Welshy”) – From Newport, and proud of it.
• Abraham (“Dutchy”) – From Amshterdam, who’s a teacher, very amusing and wears his hat whereever he goes
• Mark – From Preston, a down to Earth fella who’s decided to live and work in New Zealand – but holiday for a couple of weeks first
• Volsch… Voltsc… Vol… German dude – From South Germany, works in IT for HP doing Java based entertainment
• Chris – From Scotland, just graduated in Computing with Geography (yep) and looking to enjoy himself for a bit before getting a job in IT or something good :-)

After a fairly long coach journey we arrived at Paihia (the Bay Of Islands), checked into our hostel (The Pipi Patch) and made our way to the water’s edge to board The EXCITOR (with lots of sarcastic comments from Pat about being too excited to cope).

It was actually really good – a big-ass speed boat that seats about 20 (“so hurry up…”) with 1600HP between its two engines, bombing it out into the ocean over quite big waves – it was rather like a roller coaster, so Pat couldn’t help but hold his hands and legs out in his usual, inexplicable, “Wooh, I can’t possibly be hurt” roller coaster riding style.

It stopped by the “Hole In The Rock” for a quick chat by the captain about the history of the “Hole In The Rock”:

We then trundled through it and made our way to another one of the Bay of Islands (whereupon several large waves splashed into the boat and covered Welshy – but noone else (we didn’t find it funny, of course, no)), which included visiting a Yellow Submarine:

Apparently a Beatles Song (I think it was “Mean Mr Mustard”) was inspired by that particular sea vessel!

After making our way back to the coast, we went to the Pipi Patch bar and spent the evening drinking and chatting. Pat pretty much stayed with the group of guys above, which I guess is what happens on the first day of something like this – something to do with Storming, Norming, Performing, Swarming or whatever that crappy group behaviour theory stuff is about.

Here Dutchie shows off his free Pint and Pint Glass, which he won by spinning The Wheel Of Fortune (drink four Export Golds and you get the chance to spin and win, for the…er… win!):

Foolishly Pat slept listening to his iRiver, meaning that it would be out of batteries for the next day’s bus trip up 90 mile beach to the top of New Zealand…

Friday 17th November: Bay of Islands – Cape Reinga – Bay of Islands
After an early start we sauntered out of the Pipi Patch into a Fullers Bus (owned, as Kiwi Experience is, by the lovely, friendly and not at all big, faceless, soulless sounding Tourism Holdings Limited) for our day up to Cape Reinga – the northern point of New Zealand.

Twas a rather long journey up there, not helped by the lack of an iRiver and the coach driver talking in great detail about Maori stories for just about every thing we went past (quite interesting, yes, but after a while you end up losing track of which of the brothers of the gods of the sea or land or sky or whatever it was was angry at the tree or forest or small olive grove god for doing something bad to do with splitting up some other gods in order to, er… something) which meant that sleeping wasn’t much of an option.

Still on arriving a Cape Reinga via lots of winding gravel tracks (Pat was convinced that the coach was going to break down at several, rather shuddery points) we weren’t disappointed by the views:

(A little wind swept)

After that we made our way to some feck-off great big sand dunes to take part in some sandboarding! I sensibly stayed on the coach but Pat braved it up this:

Pat informed me that it was almost worth it – yeah the ride down on the mini surf board, head first was fecking brilliant fun – fast, a bit scary and very exciting – however this was outweighed by the bastard-hard climb up the sand dune (very soft sand) and being blasted in the face with sand at the top, such that seeing and breathing was nigh-on impossible.

Pat has now gained a great respect for people who live in desert conditions. To be honest, I think Pat might’ve been better off if he’d, say, worn sun glasses and something to wrap around his mouth… not that this isn’t a sexy look:

Sadly the whole trip was marred when Matt careered down the smaller of the two dunes, hitting a minor dip at the bottom of the dune and smashing his face into the ground. He was unconcious for almost a minute, mumbling and incoherent for a few minutes and bloody groggy, in shock, sleepy and with a fecking great big swollen patch under his right eye. Pat felt awful as he really didn’t know how to help out in this sort of situation, luckily the coach driver looked after him so it was ok.

Still, Pat’s vowed to get a refresher on basic First Aid ASAP.

Note: Luckily Matt was fine in the end, after being taken to hospital that night and discharged in the morning – he’s now wearing sunglasses to try and cover the rather impressive black eye…

The coach journey back was quite crap as Pat and others needed to make sure Matt was ok, concious and not konked out for the duration… still, we got back ok in the end – via 90 mile beach, which was an odd experience to be part of:

This, apparently, is a road. Nice.

The coach had a bit of trouble getting off the beach… fortunately as this seems to happen a fair bit another coach was waiting to help:

Classic.

After a quick stop off at a Fish and Chip shop (apparently really great but Pat wasn’t massively bothered by it for some reason), we made our way back to Paihia.

That evening was another Pipi Patch bar experience, with a bit more socialising in the wider group – meeting some more folk:

• Jennie – from Oop North, just graduated from Nottingham Trent Uni in Teh Law and travelling around with her Uni mate Kate…
• Kate – also graduated from Nottingham Trent in Teh Laws
• Chris 2 – a freelance “Research Engineer” who does work for such shows as Scrapheap Challenge – nice guy who’s a typical Keen Media Type™
• Amy – also an Oop Norther, she’s been travelling for ages and from what I gather rather looking forward to getting back home, which is fair enough!

After a rather late night of drinking and chatting, Pat flaked out in the dorm.

Saturday 18th November: Bay of Islands – Aukland
After having a rather rubbish sleep due to co-dorm-inhabitant snoring, Pat grumbled his way to check out at 10am, dumping his ruck sack in the storage room in wait for the 4pm pick up bus.

It was raining outside but Pat figured he should get a bit of exercise so had a wander around a bit – not getting too wet – bumping into Mr German and Chris after a while and heading for a spot of lunch at the bar next to the Pipi Patch. They do the most AMAZING burgers, Pat tells me – yes, that’s right, an AMAZING VEGGIE burger. Who’d’ve thought?

After lunch we trundled (well, more “waddled”… it was quite a large burger) back to the Pipi Patch, where a game of poker was just begining between Chris 2, Kate and Jen. Pat, Chris and Mr German joined in and the game commenced (with rather high stakes – matches – being involved).

Amazingly, despite Jen wiping most people out and almost ending Pat’s game, he somehow came back via a selection of rather good hands, potentially foolish bluffs and blatant luck and won the game!

He said something about going to Vegas but I’m hoping he just meant Bas Vegas and not the other one. Actually, I hope he meant neither.

Eventually the coach picked us all up and we made our way back to Aukland… 4 hours without a charged iRiver to listen to was hard going but Pat just about made it through having bought the high brow magazine known as For Him Magazine to purve at look at for some of the journey.

On the coach Pat met John (“Jersey”), from Jersey (funnily enough), who’s a gardener for the local goverment and also fireworks display technition, which is pretty cool. Had a good chin wag, which helped speed the journey up and took Pat’s mind off the ill feeling that came from a) too much burger and b) reading on the bus…

On arrival at our destination Aukland hostel (the nice-and-central ACB) at 8pm, John and Pat wandered over to Base Backpackers Hostel to meet some of the other guys, then we trundled to Globe (something of a meat market, right below ACB) meeting up with some more Kiwi Experience folk.

Twas an entertaining evening of drinking, dancing and chatting (albeit in a slightly shouty way over the loud music (“YEAH… I CRY MYSELF TO SLEEP EVERY NIGHT…”</AdamAndJoeReference>)) and at about 2am Pat finally decided to make his way back to the hostel (albeit without John, who was – how shall I put it? – “occupied” following meeting a scottish girl called Debbie) and crash out.

Sunday 19th November – Aukland
The Kiwi Experience coaches don’t leave Aukland on Sundays, meaning the whole day was free to do whatever we needed.

Unfortunately (well, that’s debatable I suppose) Pat’s plan of catching up with blogging and photo uploading went to pot as he and John spent most of the day at Kelly Tarlton’s Underwater World (no points for guessing which faceless, soulless sounding company owns this…).

It took a 90 minute walk from Aukland city centre along the harbour road to get there. You’d think there’d be some kind of free shuttle bus, wouldn’t you?

Well, you’d be right. It passed us approximately 1 minute from our destination. We were so impressed (mind you, between you and I think Pat needed the exercise so he can’t really complain).

Inside KTUW was really good – lots of interesting information about various sea creatures, a big penguin enclosure, an underwater walk way to view sharks, sea turtles, sting rays and various types of fish, a mock up of a hut used by Scott et al on their many Arctic adventures… plenty to read about and see, and all for about 8 quid.

Pat took LOADS of photos, but because this Taupo-based internet cafe sucks a bit he’s not had a chance to upload them so you’ll have to check the usual place in a few days.

After a quick ride back to central Aukland via a free shuttle bus (apparently they have one, who’d’ve thought?) Pat wandered into an Italian restaurant for a nice, civilised meal before heading back out to Base (meeting some of the guys), onto an Oirish pub called Father Ted’s (no coincidence) and back to the Globe (meeting Jen, Kate, Chris et al) for far, far too many drinks and lots of bad dancing (from Pat (who thinks he was dancing brilliantly but I’m not sure anyone else would agree)).

On the way back from the Globe, an unfortunate diversion occurred… well, it was unfortunate for John, Jen, Kate and Chris as the meat was really dodgy – on the other hand, Pat really enjoyed his 3:30am McDeli Veggie Sandwich.

Sleep then beckoned… a whole 4 hours before the coach was to turn up to take us south.

Monday 20th November: Aukland – Mercury Bay
Pat had 2 hours sleep (hooray for snoring dorm-sharers), but managed to be awake enough to check out and get on the coach for 7:30.

After a 1 hour coach journey around Aukland city centre, picking people up from various hostels (honestly, can’t people walk 500 metres?), we finally set off, with 47 other passengers.

This time our bus driver was Flea, who’s really friendly and has spent most of her life living at her folks in a forest valley in the North Island, although now lives in Aukland but with her folks place as a kinda holiday home (she’s got an old Kiwi Experience bus converted into her own mini house!)

First place she took us to was Mount Eden, which was nice as Pat and I had enjoyed it very much last time – sadly the weather wasn’t quite so nice this time but it was still cool to see the views again.

After that we went south, travelling for a while (with a charged iRiver to make things a bit easier for Pat) and after grabbing some food to use at a rather special BBQ (I’ll explain in a sec) we went to Mercury Bay.

Some folks headed straight to the hostel however many of us took the option to do some Kayaking to see Cathedral Cove (of course, I stayed safe in Pat’s bag on the coach).

Pat’s group’s guide for this was possibly the most stereotypical surfer dude in the ENTIRE WORLD. “Totally awesome!”, “Killleeeerrr!”, “Sweet AS bro!”, “Nooooo waaaaay bro!” and a whole load of funky hand slapping, punching and sliding were pretty commonplace. Pat found it very funny.

Pat and John took their two man Kayak out, with Pat navigating and John steering at the back… twas quite tough work (particularly on the wrists, which are still hurting Pat today (Friday))… but Pat enjoyed being out in the water.

What was enjoyed less was the almost inevitable capsising, which occurred on trying to land on a beach by Cathedral Cove. All was fine, but just as the kayak almost touced the beach it started to move to the right… just in time for a fecking big wave to spin it, John and Pat over in the water a couple of times.

Wet Passport in a supposedly dry pouch of a Kayak? Bring it on!

Still, it was an excuse for Pat to show off his flabsixpack whilst he let his T-Shirt dry and given the lovely weather that didn’t take too long. Pat wandered into Cathedral Cove (a big, impressive cave) and admired the lovely scenery as Surfer Dude made everyone some hot chocolate.

Once back in the (rather damp) Kayak John and Pat made their way out into the water again, getting rather tired now but still slogging on, before they all finally came back to the starting point.

Several crazy hand shakes, sweet as bros and killleeerrrs later, Pat and co made their way to the hostel (Turtle Cove), which was FULLY LOVELY.

That evening Flea took us all for a BBQ at her cool place in the forest, which was really ace – particularly wandering out into her “back garden” (a large, tree enclosed field) and staring up at the plethora of stars, visible without the glare of man made light for miles and miles. Amazing.

Following that we trundled back to the lovely, comfy beds of Turtle Cove.

Right, that’s MORE than enough detail for now. My hands hurt (oddly my wrists do too even though it was Pat who did the Kayaking… who’d’ve thunk it?) so I’m going to do a very quick summary of the days between Tuesday and now:

Tuesday 21st November: Mercury Bay – Rotorua

• Pat had a poor sleep so was KNACKERED all morning and in a fairly cheesed off mood (as he gets when fully knackered)
• Pat’s camera was a bit screwed through being put in a pocket full of sand – but it got better with some blowing and gentle smashing (contradiction?).
• Wandered around some cool disused mine shafts at the karanga Lake Scenic Reserve
• Went to Hobbiton and Pat posed as Gollum next to a Gollum statue
• Went to Rotorua and did luging, which was HILARIOUS fun – like go karting but with no motors and more speed!
• Ended up in a bar drinking again – really good night though, lots of amusement (you’ll have to see the photos later but they are quite amusing)!
• Rotorua smells of rotten eggs

Wednesday 22nd November: Rotorua – Waitomo

• Pat had a great sleep so felt much better
• Lovely sunny day
• Went to the Tipau Hot Springs + Mud Pools, which was amazing to see – there were big geyzers too, so Pat got some great photos!
• Stopped off on the way to Waitomo at a town with two buildings designed as a Sheep and a Dog. Rather, uh, odd, but they looked comically bad. Pat, again, got some great photos!
• Chilled in hostel for a while – Hostel was lovely, with nice balconies overlooking the countryside and a pool table
• Lots and lots of drink was had by all, along with a BBQ
• Amazing evening, including live acoustic guitar songs from two of the Waitomo Caves guides who happened to be around
• Lots more amusing photos
• Pat can’t remember getting to bed

Oh, and on this day Pat booked himself on a 12000ft tandem sky dive. He kinda needed the drink…

Thursday 23rd November: Waitomo – Taupo

• Pat woke up at 7am, following getting to bed at god-knows when, feeling rather bad:
  1. “Nnnggh I’m Hungover”
  2. “Nnngh I need to check out and be ready to go to the Waitomo Caves by 8am”
  3. “Oh shit… I’m doing a sky dive today”
• Pat managed to get out of bed despite of the above making him want to not leave it
• Waitomo Cave Black Water Rafting was hilarious fun – wearning wetsuit, sitting in a rubber ring, floating around caves and occasionally jumping off waterfalls into the blackness, alongside staring at the amazing lit up cave ceilings thanks to the glow worms… it’s a great way to cure a hangover!
• Pat spent most of the day bricking himself about the Sky Diving
• Pat went to the Sky Dive Centre
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat got in a Sky Dive outfit
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat walked onto a Sky Dive plane
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat got strapped to a Sky Diver
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat watching the ground get further away
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat stared at the plane side door opening up
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat watched Amy disappear
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat was moved to the edge of the plane
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat looked up at the camera man who was co-diving
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat stared below in disbelief
• Pat felt scared shitless
• Pat fell from the plane
• …
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat and his Sky Diver spun around a bit
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat felt the wind smashing into him
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat felt the rush of free fall
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat felt the parachute open and felt like he was flung up
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat slowly glided down 4000ft, taking in the awesome scenery of Lake Taupo and the surrounding area
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat landed
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was
• Pat couldn’t believe how UTTERLY AMAZING it was.

So yes, Pat enjoyed the Sky Dive a little :-)

• Pat and t’other folks went to Pizza Hut to celebrate our Sky Dives
• Pat had an early night

Friday 24th November: Taupo

• A 17km hike across the mountains has been cancelled due to high water levels in the trek route, so Pat has a free day.
• I’ve hijacked his time to sit here and blog
• Pat is starving
• Pat’s hands are sore through typin watching me type
• We’re going.
• BYE!

Squage

No Updates. Correct. No. In that order.

Fact is I’ve been really busy out and about on the Kiwi Experience doing all sorts of fun activities during the day, partying into the evening and not really getting a great deal of chance to use the net for long enough to write-I mean, er, for Squage to write the massive amount of catching up that needs to be done.

Anyway, to summarise:

1. I’m having great fun
2. There are lots of cool people
3. I’ve been drinking a lot
4. I’ve been doing lots of cool activities (including – shock – exercise to try and cancel out the beer)
5. I’ve probably not been getting enough sleep
6. Luging is fuh-kin great fun
7. Rotorua smalls a bit of rotten eggs

I’m in Rotorua today, having come down from Aukland via Mercury Bay. Before that I’d been up to the Bay Of Islands and up 90 Mile Beach.

It’s been very hectic but I’m hoping to have some more time over the weekend to do a proper catch up.

Please don’t fret if you don’t hear from Squage or myself for over a week or so, it’s not because I’ve forgotten about you, it’s simply because a) I probably haven’t got time inbetween grabbing coach rides at stupid-O’Clock in the morning, doing activities during the day and socialising in the evening and b) I really hate computers :-)

Hope all is well back in Good Ol’ Blighty ™!

Toodles,

Pat

…is captured in the photos I’ve uploaded in the usual place.

It’s been an odd couple of days. I woke up on Sunday morning in LA, then spent all day in LA (Hard Rock Cafe for the win!), got on a flight to NZ at 20:30 and arrived in New Zealand this morning (Tuesday) at 06:00 after a 12.5 hour flight.

I managed about 30 minutes of sleep on the plane, but managed to get a few hours in this morning in the hostel. Still, I’ve no real idea what day or time I think it should be.

Hooray for travelling long distances, staying up for over 24 hours and generally being too tired to think!

The hostel (right next to Mount Eden) is lovely, the bed massively comfortable and the people there friendly, which are all Ace Things ™. The weather’s also splendid – sunny skies and around 20 degree Celcius. Hooray!

Just been up the Auckland Sky Tower, which was pretty cool – scary too due to the continuation of Pat’s Phear Of Heights – but I’ve got some good photos of the view (and
of a couple of nut jobs participating in the “Hey, why not pay $200 to jump 192 metres from the top of the tower?” Sky Jump thing… I swear some of these type of people are actually clinically insane)… and aside from that been wandering around a bit taking it all in. Had a nice trip up Mount Eden too.

Photos, as I say, are in the usual place. I’m too lazy to link to them directly :-)

Got the Kiwi Experience starting on Thursday morning, which should be a whole range of fun, insanity and (largely) drinking. Can’t wait!

Speak soon!

Toodles,

Pat
—
Sorry, did someone say Southend BEAT Man U?…

Well, that was a very good 6 days!

As Squage as bored you to tears with, we got up to lots of things. A quick (actually, this time) summary of the things I’ve observed about New York is below:

People
Whilst a bit brash, New Yorkers seemed to be a generally friendly bunch.
They seem an honest and generous group of folks – irrelevant of their particular background (there’s a LOT of cultural diversity in NYC)
Waiters/waitresses were much keener to help than I’m used to in England, but I think that’s down to the culture here surrounding tipping etc.

Food
Whilst not as ridiculous in size as I was expecting, New York food portitions were certainly sizeable, such that after a couple of meals I learned it really wasn’t worth having starters as you’d generally be full after them.
There was a wide choice, I think helped by the cultural diversity, but of course the good ol’ chain restuarant favourites were very much apparently whereever I went.
New York Pizza places rock.

Money
Everywhere in New York wants your money. It’s bloody expensive.
Tipping is pretty much mandatory everywhere, and generally ranges from 15-20%
ATMs charge you for withdrawals
It’s bloody expensive.

Transport
The subway network is really pretty good. It covers most of Manhattan and there are frequent trains on all of the lines.
One of the few “great value” things in New York, I’d say. For instance, you can get a 7 day subway(+bus) pass for $24 – which allows you to get anywhere in New York – not just Manhattan – so, for example, you could go from the Bronx, through Manhattan, through Brooklyn and pretty much to JFK airport every day for a week with that pass… Oh and also they seem to have tie-ins with various stops/attractions/restaurants, so that with a subway pass you get various discounts. Now why can’t Transport for LondON do something similar?

TV
Programme wise it’s not awful and there’re plenty of movie channels around.
Adverts, however, are TERRIBLE. What’s particuarly annoying is that lots of them seem to take the approach of showing the ad, then repeating the whole damned thing again. Nnngh.

Language
It’s almost like English but different. I still don’t understand why somewhere you go to take a crap is called a Rest Room.

Anyway, my eyes and fingers are hurting (despite Squage doing all the typing previously, how odd… so I’m outa here)

Toodles,

Pat

Howdy Blog Fans!

Sorry about the lack of updates over the last few days. The more astute and/or impatient of you may have noticed that Pat uploaded even more photos on Saturday, but aside from that we’ve been avoiding PCs for a bit, which is nice.

Anyway, we’re now in New Zealand but I’ll come onto that in another blog entry. This one’s a quick (ahem) review of What Else We Did In New York:

Went on a Bus Tour
We decided to give up on the “pretending to not be tourists” thing and go for the Gray Line open-top bus tour of Manhattan.

It was pretty interesting, plus got a couple of seats to ourselves and the tour guide himself – a jewish guy who’d been in Manhattan for about 40 years and was as stereotypical a New Yoiker as I could imagine – was quite funny.

Dunno if he’d’ve understood irony, but there didn’t seem time to investigate.

Here I am soaking up the infotainment (shudder):

Went to the Empire State Building…
…and were talked into taking the “New York Sky Ride + Empire State Viewing Platform” package, as by the time we’d to there (about 6pm) the queues were over an hour long – but if you went to the sky ride you skipped the queues for only blah blah blah more plus you get blah blah etc, etc.

Anyway, first stop was the Sky Ri-actually, no, first stop was getting through an airport-style X-Ray machine (over the top security? In America?? What???), then onto the Sky Ride, which itself was quite cool.

It was basically a simulator ride (one of those pneumatic “throws you about in your seat” jobbies), voiced by Kevin Bacon (for some reason) of a helicopter-type ride around New York, starting from and ending at the Empire State and occasionally going into crazy “out of control, passing through crowds of people comedically falling out of the way” mode… quite funny.

Sadly this was marred a little by the New York City promotional video, which preceded it. I can’t quite put into words how cringeworthy it was for a cynical English person-er, I mean Squagé-to watch a video soundtracked by enthusiastic (and no doubt holding headphones passionately whilst in the studio) Americans, crooning “Iiiii Aaamm New York… Ooooh Yeah… Neeeww York… I Aaaam New Yorrrk…”

I honestly thought it was a spoof at first. Hey ho, nothing wrong with being proud of where you come from I suppose (an Essex upbringing didn’t provide Pat or I a great deal of experience of this, sadly)…

Anyway, after all that we skipped the long queues and made our way to the top of the Empire State.

It’s an odd feeling being in the Empire State lifts. You get in, it all seems normal. It starts to move up, you feel it accellerate quite fast. You watch the floors count up… 1… 2… 3..4..5,6,7,8,9,10….. then after two seconds: 20… then 30… 40… etc. My ears actually popped twice on the way up!

Once at the top, Pat had to put on his bravest “I’m not crapping myself, really” face to pose for this photo:

It almost worked.

The views from the top were amazing… you could see for miles and miles and New York City lit up at night is a wonderous sight to behold. Amoungst lots of “Scared and Shaking” blurry photos, Pat managed to take one particularly nice one:

Oh and hello to the two guys from Bristol (hope you recovered from The Phear) and the mum and two daughters from the midlands who I met and got chatting to. Was nice to have a chin-wag with some peeps from home!

Ate Food
After that we wandered into TGI Fridays, which has even less Veggie stuff than TGIs in the UK, but still managed to make Pat so full he could hardly walk.

He’s going to be SO fit for the Kiwi Experience activities in New Zealand.

FRIDAY

Washed Clothes
YES! Live the dream! Mainly this is being mentioned due to the lovely Thai lady in the laundret-sorry, Laundromat close to our hostel, because on getting chatting with Pat and finding out he was going to Bangkok on the way back she gave him a big book all about Bangkok city! It really made Pat feel chuffed about the kindness of people, that did.

Saw the Statue of Liberty
Went on a boat tour thing, which was good – Pat got lots of photos during it of the Statue herself:

Manhattan Island:

Brooklyn Bridge:

And we convinced someone to take a photo of us:

Met a couple of cool ladies from Dublin, who were over on business. Again it was nice to have a chat with people from closer to home…

Saw Another Film
This time it was The Departed. Some great acting, a good plot and overall a big Thumbs Up.

Went to a Broadway Show
Well it was technically an off-broadway show, but it’ll do. Pat heard you could get half-price tickets to various shows via some people at Times Square, so he went up to one of them and bought some tickets for the show the particular person was promoting. It was called Altar Boyz. It’s a musical comedy about a religious boy band group.

I know what you’re thinking, but don’t worry! On arrival Pat was relieved that this was clearly a very manly thing to be watching, as he was surrounded in the seats by:

• Couples
• Women
• Gay guys

Still, twas a very very funny musical and Pat’s presence as a single straight bloke gave for some amusing banter between Pat and Colin/Mark, a gay couple sitting next to us.

Anyway, after that we went back to the hostel and got to sleep.

SATURDAY

Photos
Uploaded lots of them.

Airport
Went there, sat around a bit, got on the plane, got to L.A.

I would go into further detail but I’ve rambled on for about 5 times too long already :-)

Right, now over to Pat to write a bit of a summary of what he dun learned from his past week…

Toodles,

Squage