NZ - Day 2 -Glowworms

** Written by Guest Blogger - my man Gregg! **




For our second day in NZ we were off to Waitomo to see their world famous glow-worms. Even with turn-by-turn directions by Google we managed to get a bit off course. Luckily we had given ourselves plenty of extra time, and decided to stop in a small town for coffee. Stepping out of the car we were immediately greeted by the smell of roasting coffee. The smell led us to the Otorohanga Railway Station. Well, it used to be a railway station...now its home the Origin Coffee Company. We drank some very good coffee while the sounds and smells of coffee roasting filled the room.

There are several guide services in the Waitomo area; we chose The Legendary Black Water Rafting Company. Our guides, "Monkey" and Brydie, equipped us with thick wetsuits and helmets, and gave us a quick lesson on how to our use our gear to descend into the caves.

We Rappelled ("abseiled" over here) 35 meters into a small dark hole, our headlamps trying to illuminate as our eyes adjusted to the abyss. We explored an amazing new world, saw incredible limestone formations, stalactites and stalagmites, took a "Flying Fox" (zip-line) ride in the dark, met "Cecil" a fresh water eel who lives in one of the many water holes and has become quite accustomed to the many tours that wade through his little home.

We climbed up tubes in the rocks with water rushing down, squeezed through tight passageways and jumped, up to 15 ft in one case, into pools of dark, cold water. And sometimes we just floated on our backs, in silence, with helmet-lights off looking up at the roof of the cave watching what look like green stars in the night sky.

When the adventure was over we took a different route back to Rotorua. It was longer, but easier to navigate. and made for a very scenic drive back. And no big surprise, we saw LOTS of sheep.

A quick stop in town for some take-away Thai and we were back at our hosts home. We wrapped up the evening by sharing stories about our caving adventure, and the mountain bike ride they had just returned from.

NZ - Day 1 - We've arrived in Rotorua!

Apologies first .... we've forgotten the USB cord for the camera. So pictures will follow, but possibly not until we get back!

We arrived in Rotorua a few minutes early, at 8:30 am on Monday. If you're trying to figure out the time conversion, NZ is 20 hours ahead of the U.S. West Coast. Here's how I think about - in practical terms, that means that NZ is 4 hours earlier in the day, but a day ahead. So as I write this it's 9 am here, which means it's 1 pm for most of you. But since it's my Wednesday, it's your Tuesday. See? Pretty, easy, right?

Marcello VERY generously offered to pick us up at the airport to help us transfer bike boxes to his home, where he'll store them for the duration of our trip. What a tremendous relief! It's absolutely fantastic that we've been able to get her with our own bikes, but dealing with the bikes and those big boxes for three weeks was going to be kind of a nightmare.

So Gregg reassembled bikes at Marcello & Heide's place. We had a moment of worry when my headset wouldn't work properly. Apparently a seal had cracked (oh no!!), but Gregg was able to put it together without the seal (yay!!!). It's not a permanent solution, but it'll be fine for the amount of riding we'll be doing here. Good enough!!

So we drove a few blocks to meet our Couchsurfing hosts in Rotorua. We spent a bit of time with Ben, and the house dog Flo, and then took off on our bikes to find some lunch, and more generally to find our bearings. Rotorua is a pretty small town, and both Marcello and our CS hosts live very near to both the forest and the center of town.

Once downtown we went straight to Zippy's Cafe. The food was good, the coffee was pretty good, and there were a LOT of Single Speeders there. After all the hype over this place I'll admit that I was expecting more, but I can see why it's a popular place. Among the SSers hanging out in front of the Cafe is Jacquie Phelan! I still owe her $3 for a patch she gave me at the Single Speed World Championships (SSWC) in Durango last year! She says she'll take a beer at the Pig & Whistle. Sounds good to me.

We exchanged some cash (FYI, no fee if you do this at the Bank/Post), picked up a phone, got some groceries, and then took the scenic tour back to our temporary home. There is a lot of thermal activity around Rotorua, and our scenic route back took us through several bubbling mud pools. Have you ever seen the old David Bowie movie "Labyrinth"? Remember the Bog of Eternal Stench?

And to cap off our first day in Rotorua, we spent a fantastic night with ALL of our hosts. Tracy & Ben are officially our hosts, but Ron & Jason have also been great company! And I can't forget to mention Flo & Nick - the dog & cat ... also pretty good company! We probably won't see everybody in the same room again while we're here, and we missed the opportunity to capture the moment on film. But we're really enjoying their company, and we're so glad to be able to spend this time with them rather than in a Hotel!!

And that's a wrap on Day 1!