Pictures

Pictures are finally up. Come one, come all and see what Lisa and Ryan were up to.

Pictures Coming Soon...Promise

I have plenty of pictures to put up for you all to see. Bear with me just a little while longer, I'm cleaning up some computer-related issues on my home network. I hope to have them up during the upcoming week. In the meantime, here's a preview of Lisa and I sitting on Frodo and Bilbo's doorstep.

Honeymoon, this is Houston...Welcome Home

After many, many hours...we've finally arrived safe at home. The flight up from Auckland was filled with plenty of turbulence (the first 4+ hours were all bumpy), making it hard to sleep during the 12 hour flight. That made for an interesting drive home from SFO today. Regardless, we left Auckland at 5:15PM on Saturday and got home around 4:30PM on Saturday (a magical thing, that date line).

I've got about 300 pictures in the digital camera to start rummaging through. I'll hopefully post them during this next week so you can see what fun we had. Keep it tuned here for a link to those pictures.

Hello from Orewa

We've landed in Orewa. We've found Aunt Marie and Uncle Ray's and have had a meal. The drive up wasn't bad, just some traffic in Auckland.

We left the hotel this morning and hit the Skyline Skyride luge in Rotorua. This was a fun downhill ride on a sled with brakes and steering only.

We left there headed for Matamata, also known as Hobbitton (the film set for the Shire in Lord of the Rings). We did the tour there, seeing the old Hobbit holes and the nearby land.

After that, we did the final drive through Auckland making a quick stop to hit a couple of shops. Then we did the push up to Orewa. Tomorrow we spend our last full day in New Zealand. We may do a short post, but otherwise we fly out on Saturday around 5:30pm (about 9:30pm on Tuesday in California). We arrive on Saturday around 1:00pm in California (funny, we're traveling back in time). So if we don't post again until we get back to the US, wish us a good flight.

Kia Ora!

That's Maori for hello/goodbye/good health/welcome. Today we arrived in Rotorua after a short drive up from Taupo. We spent the first part of the day touring the Whaka Thermal Area, which also happens to be a Maori village. We were treated to a Maori concert and were then taken on a guided tour of the village and the surrounding thermal features (some geysers, mudpools and steam vents). We finished there and found our hotel. This evening we were taken to the Tamaki Maori village where we were treated to a Hangi (Maori feast). The food is cooked by superheating volcanic rocks and then cooking the food on those rocks (similar to a luau, but slightly different).

There was a lot of Maori traditional songs and dance. Near the end, they made the honeymoon couples come up to be serenaded by the villagers. When that was over, the honeymooning men were kept in front to take part in the Haka. I looked ridiculous, but I think with some more preparation I could have been pretty good. The Haka is a Maori tribal war dance/chant that the men would perform when going into battle. The idea was to intimidate their enemies before the battle with fearsome noises and faces.

Tomorrow we'll be here again. We'll check out another thermal wonderland: Tarawera. It erupted long ago, burying two nearby villages. The explosion was loud enough to be heard in Auckland and Christchurch (trust me, it's far). We'll also hit the luge (pictures will come later, it's difficult to explain). The next day we head to Orewa to spend the last two nights with Aunt Marie and Uncle Ray. Until then, Kia Ora!

Take Us to Your Leader

Yesterday we arrived in the nation's capital, Wellington. It's much different from Auckland, much more tolerable. We spent the first day touring Parliament and walking around (walking is becoming a central theme of the honeymoon). Today (Sunday in NZ, Saturday in the US) we took the cable car up the hill to the botanical garden. We walked down the garden back to the city, seeing lots of cool plants, including the massive display of blooming tulips they have. We then hoofed it over to Te Papa, the national museum (like the Smithsonian, but smaller). There we learned all about the history of New Zealand and much more about the native Maori culture. We did more walking today than probably any other day. Sorry there aren't any pictures, but there are no card readers on this machine.

Tomorrow we head to Taupo, a city right on a massive lake in the center of the north island. It sounds kind of sleepy, until you're told that the lake is actually a gigantic crater created when the nation's largest volcano errupted in 186 AD. The drive there is supposed to be about 5 hours and then we've got some sight seeing to do, so there likely won't be a post that day. The next two nights we're in the same town (Rotorua), though...so we should have time then for another post. Until then, enjoy the picture of us underground in the other post.

NOTE: I'm having some problems getting Blogger to publish this post and the last. If only one post comes through, I'll try to fix it when we got to the next town.

Moria Update

Now that I'm finally in a city with real internet access, I can post a photo from inside the Waitomo Caves. Keep in mind, this picture was taken about 30 meters underground after a couple of hours, slogging away in the cold water and mud...so we don't look our best. But at least we've got a smile. :)



You can see we've got our "gumboots" and wetsuits on, not to mention those killer helmets with the LED headlamps.

Into Moria

Yesterday (Thursday here in New Zealand, Wednesday for those of you in the US) we traveled into the Waitomo Caves. We took the Tumutumu Toobing adventure and went 30 meters underground. We wore some sweet wetsuits, ventured through some seriously cold water and (somehow) emerged in the sunlight about 3 hours later. There were many sharp, pointy and hard rocks we had to climb over, under and through. We have some pictures to post, but the city we're in now has limited internet access, so we'll have to wait until we hit Wellington tomorrow.

We also got to see the glowworms underground. When you turn your helmet lights off they show up as faint blue lights on the ceiling. It's a little scary to sit in complete darkness underground like that, but when you see the worms on the ceiling it makes you feel a bit better.

On to the next post...

Into Mordor

We finally reached Mordor this afternoon, to deliver the One Ring to Mount Doom (aka Mount Ruapehu). We took a "nice" drive to the ski slopes up the mountain and had a spectacular view of the surrounding lands. The trip to the top was a bit dicey, think narrow mountain road up a very steep incline with no barrier between you and certain death down the side of the mountain. Fortunately for us, we had Lisa on that side of the car. :) She took it "well" and we made it to the top in one piece.

Once at the top, we had a chance to see some skiers going down the slopes. We were also able to see some of the New Zealand army up there (about 200 of them, at least) doing some sort of cold weather training. They were very friendly towards Lisa...I wonder why.

We also did a nature walk near the hotel. Beautiful forest with a nice river running through it. Good exercise...not that we need anymore.

We have pictures from today as well, but no card reader. So we'll try to post those pictures later.

We're staying in the Powderhorn Chateau this evening, a hotel frequented by the cast of the Lord of the Rings during filming nearby. It's a VERY nice place, if we had more time this would be a great place to spend it.

That's it for now. We're off to the capital (Wellington) tomorrow. We'll be there 2 nights. It's a bigger town, so hopefully we'll have better facilities to upload some pictures. Until then, continue enjoying the picture of Lisa on our first day.

Houston, the Honeymoon has Landed

After hours on a plane (where we were seated apart...for some stupid reason) and a crazy ride through Auckland (see image above), the honeymoon has arrived. We spent the earlier part of today waiting to check into the hotel room. We walked about, got to go up the SkyTower, had some food, did some shopping and were finally able to check in. We've now showered and are about to hit the town once again.

Some things to note:

• The people here are crazy. They drive on the LEFT side of the road.
• Air New Zealand hasn't done themselves any favors in our eyes by seating the newlyweds 2 rows apart for 13 hours.
• Auckland's really only 18 hours difference from California (contrary to my prior post). So think of it as Auckland being only 4 hours behind but in the next day (I'm posting this around 3:00PM, Wednesday Auckland time and it's 7:00PM, Tuesday in California).

Tomorrow we leave bright and early for our date with the Waitomo Caves glowworms. We'll be suiting up in wetsuits and braving the chilly, underground waters for a chance to see the luminous critters. Not sure we'll have internet access there or the next town, so you may not see a post from us again until we reach Wellington on Saturday (Friday for those of you in California).

All Aboard!

The party train's about to depart Folsom, just completing final preparations now. We're a little behind, but we'll make it up on the way to San Francisco.

I'm currently thinking through every scenario for how driving from the Auckland airport to the hotel is going to go. Trial #1, seeing what side of the car I try getting in on. Trial #2, seeing what side of the road I head for first.

Other quick tidbits to everyone:

• New Zealand is 19 hours ahead of California. You can think of it as NZ being 5 hours behind California, but already in the next day. For example, 10:00AM Tuesday in California is 5:00AM Wednesday in New Zealand.
• If you know people who might like to read this stuff, feel free to pass the link around. Don't go posting it on Slashdot, though. My DSL line isn't THAT good.

Catch you all on the flip side...

Update: I've removed the feed URL. Since the honeymoon's over, there won't be any further updates.

First Post!

Okay, the honeymoon hasn't officially begun. However, it would be nice if I tried posting something to ensure that it does, in fact, work. The honeymoon officially gets underway around 12:00PM Pacific Time (-0700) on Monday as we leave for the airport to begin the long airborn adventure to Middle Earth. I'm hoping to have net access from time to time during the trip to be able to post. With luck I'll also have access to a computer that will let me upload a picture or two, but I'll just settle for being able to post.

See you in Mordor...