Day 2 Rotorua, New Zealand

Day two Rotorua

Today is the day that I travel off to Rotorua. There is at least a two hour time difference between Ausutalia and NZ. This is only annoying when you have a bus to catch at 9.30am and you are stuck on Aussie time. I was going to follow Pitt street to Hobson which is the street the bus station is located. I ended up walking along Mayoral drive past the strip club that is next door to the Slvation army church next door.  This route still got me to Hobson street via Auckland police station. The bus was already at the station and I had to wait until 915 for the driver to appear and put my bag on. I did have breaky of coffee and sandwiches.

The bus to Rotorua goes through to Manakau city, Hamilton etc. It takes several hours and I did have a rest stop at a town that was part of the land wars between maori and English. The usual sniffing out of the cemeteries told me plenty as I had seen the cemetery as we pulled in. The town was called Rangiriri. The rest stop had a museum, which was closed as I was going to buy books on the subject. Maybe next time. I think I have figured out the problem with my camera. Could there be conflict between the wireless mouse connection and the camera when I have the cable connected? I transferred 20 pics with no problems after I had taken the connection out. Will test it out later again or when I am able to. I will be staying in Rotorua for 3 full days as there is plenty to do in town I think.

The entire trip from Auckland to Rotorua I was listening to my ipod with the podcasts i put on along with some music. The podcast I was half way through was about the Gallipoli campaign through the Australian war memorial. I will listen to the rest in the next couple of days. Ne of the first podcasts was actually about the Clock tower, which I had visited the day before. It is supposedly the biggest in NZ well the clock face that is.

My zenbook lasts longer without power and seems to last longer than my old netbook I have at home. This zenbook is better weight wise in my bag than the other one. Well worth winning the prize. My bag isn’t weighed down, but the snap locks I have are more suited to base climbing and I bought some take to make sure I do not ruin a bag and the tape hopefully protects the straps. I can think of nothing else that could help me other than gaffa tape. I have bought a back up camera from Farmers store, which is like Kmart, but New Zealand. At least I did not go to Harvey Norman that was next door. That would have been a rip off and a half even if I did get the exchange rate. The new camera is also a canon, but a touch smaller with a lithion battery thing you have to charge.

I did walk around quite a large part of Rotorua today well this afternoon and I was looking for the box office for the show I wanted to go see. I could not find it, but found I had walked past it as it was next to the pick and pay. Kuirau Park has not changed much since I was there last time, but they have been doing some roadworks so I don’t know how they would get on with the thermal stuff. I am staying across the road from the park. After finding some of the lake at Sulfur bay, the museum was the next place to walk past. It was closing time so I did not go there and was listening to music coming from somewhere.  The other sights of the Queens park was visited or was it Princes . Deciding to follow the noise meant I found people in pink wandering around. I discovered this was something to do with cancer, so I stuck around and watched the people in pink go walking. By this time it was getting late so I found an Italian restaurant that I had a meal in. Steak with bacon around it and mash kumura too. Once I got back to the hostel I found my card was not working. Seems my chip in my bank card or my mobile phone wipes them. Could be because I walk around all day with it in my pocket.

Tomorrow I am visiting with the Hobbits in Hobbiton in Matamata, which will be a fun day. Something that I did forget about were the bumble bees flying around. I do not like them and felt like Ali trying to get out of their way.

Tip

Always carry a pen with you as you never know when you need one especially when you are on a plane that needs customs forms filled out. Saves time.

Highlight

Following people in pink to find many pink people and a pink catapillar with an annual walk for cancer. Not bad, but Brad follows the noice to find out what is going on. More like my version of an unexpected journey. The cemetery was another one too and the first place I visited.