What a group we make...

Our days revolve around working (of course) and then heading up to the roof where we drink beers and talk until three am before heading to bed. It really has been a great couple of weeks but alas, the management have decided to close the roof at night so that people on the fifth floor can get some sleep! this means we will have to look else where from tonight.
Hope you are all ok back in the UK and im sure we will speak to you all soon.

Pol and Ali

xx

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Polly and ali

xx

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Its been a while but we are back on the road after slogging our guts off for 2.5 months and it feels great!!!
We left Sydneyshire on Friday evening after picking up our little car and headed off into the great unknown (not before ali had stalled 12 times whilst reverse parking)
First stop was the blue mountains. We stayed in a place called Katoomba which was absolutely jam packed with crustaceans (our new word for crusties!)
Hostel was a shock to say the least. Walking in, we spied a chandelier in reception and thought we had hit the big time (we ended up staying in a scout hut!) Saying that, we had an eight bed dorm to ourselves which was sweet, but we returned on the second night to find the door open and a drunk local passed out in another bed! The snoring was so loud that neither pol or i could bear it!
As for the blue mountains themselves, wonderful! we went to a place called scenic world (how corny!) which consisted of three scenic transport rides and a hell of a lot of Japs! Got some top pics and we nearly got snapped ourselves as we changed into shorts half way round thinking no-one was watching!
Departing Krustyville, we headed off past the hunter valley where we scored some great wine and some chocolate port! (how rock and roll are we!?) Headed to an old industrial town called newcastle which bore an uncanny resemblance to Grimsby and Hull, needless to say, we went to bed early and left around 8am!
On the way up to Byron Shire, there was not much to see. We did bump into a Koala Hospital and took some great pics of half stoned Koala's sleeping!
Byron Bay. What can we say about it... well, if will is reading, we can kinda understand why you got lost there... it's a hippy heaven, full of weed smoking surfers who just chill on the beach all day and party at night! We met our pal, katie there (she was working in a hippy commune called the arts factory - recommended!) and chilled on the beach as the sun went down and the locals played didgeridoos and bongo's! what bliss!
We are now in Surfers paradise (paradise being somewhat of a lie!) but we intend on aving a beer or two and a larf whilst at it!
We shall update on tonights antics asap!

Peace love and a big phat kiss

Polly and ali

x

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We were told to expect something big.. and wow. Sydney sure knows how to throw a street party. People started arriving at 3pm and by 4 there was a small army of young and old lining Oxford Street waiting for the festivities to begin.
Alas, we were unable to see much of the parade that night as the sheer numbers prevented us from having a clear view (oh and waiting for the girls to get ready meant we arrived late!) So after half an hour of photographing backs of heads we called it a night and headed to the first of the nights venues.. After being ID'd and almost kneecapped by a swarthy Maori doorman with a metal detector (Apparently it was a bit of an unsavoury part of the City!) i nervously wandered into the pub, half expecting a scene from Trainspotting (the one where Begbie throws a pint glass off the balcony and hits someone on the head!) It actually turned out to be a bog standard boozer! Set out over three floors, it had a smattering of pool tables and the obligatory gambling den filled with chainsmoking, lizard skinned men and women.
After a quick drink, we were herded off by one of the loud mouthed Southern Ladies in the Group to find a proper party (she literally herded us. im not kidding!) So off we went, dodging the endless crowds of drag queens, fairies and hot panted men along Oxford Street before we joined the back of a rather large queue outside a place called the Gaff. Here's where it turned nasty.. really nasty.
After paying the $10 entrance fee, we were ushered into a largish bar which had "the Venga Bus" blasting out of the speakers.. Need i say more?
After an hour or so and several plastic schooners of Fosters things weren't looking any better. We sat next to glass panel which looked out onto the sweaty dancefloor and were promptly entertained some of the states that were trying to dance.
After an hour of DUMFF DUMMFF DUMFF we headed outside to grab some air and to clear our heads and to survey the Post Mardi Gras carnage that littered Oxford Street. by this time it was about midnight and the cleanup operation had begun. A Fleet of open lorries had arrived and their crews (rather scary looking men with big tatoos) started to pick up all the beer crates. Now, i wasnt aware of this at the time but sean (our old landlord from Melbourne) told us that people steal the beer crates and then make a fortune selling them to the vertically challenged!
After ten minutes or so of random abuse from a group of German guys, we tried to head back into the club but were rudely informed that we had to join the back of the queue! So we did the honourable thing and walked off!
And that pretty much summed up our Mardi Gras experience!

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Anyway, enough of my whinging. im off to veg infront of t'telly

Ali

Five weeks of Working to go remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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We also experience the public fesivities they call Australia Day yesterday, and the question that seemed to be on everyones lips was 'What does it mean to be Australian?', well let us answer that for you.

It all started on Thursday afternoon at work, the company were kind enough to hold a bbq for us, and we all chipped in and gave a bit for the Sally Army who were collecting for the families effected by the bush fires. Ten sausages later and we were all asked to move forward and congregate under cover in the garage area ready for the raffle and speeches, the excitment was unbelievable! and quite rightly with a Jamie Oliver calander and some 15 year old whiskey in a bottle shaped like the Eiffel Tower who blame us! Everyone was truely in the spirit of the day wearing the countries national colours of green and gold and they all soon broke into song (the National Anthemn) whilst I, nervously munched on my bread roll and tried not to draw any attention to my intrusion into their National Day. It was an enlightening experience, and I wondered if any Company in the UK would take so much pride in their staff and their country, I don't think so.

Friday (yesterday) was a public holiday (yippee for us at its a day off work, but boo because we didnt get paid) We rose around the same time as during the working week and headed into town for the many festivities being held. This was before we watched the customary England batting collapse as we tried to explain the rules of the game to a bunch a yanks who thought we were Aussie! Apre's bier, and a rendition of Waltzing Matilda we headed down to Darling Harbour and baggsied a top spot by the water, making sure we took up as much room as possible! Meeting up with some friends we made at the very start of our trip we snuck some beer past the armed police and proceeding to bring a British edge to the distinctly aussie party (no one else was drinking, which suprised us although there were lots of us from other countries flouting the no alcohol rule).

From what we made out during the 3 hour show, being Australian means liking ships (lots of ships) supporting and showing appreciation for the Emergency Services (especially life guards - whom it seems were all around 15 years old) and for the rest of the evening, we felt like we were watching an Australian Army recruitment video. Stream upon stream of multi cultural immigrants (not one of them actually Australian) poured out the most patriotic bumff about what a great country this fair land is. What we laughed at was how serious it all was, and more importantly, what exactly was the point of the day? The ships were from Amsterdam and there were more foreigners in the crowd than Australians! They were careful to add 'This is and always will be an Aboriginal land' as not to offend anyone. We stayed to watch the fire works display, which we may add, the Aussies do extremely well.

Aussies are extremely patriotic, and dont get us wrong we both felt it was a good thing although some here feel it breeds racism. The Big Day out Music festival promoters asked the crowds not to bring the flag with them as they were scared they could not control any potential fights. This spread outrage across the country and the Prime Minister (regardless of how we think of him) condemned this action and said it was a sad day when Australians were not allowed to show their pride in their country. We can only imagine this happening in the UK. It would be Tony Blair banning the Union Jack as it was UN - PC!

Other activities successfuly completed by Team Pollyali was the walk across the Harbour Bridge last weekend with an afternoon at Coogee beach. It was well worth while, when you're on the otherside you get to see the great Sydney skyline of the harbour you get to see the image we all know well of the Opera House,
Like any famous landmark, it's much more impressive from a distance, when you get up close you can see that the roof is made from chip-shop tiles (much like the off white ones we had in the Granny flat's kitchen) and it says 'made in Sweden' on them!

The walk over the bridge was great again we got some fantasic views of the Sydney skyline, although I did manage to finished with a sunburnt scalp! That is the 3rd time this trip that's happened to me, I must be going thin on top of something, or prehaps I should just invest in a hat, the one the girls bought me from work only could stand two plane journeys.

Other news Will and Andrea saw Mike Skinner (aka, the Streets) in deep conversation about contemporary art and we had a few beers!

Hope you are all ok

Polly and ali

xx

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NYE was a blast.. we wandered into the quay area around the bridge around 5.30pm to be blown away by the number of people that were already there (a fellow traveller had warned us to arrive early)We sat in the street hobbo stylee and drank cans of KB which to our increasing consternation, seemed to be attracting much larfter and picture proposals..(why?) Well, the fireworks came and went, Pol ran around trying to see them whilst, i, the faithful lapdog, followed while apologising to the people she had left in her wake!
When the clock struck 12.10am, the police asked everyone to leave so we joined the crush of nearly 1,000,000 people, all trying to escape the same place. After re-meeting our Swedish chums, we scoffed a mediocre kebab and retired hurt.
Bit of a change to the usual on New Years day - We went to the beach and basked in the sunshine whilst fighting off a nagging hangover! Bondi beach by the way.. is kewl! there is however, too many British Lobsters and on a sunny day, nearly 30,000 people descend on the resort.
We started looking for work on Tuesday of last week and in the second agency we visited, we scored! yippee! I am now employed as an office dogs body with the New South Wales Fire Brigade's Industrial Relations team and the Polster is working in a customer service department updating customer record! (havent we scored big?!) Moved into a shared house on Sunday and are both in the process of knuckling down and saving some dollar (in other words - we is skint!) pay day is a week away so its early nights and foxtel movies for us until then!

Parents: We will call you when we have some more cash - i.e Next week.. but we are ok and doing grand!
Anyone else that still reads this: We need more comments.. you all promised so much and then collapsed. Rather like the England Cricket team i may add... Come on.. lets have some more news from back home!

Col: Hows the work etc? Back in Manc yet?
Matt s: Wobble

Lots of larve and hugs

Polly and Ali

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After the crazy cats re-emerged from the surf we headed back on the free train to our lodgings for some scran and more booze. Needless to say, Us Brits enjoyed ourselves more than the Europeans amongst us as the pic shows!

Boxing day was a mixed one, we recovered from the previous days excesses and watched England collapse whilst praying that the game made it to the Third day and we could go and watch.
Well, it made it to the Third day (today) and after rising early, Pol and I made our way to the MCG to partake in the highly recommended Boxing day Test. And how we wished we hadnt parted with forty pounds each before we had left Blighty. For starts, a tout was punting the tickets (in the England end) for $20! and then there was the cricket! Nice views though!

So its off to Sydney tomorrow, we say good bye to Will and Andrea and hello again to our Swedish Chums Rony and Linnea. Lets hope Sydney provides us both with work and more fun.. and if not, well...erm.. we will worry about that later.

Polly and Ali

xxx

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Good night and God bless us all

Polly and Ali

xx

Heat - eat your heart out remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Lots of Love

Polly and Ali

Kevin Pieterson!!! remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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And check out our house, nice! We have chandeliers and an unofficial pet mousey called Shane.

Last Saturday was the hottest day so far, it was around 39 degrees, I know a lot of you will have experienced hotter conditions, but when the city is surrounded by bush fires and the wind changes the conditions are unbearable! We woke up to a smell of burning wood, I had just presumed the neighbour was ignoring the total fire ban and was having a bonfire, that was until I went outside for my morning run (one of my many promises to myself to keep up for the foreseeable future) and I couldn’t see to the end of the road! The wind had changed direction and was blowing all the smoke our way! We paid a visit to the trusty BBC website and viewed a satellite photo of the area, oh my god, much of Victoria, a state the size of Britain was covered in smoke! Needless to say it was very hot and sweaty! The best remedy for this was a trip to the seaside. Our local beach is just down the road from us, but after paddling in there one drunken night we had come to conclusion that St Kilda beach was possibly not one of the nicest around and so headed off on the train to Brighton Beach, which is just 20 minutes down the track.
Whilst we were basking in the sun we witnessed a fire break out right in front of us and the resulting smoke managed to waft across the bay in our general direction.. It didn’t however, cool us down. This was done by frequent bathing in the Sea.. Another dangerous activity to cross off our list of things to do as the seas around this country are home to some of the most dangerous creatures and squelch things ever. We must have made quite a sight for some of the locals as Stokey Will enjoyed spinning around with Pol and Andrea making numerous comments about sharks and cone fish!

In the evening we headed out into the city to check out the Christmas lights and a local free open air screening of the classic film ‘Dirty Rotten Scoundrels’, oh how we chuckled! Melbourne was however very picturesque in the twinkling moonlight, but did lack the Christmas cheer we are so used to at home, I think it’s probably down to the weather rather than the people. If truth be told it really doesn’t feel much like xmas at all! Somehow walking around listening to “chestnuts roasting on an open fire” and “I’m dreaming of a white Christmas” wearing only shorts and a t-shirt whist basking in the sun doesn’t seem quite right. I’m so confused to what time of year it actually is I keep asking Ali when Wimbledon is due to start!
All across Melbourne there are crazy sculptures we took the opportunity to pose next to some of them.

Oh while I was walking around the streets of Melbourne I came across a familiar face, those of you who live in Manchester may recognise this little character, I can’t remember where about’s I’ve seen him before but I know that there maybe one or two in the Northern quarter and I think one somewhere on Oxford Rd!

Here are our friends Andrea and Will, ain’t they sweet!

As we mentioned early, we took ourselves to the Melbourne Museum this week to check out in full colour, some of the beasties that we will probably see on our journeys. Eurckkk some of the insects are wrong! Check dis out!

and here's one of me for Mum and Dad.

We had to make a sharp exit from the museum as the kangaroos woke up and started chasing Ali!

Rest of the week has been spent looking for jobs, being turned away for not being Australian and generally getting annoyed at the lack of work in this place. Things are looking up though and fingers crossed, we will both be working next week… oh and great first day in the cricket.. Shame Cook and Bell couldn’t stay in for a tad longer!

Incey Wincey Spider remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Pollyali

xx

We're off to see the Wizard. remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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We arrived at Pols relative Caroline's house on Sunday evening after a day spent wandering round shops and biting our nails as England valiantly attempted to bat for longer than 3 hours against the two juniors of the Australian team (Glenn Mcgrath 36 and Shane Warne 37.) Dinner was, wait for it, Roast Lamb! Having been in New Zealand for 2 months and not even getting near to lamb, i'd managed to eat it twice in two days. Heaven! We retired to bed that evening, full and content as we no longer had to sleep in that damn van!
Monday morning arrived and we were faced with the alien concept of not having to get up! Our room was dark (good Curtains) and we didn’t have to check out at 10am! So we sauntered down stairs and had a leisurely breakfast and made plans for the day ahead. The main aim was to see the remainder of the first test so as we had a couple of hours to spare, we headed over to the City to check out the Museum. Situated in a pleasant grassy reserve aptly named "Auckland Domain" the museum housed the War Memorial and several interesting exhibits that both Pol and I were keen to see. After 40 mins of wrong turns and missed streets, we parked EZY and tramped over the grass to the imposing entrance to the museum while discussing that it looked nothing like it did in the guide book (probably because the sky was clear blue!) After the obligatory circular door, we found ourselves in the reception/Cafe area of the building where we were greeted by a sign discussing the charges for entrance. Now, we had been told that there was a donation bin and essentially the museum was free.. how wrong was that! the three entrances were staffed by uniformed teenagers who greeted us with a welcome to Auckland Museum, can we ask for a donation of $5 please? Well Pol, being Pol, decided that she didnt like this and quipped "Its not really a donation then" to which the reply was "Well it is for Auckland rate payers". Great we both thought, they have even installed a EFTPOS machine on the gate so they could take credit card " Donations." what a crock!

The Museum itself was decidedly average. There was the usual smattering of exhibits, the most interesting being one that described the Thermal plates and volcanoes that are so abundant in New Zealand. There was also a house which was supposed to simulate the effects of a volcano errupting in the harbour of Auckland. We sat there watching the fake news report about the impending doom when the window (which was really a big tv) started to move and wow, the erruption happened before our eyes! All this smoke and ash billowed towards our “house” it shock briefly and everything went black. Then the lights came on and the show was over! We both felt slightly cheated!

After a couple more rooms full of insects and assorted flora and fauna, we emerged from the musuem and decided to head over to one of the “burbs” to watch the final few hours of the Test. However, neither of us thought we would get to see any of it as England lost two wickets in the short 20 min drive and knowing the tendency of the team to collapse, things were not looking good. The cricket Gods were obviously listening to us as they gifted Ashley Giles the ability to bat for longer than 10 mins and we arrived at the pub with 4 wickets remaining. We ordered a beer and a burger and settled down to watch the last minutes of the innings. It didn’t last long as England managed 25 mins and having barely eaten our burgers, we ambled out into the late afternoon sunshine and headed back to the house.
Tuesday was spent strolling around Auckland and we went to see Children of Men at the Cinema. The film was ok, Julianne Moore made more of a cameo appearance and Clive Owen did his best not to appear too wooden! Oh, Michael Caine was well funny as a stoned hippy!
Wednesday: Dropped off EZY in the city centre and managed to blag the agent who did the check in with us. We had driven off without the bucket and lost the tea towel in the course of the fortnight but bluntly told him that the woman at the airport had not included either item in the van when we picked it up! After complaining about the state of the first van, we went for some lunch at got the ferry back over to Bayswater.
Thursday (Today) The weather took a turn for the worse today so we have been pretty much house bound. A quick walk over lunch time was abandoned and we came back to attempt a 1000 piece jigsaw… we failed! Went to see a play at the theatre.
Oh.. one more thing.. tomorrow, you will have some pics on this entry.. the wifi connection we have (next doors) is rubbish and it takes too long for us to upload the snaps..

good night all

Pollyali

x

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Today we are going to stay with Polly’s aunt here in the fine city of Auckland and we are looking forward to some proper food, a proper bed and more importantly, some other company. Now that doesn’t mean that we have argued, but its been a tad lonely at times with not many opportunities to meet other like minder adventurers. As this has been the case, we feel that for anyone else thinking of the doing the same, seriously consider what you want from the country. If you want to have a laugh or meet people, use the traveller bus networks. Stray and Kiwi Experience seem to be the transport of choice for most of the people we have met and we havent heard many negatives about it. Travelling in a group of friends for instance would be the only exception to this no campervan rule. The big vans that sleep eight would be cost effective and a helluva laugh!
Now that’s out the way, we want to highlight the fun that we have had on our journey round this fair land.
Drive over to Milford Sound.. This without a doubt was THE highlight of our trip in the South Island. All the guide books and programs we see in the UK recommend that this trip be taken, and it’s a must.
The South Island was amazing, the West Coast in particular was like something from a film… Our journey over Arthurs Pass to Queenstown was shrouded in mist and rain but it made it even more exciting. The waterfalls that cascaded down the rock face literally feet from the road and the endless stops to investigate what lie beyond the green DOC (Department of Conservation) signs which usually meant some beautiful scenery or a waterfall. Yes, it does rain quite a lot in the Southern Parts of New Zealand, its kind of to be expected and it didn’t disappoint us, although days of being constantly damp can irritate! Milford Sound was made all the better by the rain and this meant we could view some of the more spectacular waterfalls that are not visible when dry.
Activities we have done in Auckland:

Auckland has been fun… we were slightly reluctant to head over this way last weekend as we felt that nearly two weeks would be incredibly difficult to pass. How wrong were we. The first day we went to Kelly Tarltons Underwater and Antartic adventure. We had a bit of a chuckle when I announced to Pol that Kelly was in fact a World Famous female Scuba Diver. We we got there, either Kelly had been the patient in an amazing sex change operation, or I was wrong. I think the former is the most likely… with all that hair! Anway, the place, other than costing $28 each (roughly ten pounds - not a lot really) was pretty good. The Antartic part of the centre consisted of a bob cat ride around a medium sized Penguin enclosure while we were treated to a cheese on toast commentary telling us how successful and humane the breeding program was. We both couldn’t seem to forget that penguins are supposed to be wild and no matter how much snow or food they get fed… they still didn’t look too happy, they were cute though!
The Suburbs around Auckland are pretty impressive and have taken a major role in keeping us occupied. We have been residing in a small beachside town called Takapuna for the last week, it consists of a main street with shops and restaurants and a nice sheltered beach where it seems that the whole population of Auckland run. We have spent our time drinking cups of coffee and writing our diaries… well we haven’t managed the latter since Thursday as the Cricket has started and we’ve been too busy watching the Pommies get an Oz styled whooping.. Seriously though, we are a tad nervous about going to Melbourne now, especially as it looks like the first test will be a white wash!
The campsites we have stayed in have been ok in general. There have been A few however that deserve a mention.
Opononi Holiday Park: Comes in at number one in the RIP OFF charts. $32 dollars a night! The park consisted of three tiers of grass, a kitchen block and a shower room. The kitchen was ok, but the shower room was the most disgusting place I have ever been in. It reminded us of the toilet from Trainspotting! The ceiling was down and leaking and FULL of spiders!
Twizel Park was the BEST! - $22 a night for a secluded camping spot with spotless toilets and a lovely manager who would have done anything for her guests.. Shame Twizel was like the village from Silent Hill.
In between we have had picturesque DOC campsites in the middle of nowhere with no facilities other than a stream for water and a hole in the ground for poo pooing! We stopped using these when news of a Dutch couple being kidnapped reached us and although NZ is a relatively safe place, we both felt more at ease in the populated camping grounds! The Dutch couple were ok and were inundated with offers from the local population. One company even offered them a free campervan and a holiday to Queenstown staying in Luxury accommodation.
The driving in the South Island was notoriously poor. Although the roads are dead at the best of times.. Often a car will appear in your rear mirror and will attempt to pass at 150kmph with scant regard for anyone else in the vicinity.
To Sum up this rather lengthy entry, we both feel that the south island deserves far more time than the north. With the only places of interest in the North being Rotorua, Tongariro National Park (Mount Doom from the Lord of the Rings)
and Auckland itself. The list for the South is endless: the beautiful scenery of Queenstown, the Glaciers, the Wine of the Marlborough region, the endless National Parks.
Next time we catch up, we will be in Melbourne, Ali will be sunburnt and we may indeed have joined the mass working population.. (gulp!) so until then.. Ttfn.

The Final Countdown remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Take Care everyone

Pollyali

xx

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Well, its been emotional... well, if im to be honest, it still is rather! Into the last 2 weeks of our Kiwi adventure and its been a hoot. We sauntered into the largest city on Saturday morning, partly driven by the rain, and partly by the promise of excitement and more importantly, nightlife. Friday we stayed at a small surfer campsite just outside of Auckland in a village called Piha, it was lovely and we cooked a nice Curry and sat and drank some wine purchased hours earlier from Nobilo Wines! After eating and being bitten to death by what can only be described as genetically engineered Thunder Flies, we took off to the beach and watched some of the local youth bravely surfing the ten foot waves... Totally Far out man!
After half an hour of this, we grew thirsty so wandered off looking for refreshment. Ending up at the hippest place in town, we ordered 2 pints of lager... Now before i continue, i would like to tell you what the place was. It was a place where old and young met in complete harmony, it was where the drinks flowed and the incessant chatter of individuals floated on the slight sea breeze. It was in fact, the Local Lawn Bowling Club! There were no stuffy white jackets like in Britain, 20 year olds were playingt 60 year olds and peoples dogs frolicked in and out of peoples legs, urinating at will on bowling ball bags! No-one cared! And more importantly, the beer was $3.30 a pint... that's just over one pound to you lot!
Saturday was spent in Auckland and spending lots of money on coffee and activities.. we havent done that much since.. we are currently residing in a campsite run by a mini hitler and his wife.. he showed me where to park the van on Saturday evening and went completely off his rocker when i didnt get it spot on! As such, we now completely disregard all camp rules and as we are staying tonight as well, we may get drunk and p!ss on his van!

Laters!

Pollyali

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love

Pollyali

x

EZY MARK 2 remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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waiotapu thermal valley... nearly forgot about this one! Not cheap ($25 dollars - about 9 pounds) which is cheap but not for us crusty world travellers! Needless to say, the place consisted of loads of oozing and squelching pools of mud and water.

The smell of which is quite indescribable. stink bombs and fart spray is the best we could come up with! got some nice piccies but as we are lazy and cant afford the internet time to upload them all, you will have to wait.
Right, we are off to find some cleansing lotion for Pols acne outbreak and to chill...

BYEEE

Pollyali

Mammap: Since when you been busting some grooves and living in the ghetto girlfriend?!?
MammaA: When do you leave for Italy?

xxx

SLOW DOWN! remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Pollyali

xx

To the North Monkeys remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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The evening was spent playing Monopoly and after a a cosy nights sleep we were awoken to the smell of fried bacon! As we munched our breakfast the Captain announced that he had seen some dolphins playing by the front of the boat and i have never seen people move so fast in my life. All of a sudden, all 33 people were crammed in the front of the ship gawping at a pod of 6 dolphins which including an ickle baby one! queue more äwws and wows!Unfortuatley our camera takes 3 seconds to take a picture so we didn't manage to snap the happy moment.

A couple of minutes after seeing the dolphins we saw another set of creatures, in total 11 yellow eyed pengiuns were coming out amongst the rocks and into the sea. The yellow eyed penguins are the second rarest penguins in the world with only 2000 pairs alive in the wild, so we were really lucky to see so many of them!
The trip ended with the usual practice of any tourist operation, the veiwing of the photos you had taken as you were boarding the boat. We did not purchase the set at $35 as it had been a couple of days since we had hda a shower so we were some what greasy in the pictures, not something you parents would have been proud to have mounted on your walls!

It's big Al's birthday today so we are going to indulge in some hot springs and a game of a-maze-n-golf.

xxx

Oh Milford, Oh Milford remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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So far the veiw s are unimaginabl;e and I wish I had saved up a little more and bought a rather expensive camera as ours does not do it justice.
Mum's been telling me to hurry up and put some piccies on the website, I apologise it's not through laziness but the fact that each photo is taking 15 mins to download and time is money! Promise as soon as we find a decent conecction we will provide proof of our adventures.

ttfn (as Mum would say)
xxx

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We arrived here in Dunedin at 7.30pm last night and checked into anouther holiday park, I think we're going to look for somewhere free tonight, they're not expensive but if you can get one for free it's much better. The free one we were staying on in Queenstown we later found out was a scene from 'Lord of the Rings', no wonder the veiws were so good!
Dunedin is a pretty university town and so far seems very pleasent. We have visited the Cadburys factory this morning,and found out some interesting facts.

1: Dream is only made here in Dunedin and is the only real white chocolate.
2: The reason why there is a difference in taste is because of the milk that is used. In New Zealand Dairy Milk is made from milk from the Otago region. In Britain it's made from British milk, presumably from somewhere around Birmingham and in Oz it's made from mostly powdered milk because they don't produce as much milk.
we are now heading up to the 'Worlds Steepest St' after this.
Well that's about it so far, we will update you soon.

Pollyali xxx

Mum and Dad - I am sending a package home today with Loz's pressie and some other artifacts for you.

Twizel down to Dunedin remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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Love Pollyali

xx

White water rafting remains copyright of the author pollyali, a member of the travel community Travellerspoint.

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1: The Car: Was supposedly fixed by the garage. We went to pick it up on Thursday and the engine was still making strange noises. We told the garage we werent happy and that we couldnt wait around any longer for the them to look at it. They refused the give us a refund and to cut a long story short, we met a couple who were desperate for a car. We were desperate to get rid of ours, so we came to an agreement and sold it to them. It meant taking a 350 pound loss on the damn thing but never mind. We are now the proud renters of a EZY campervan which is far less hassle and a good laugh. If anyone out there is thinking of coming to New Zealand, do not, and i repeat, DO NOT buy a cheap second hand car..most of them have been round the country six or seven times and they are just too unreliable. And dont buy from The BACKPACKERS CAR BAZAAR.. bunch of cheating rip off merchants.

We celebrated by having a few shandies and entering into a paper scissors, Stones competition in the hostel bar. The prize was a $750 stray bus ticket around the south island. And who do you think won?!? POLLY! unfortunately we werent allowed to sell the ticket and Pol did the good deed of giving it away to a couple who had been trying to win it for weeks!

We picked up the van on Thursday and headed out into the wilderness. As its a high top, the slightest wind means it drives like a dodgy shopping trolley and after covering 100km in two hours, we headed into the southern, snow capped alps. Spent the night in a free campsite in the rain and watched a film on our DVD player in t'campervan! (proper bo!) We are travelling in a convoy with seven Swedes complete with walkie talkies and ornate campervans! We drove to Franz Joseph Glacier the next day and walked up to the face while taking pics etc.

It was a really strange place, erie and almost alien like with rocks everywhere and the most beautiful waterfalls cascading out of every crevice. Stopped in a nondescript village called Haast and celebrated one of the Swedes birthdays by having dinner in a yokel bar/diner. Cant remember its name, but its the only one in the village so if any of you make it this far, stay clear! Set out for Queenstown the next day (still raining) and drove through some prehistoric rainforest whilst the sun attempted to make an appearance. More waterfalls later and we arrived here. Stereotypical Ski Resort, lots of sports to do and loads of backpackers. Weather is a bit changeable (sunny but cold) and we have booked ourselves to do some white water rafting today (gulp!) Polly is off Horsey riding tomorrow and thats aboot it.

Loz - Congrats on RAF
Holme Farm Massive - Hope all are ok, pass on our congrats to Mark
Hainton Avenue Posse - Hope Nanna is ok and you both are
enjoying the decorating.
Dad and Joan - Havent done any more wine tasting yet.. will let you know when we do - Kathy Linskey do a nice tipple if you want to investigate - they will post to the UK too!
The Bagnall Clan - Cheers for the update on the footie, hope the various injuries are healing ok - Brian - the scenery here is unbelievable - not done as much walking as we hoped but will do soon!
Rae - Hope you didnt witness any stabbings at Hull Fair
Emily - Hows Britains next Swimming champ coming along?
Manchester Massive - Respect! oh and Phil can you email your address to us please?
Matt S - Hows uni? Slacker...

Lots of love

Pollyali

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Ok I'll start from where we left off.

Nelson
This is where we met up with our Swedish friends again, not much to report on the place except we had a less than average curry for dinner in an establishment called The Indian Cafe, and we stayed in a hosel called aptly named 'Backpackers',the double room we opted for after seeing the other clientele (lots of crusties and men with long greasy hair)was very reasonable.
After a very short stay here we decided to make our way futher north to the Able Tasmen National Park, but before we did that we had a job to do, to turn Betsy into a mobile bed! We bought a matress (single was the only size that would squeeze past our wheel arches)along with some material for making curtains (blue with gold flowers), some pillows and a brown fleecy blanket. She looked amazing!
We made our way up the coast followed closley by the Swedes in their Spacecar (a people carrier cleaverly made into a campervan complete with DVD!)not vary spacious I hasen to add. The views where spectacular especially now the cloud had lifted and we made our way slowly up the windy hill road to the entrance to the park. The walk itself ran along the edge of the cliffs and skirted round the edge of several massive golden beaches. We stopped at one of these for our lunch (coffee and bannana's) We then headed back to the car and went to find somewhere to sleep!
We ended up next to a motorway in a free campsite where we tested out the back of the car as a bed... very nice although a slight squash!
This is when the fun began. Our plans were to proceed along to the West coast and do some glacier walking. However, the car, had other ideas! We were roughly thirty miles out of Motueka when the dreaded engine judder came back! Queue hasty call to the AA whom we had joined only four days ago. Verdict: Electronic and Transmission problems... To top it off, we couldnt get the key out the ignition, the air con stopped working and the gearstick would stick in park! The AA reluctantly gave us a budget of $800 to get a hire car, the car towed back to Christchurch and accommodation for the night. Anyway, it didnt cover the towage costs and a decision was made to drive back ourselves with the four wheel drive disabled. We ended up using the accommodation budget of $120 and picked a swanky flat with a jacuzzi!
Drove back to Christchurch on Saturday (all 500km) and took the car to the garage where we were told that nothing could be done until monday and we would have to stay in the city until then. They gave us a courtesy car which we drove off and promptly died in the middle of the street as it was completely drained of petrol.
So here we are.. total cost of car problems.. $500 and rising fast.. we need to stay here another night as there is no promise that the car will be fixed in time to leave today.. we dont know what to do and get angrier by the minute. Note to all: Do not buy a car from the back packer car bizarre!

weather has improved though!

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