New Zealand

June 25th. We have been looking at this trip for a couple of years and on the internet for 3 months. The first real plans were the 90 day VISAs which I got 2 nights ago.

7-29. Plane-got free tickets for frequent flyer miles with American Airlines. After checking for 14 nights, I got a fairly good schedule. We leave on 7th august and spend 35 days in NZ and then 90 days in OZ, returning on 12th December. I should have reserved earlier but we did not get the miles needed until 9th of July. First place to stay: we wanted to stay in Auckland city for the first week, but did not want to pay the price.

We have a 2 bed/ 2 bath apt in a resort for $294 USD for a week. Of course, this is not the resort season. It is about an hour north of town. This is in our budget and I think we can do better when we are on the ground. NKO has consented to stay in cabins with the bath down the road!

Rental car: I settled on one that is about half of what AVIS wanted. $34nzd or $25US per day. The car is 6-10 years old and very small.August 9: We arrived in Auckland after a 12 hour flight from LA and 7 hours of flying from RDU via Miami to LA. The 12 hour flight was almost unbearable, but we did have our TV screens in our seat to keep us busy and games such as solitaire to stay awake if we wanted to stay awake. We flew on a big 747. We both slept a little, but we were pretty much zombies when we arrived at 5:30 a.m. Saturday,

August 9th. Got the car at 7:00 a.m. and headed to the Otari Market, a big market which sells all kinds of South Pacific Island goodies, along with fresh fruits, vegetables and other good food. We ate a wonderful sandwich, but we don't know what it was! Stopped in Auckland to look around and headed to our condo in Gulf Harbor, north of the city. The condo is beautiful with all the modern conveniences you could want and huge. It is right on the water with yachts out front and very modern. Went to bed at 7:30 p.m. to catch up on much needed sleep.

August 10. Attended a wonderful concert at the symphony hall in Auckland performed by the Auckland Philharmonic. Also, went shopping downtown where they have a lot of nice shops. Found a good grocery store called "New World" and stocked up on some healthy food for the condo. Also, attended a nice country fair held at a local school. Enjoyed mingling with the locals. Auckland has so many different, diverse neighborhoods to explore. It is like Seattle, San Diego and Vancouver all put together. The weather has been both sunny and rainy, but mild temperatures-55 to 60 degrees during the day.

August 13. Today is NKO's birthday and we had a wonderful lunch at an up-scale deli in a fashionable Auckland neighborhood. The food here has lots of Asian influence and is so good. But, we're not gaining weight, keeping up with WeightWatcher points and eating reasonable portions. NKO has lost 33 pounds since January 9 and DAC has lost 22 pounds since March. Yesterday, we drove way up north and saw gorgeous scenery-lush, tropical landscape with high mountains. All kinds of different flowers growing here. Visited site where the Maori people (South Pacific Island people) first landed and lived in NZ. Lots of history here related to the Maori people. Visited the art museums in Auckland on Monday. Yesterday while driving to the north, we stopped along side the road and saw dolphins playing near the beach. By the way, our rental car is a 1994 Toyota Camry with 194,000 miles on it. It works fine. Will explore the south part of the north island next week and then take the ferry to the South Island where there are huge mountains with snow, lots of volcanos and craters-place where they filmed "Lord of the Rings." Will fly to Sydney next month to begin our Australia adventure. More on NZ later!

August 14. Today we went shopping at a huge shopping center/area outside Auckland. They have different stores here and it was very interesting. Driving on the left is challenging to say the least, but DAC is doing so good, sometimes with my help or in spite of it! Only thing is he keeps turning on the windshield wipers when he wants the turn signal as they are reversed. I guess the KiWi's know we are tourists when they see our windshield wipers on when it is not raining! We are headed to the symphony tonight. Last night we had a wonderful dinner at one of Auckland's finest restaurants to celebrate NKO birthday. We ate ostrich, crayfish ravioli, white fish, polenta and the best "French cut" green beans. The meal was $65 US, but worth it. Portions were small. Also, Doug ordered "ravioli" and he received one ravioli. It was kind of big, but not that big! This was a restaurant that believed in portion control! We may stay in Auckland another week as we are enjoying it. Then head to the South island. We'll keep you posted. Also, we may change rental cars. DAC found a deal with another rental agency for a newer car at a cheaper rate. Another story, we lost a hubcap on the car we have so we have been checking around to find a replacement so the rental company does not charge us an arm and leg for one. Found one today for $13. But, yesterday DAC found a used one for $5. We put it on, drove away and when we reached our next destination it had already fallen off. Needless to say, we won't put the $13 one on until right before we return the car. New Zealand has the cleanest bathrooms we have ever seen. No matter where you go, they are clean, spacious and there are plenty of them. We rate this country tops on bathrooms!

August 16. We are going to see NZ's biggest opera diva-Melvena Majors in concert tonight at the symphony hall. Also, headed to Sky City Casino to watch the kick-off of the NZ All Blacks against the Aussies, the biggest rugby game of the season. After the kick-off, we'll head down the street to hear Melvena. DAC got up early this morning and exchanged our car for one that is a dollar cheaper per day and newer-a 2000 Toyota Camry-real nice with "cup holders." The other one did not have cup holders which made it difficult for Doug to feed his coffee habit while driving! We are headed to the south of the North Island tomorrow. We'll be back in Auckland next Friday and stay at the condo in Gulf Harbor next weekend. The scenery should be beautiful on our road trip this week. We feel pretty rested after a week here, but NKO still gets hungary at odd hours-guess we're used to eating EST, not NZ time. Another note, we are not able to get the Sunday NY Times here, but the local papers are pretty interesting.

August 27. We are in Wellington this week and off on the ferry to the south island on Friday. We have had a great road trip through the north island, stopping at many thermal baths and mineral baths which are all over the place due to the volcanic formations in NZ. We attended a Maroi concert and dinner one night which provided us with a performance of Maroi life when they first settled NZ. Doug was selected as the "Chief" for our group and got special attention all night-he was very happy! Met other travelers from Germany, Ireland, Holland and US. It was a fun evening of entertainment. We have been eating good food-bluff oysters and mussels to die for. One day we had oysters and mussels at a place along side the road delivered to us in newspaper wrapping-steamed-so delicious and a beautiful picnic table for enjoying the food and scenery. We went to a wine and food exhibition in Auckland last weekend that was fantastic. The food show was for those in the business and we got in by telling them we were partners in Sid's Barbecue in Beulaville (our favorite barbecue restaurant at home). We were treated to all kinds of different food samplings and wines. We were "happy campers" after leaving this exhibition event. We are doing fine with our Weight Watcher's program in spite of the good food we are trying here. It is cold here and we will encounter snow on the south island. Finally figured out the time change-when you all are starting your day at 8:00 a.m. we are going to sleep at midnight after experiencing the day you are about to enjoy. We went to the horse races in Auckland last weekend and Doug won $6 and I won $3. We just covered our parking and a coffee for Doug. Also, Doug won $20 in Auckland at the Casino last week playing roulette. Guess he is lucky in NZ! They have a steeplechase horse race that is unbelievable. The horses jump several bushes and run a course that lasts 5 minutes. It was truly amazing and a female jockey won the steeplechase race. Wellington is the capital of NZ and a very nice town-reminds us of San Francisco with steep mountains and houses built on the bluffs. We went to a very "artsy" play last night in Wellington. It was very unusual and probably wouldn't play well on Broadway, but for here, it was very good. We have been staying in nice holiday parks which provide one and two bedroom suites or cabins for reasonable prices-about $45-50 US per night. We usually have cooking facilities and we keep our diet cokes and healthy snacks in a box in the back of the car. We are "traveling nomads," but having a good time. The ferry ride we will take Friday to the south island may be rough as we will go through Cook's Strait in the Tasmin Sea/Pacific Ocean, but we should be fine. There was an earthquake last week on the south island that measured 7.1 and there are some aftershocks, but no one was injured. NZ has very wild, green, mountainous scenery with all kinds of jungle-like trees and foilage. It is very unique and we have been impressed with it. Looking forward to Australia next month where it will be a bit warmer. It is nice to experience winter in the summer "down under." When we get to Christchurch, we will only be about 4 hours plane ride from Antartica, but we don't plan to visit there!

August 28. Still enjoying Wellington. We visited Parliment today and observed a debate session-very interesting. Also, visited a maritime museum and found a week old New York Times in a newspaper shop for Doug-cost of $8! Last week we had some adventures. We visited the Craters of the Moon in Tapou, a very beautiful stark scenery with lots of volcanic activity-geysers and smoke coming out of the ground everywhere. Also, we saw our first kiwi bird at the aquarium in Gisborne. The kiwi is a cute furry bird with a large beak. We visited a prawn (shrimp) farm in Tapou where we got to feed baby shrimp, then we ate a delicious shrimp meal at the shrimp farm restaurant. We went to a neat city called New Plymouth where Tom Cruise has been filming his latest film, The Last Samuri. There is a huge mountain there that looks like Mt. Figi-guess they want to replicate Japan in NZ! We stayed at a lodge at Dawson Falls, half-way up a 6,000 ft. mountain that was gorgeous. It was pricey-$150 for one night with a home-cooked dinner, but worth it. Apparently, even Tom Cruise could not stay there (he wanted to, according to the innkeeper), but his private helicoptor could not land near the lodge. Being a common person does have some privileges!

Last weekend in Auckland, we went to a wonderful flea market and bought winter clothes-warm tops and sweaters for our trip down south. We bought a few things for 50 cents each and some for 20 cents. Nancy washed them and they are so nice-can't find good stuff that cheap in the US! We attended our first Rugby game last Saturday night in Albany, outside Auckland. A rougher game than US football, but very interesting. We had seats up close and personal! We drove through Rotorua this past week, a beautiful, haunting place with lots of thermal baths and smouldering ground. Visited an old bathhouse that is now a museum. In the early 1900's, this was "the place" to take mineral and mud baths to cure diseases and pamper your skin. Visited a "glowworm cave" last week where small worms glow in the dark in the intricate caves-rode through the cave in a boat. It is cold here-45 degrees, but most of the beds we sleep in have "bed warmers"-electrical cords and blanket under the bed with a control switch for keeping your bed warm-like an electric blanket, only under the mattress, not on top. We drove on a highway called the "Forgotten World Highway" last week that was so beautiful-lots of green mountains with grazing sheep everywhere-twists and turns and you thought you were on another planet! We have enjoyed the TePapa Museum in Wellington which provides lots of interactive displays on life in NZ, including earthquakes, the animals of NZ, immigration of people, etc. One of the best museums we have seen and free of charge to all!

We plan to go to the South Island tomorrow via ferry, unless we find a "weekend hotel" deal in Wellington in which case we would stay and enjoy the city life a little longer. The south island has very few people and the highlight of our trip there will be the spectacular scenery. The main towns on the south island are Christchurch, Queenstown, Nelson and Dunedin. We don't plan to bungee jump off the Queenstown bridge, but you never know!!September 7. We are in Christchurch after an exciting week and a half traveling throughout the South Island. We took a ferry from Wellington to Nelson which was beautiful-like cruising on the inland waterway passage in Alaska-big mountains and cliffs along the Cook Straits. We stayed in a very small town, Collingwood, last Saturday night in an adorable cottage called "the Bluebird," right on the sound. Tinky's Tavern was in town and we had a beer and watched the rugby game on the telly. We took a gorgeous drive through the Southern Alps to Franz Joseph and Fox Glacier. These glaciers run right into a rain forest, the only place in the world where this happens. We stayed in a cozy cabin only 4 km from the glacier. Then we headed to Milford Sound and Doubtful Sound where we stayed in a small resort town called TeAnau. This is the area where the 7.1 earthquake had occurred a week earlier. In fact, they had another last night that was 6.1 magnitude, but we had left the day before. Te Anau is gorgeous and sits on Lake Manapouri.

We took a boat ride and perilous bus trip over huge mountains to cruise in Doubtful Sound a few days ago. It was spectacular as there were hugh volcanic mountains and rain forest foilage. A story will be forthcoming on that adventure. We drove through Queenstown, but did not bungee jump or take a jet boat ride through the canyons this time! They were snow skiing in the the mountains surrounding Queenstown. We then drove on to Invercargill which brought us below the 46th parallel and closer to the Antarctic. We had the best bluff oysters in Bluff, NZ and stayed on a sheep farm in near Invercargill. We drove on to Dunedin yesterday and enjoyed the symphony there last night.

Tonight we went to the symphony in Christchurch and heard Vivaldi's Four Seasons. Some interesting NZ information-prostitution is legal in NZ. They have loads of reality TV shows, one called "The Filth File" about how restaurants are kept clean or not so clean. Another called "Border Patrol" about the inspection agents at the Auckland Airport and their stories on catching people smuggling stuff into the country. There are 4 million people in all of NZ and half of them live in Auckland while the remainder live mostly in Wellington, Dunedin, and Christchurch. The beef and lamb here is all "grass-fed" and tastes so much better than in the US. Most all of the fruits and vegetables are organic. NZ is trying to keep their meat and produce and vegetables from being genetically engineered like in the US, but things may change in the future. They have the best sweet potato here called Kumara-delicious! There are only about 3 or 4 TV channels and most people only get 7 or 8 even if they have what is called "Sky TV." Doug is still going through withdrawal from watching all his TV programs at home. It is still cold here in the Southern part of the Southern Hemisphere, but we are looking forward to warmer weather in Australia. We are flying to Sydney on Friday from Christchurch. We will be in Christchurch this week taking in the sights. A popular saying here is "no worries." Stay tuned for more news from down under and "no worries to you."

September 9. We are still in Christchurch staying at a nice two bedroom apartment in a holiday park. Only $68 NZ per night ($45 US). Christchurch is the most "English" city in NZ while Dunedin where we visted a few days ago is the most "Scottish" city in NZ. We took a scenic drive yesterday to a small town on the ocean with snow-capped mountains behind it. The town, Kaikoura is known for the blue whales that swim in the waters nearby. The town is so beautiful. We saw a seal colony on the beach this morning, up close. Also, bought a cooked crayfish for $25 NZ and had it for breakfast. The crayfish here are world famous and we just had to try it. We bought it at a fish market-at the restaurants crayfish goes for $50 and upwards. We have been eating a lot of fish here and it is very good. For lunch today we had a risotto dish with shrimp, mussels, and salmon seasoned with rosemary and thyme. Also, a scallop mousse.

The other night Doug was so desperate to watch TV he was watching a "sheep-herding tournament" on one of the three channels on TV. Very interesting how the sheep-herder and sheep dog do their job and this was a tournament, just like watching golf in the US. Also, we heard a cooking show on the radio yesterday on NZ public broadcasting. They were talking with a famous chef and giving us recipes just like on the "food channel" on TV at home! Forgot to mention that when we were in Doubtful Bay a couple of days ago, it was snowing. Doubtful Bay is in Fjordland National Park which is so beautiful.

On another note, the young folks in NZ and Australia (in their late teens or early twenties) go on what is called "OE," overseas experience. They travel to England or US or other countries for a couple of years to get some life experiences. Living on an island is an isolated lifestyle so this gives them a different perspective. Sounds like a good idea to me! We went to the big Presbyterian Church in Christchurch last Sunday-it was very nice and the people were real friendly. We met a couple from Tuscaloosa, AL. He was a visiting minister and his wife was traveling with him. He used to preach in Chapel, NC-it is a small world! They sang beautiful modern hymns-they were so poetic. A bit of trivia-there are more sheep in NZ than people! We fly to Sydney on Friday and will be there for 11 days. Then headed out on a road tour of Australia. We have rented an apartment 5 minutes walk from the Sydney Opera House. Doug plans to buy a car for us to travel around Australia. There are car auctions and lots of used cars available and it is cheaper than renting a car.

September 10. Today we went to Antarctica. The Antarctica Exhibit in Christchurch, that is. Christchurch is only about 900 miles from Antarctica and all planes going there fly from here. They have a wonderful exhibition that provides insightful information on the continent of Antarctica and gives you a real-live experience as if you were actually there. It is well worth visiting if you are in Christchurch. Last Sunday, we went to an exceptionally nice outdoor market at the race track in Christchurch. They had lots of neat new items and second-hand stuff. It was as good as the Rose Bowl outdoor market in Pasadena, CA held the first Sunday of each month.We have been taking lots of pictures here, but will get them developed when we get back and put them on a website with Walmart. There are no Walmarts here, only a big store called The Wearhouse that is like Walmart, only has less stuff and no groceries. No photo stores here provides a website for pictures and we don't have a computer with us to upload pictures. We will email everyone with the website of where our pictures will be when we get back in December and add the web address to this website at that time.

September 12. Flying to Sydney at 2:30 p.m today. We stopped off at the casino in Christchurch this morning to check it out. Bet $5NZ on black on routlette and won $5-guess it is our lucky day. During our 35 days in NZ, we averaged spending $280 NZ dollars per day which is equal to $168 US dollars per day. The gas was $26 NZ per day.We put about 8,500 kilometers on the car. Our car rental was $33 NZ per day. We met people who paid as low as $25 NZ per day, but we were satisfied with our car.Our lodging averaged $73 NZ per day or $44 US. This consisted of 10 nights in a 3 bedroom condo, 3 nights in a regular hotel room, and the rest in one or more bedroom tourist flats in holiday parks. The above expenses were relatively fixed. The food and entertainment costs would vary by the number of people and preferences. Our cost was $140 NZ per day. Our costs included no unprepared meals, but did include a lot of prepared food from groceries, deli's and such. We also enjoyed some high-class restaurant meals as well as diner food. We bought interesting cheeses, breads, and soups. We did not eat at NZ or American restaurant chains. We used frequent flyer miles for our airfare to and back home from "down under." Now we'll see if Australia is as reasonable as we hope it will be. We have heard food is less expensive in Australia than in NZ-we'll see! More adventures in Australia after we arrive there-stay tuned.