Saturday, July 5, 2008

Wellington and Northland




In the last few days I have traveling at the speed of light, having lots of great adventures despite the weather which has been cool and rainy. On July 3rd I left my hotel in Wellington, but not before getting a picture of me with Francois Steyn, the fly half for the South African Springboks rugby team and riding in the elevator with Percey Montgomery. Tonight I watched my first rugby game on TV in my hotel in Auckland and really enjoyed it, even though I had no idea what was happening. The game was an important one, with South Africa playing against The All Blacks from New Zealand, who won.


From Wellington I took 2 planes to Keri Keri in the north of the north island, called..........Northland! I met Hone from Waka Taiamai Heritage, www.taiamaitours.co.nz who gave me a greater understanding of Maori ways. He is an incredible person with a real passion to teach people about his people. His grandson is only 9 and recited their lineage from 500 years ago in their tribal tongue while Hone translated. One of the highlights was when Hone told me all about the constellations according to Maori lore as compared with the way we learned it. The southern hemisphere sky is really amazing and we had a good clear night for stargazing. I enjoyed my time with Hone and his family and recommend his tour when you travel up north. I also did a dolphin discovery tour www.explorenz.co.nz and was willing to swim with the dolphins in the 50 degree water, but we did not see any! The tour of the Bay of Islands, with 144 islands, was worth it, even without seeing the dolphins.