Bay of Islands-Jack Pass STRAY

Day 2 Auckland to Hahei
I stood outside my hostel for about 15 minutes before the Stray bus came. The things going on in Auckland at 6AM are quite interesting. For one there are street cleaners—both in vehicles and using leaf blowers? Odd. There was also a couple—or what must have been a one night stand thing breaking up in the street. When the bus came both this guy on the corner and I moved toward it. It turned out he was also going to the Bay of Islands. His name was Dave and he is from the UK. He has been in Auckland for 4 days and is traveling NZ for 8 weeks. He was a pretty interesting guy—good stories and interesting pictures. He showed me pictures of pretty much everything that I won’t get to see while I am in Auckland—including an aquarium of Antarctic Exploration. It looks like a sweet aquarium so I am pretty bummed I will miss it. Anyway, at least I got to see pics. There were actually 2 other Americans on the bus that morning—they both went to Penn State and lived in Cali. Quite nice. The others were English, German and perhaps more English. There are so many English here its nuts!! Our drivers name was Hoover and she was a pretty plump but hyper lady. We were on our way within a few minutes but then turned around to get more people we missed on the first go. Stray is quite a bit different than Adventure tours—they don’t stop as much and its also a pretty laid back gig. For one accommodation and food aren’t included. But we did make a stopoff in a town to go to the grocer—I got myself some pbJ, bread and chips—for only 8 bucks—noticed the same cereal I had gotten that morning was there for 3 bucks—rediculous!
Pretty much since I’ve arrived in New Zealand it has been raining but luckily I have a raincoat so it hasn’t been detrimental. Anyway we made a few stops along the way up the island—one stop at a Kauri tree that was 650 years old. Our driver made us hug it—which was actually impossible to do it was so big. Our next stop was at some genetically engineered sheep farm where the sheep are engineered to taste like raspberry—so obviously they are red. Okay so this is a lie, and yes I fell for it too. Our final pit stop was to this world famous bathroom designed by some famous guy—the last thing before he died—I guess his other works are in Spain. I’ve got a brochure on it if you’re interested.
Finally we made it to the Bay of Islands and it was still raining. We were supposed to do a dolphin adventure cruise that came free with this particular pass but unfortunately it was called off for the day—as well as all other activities. Honestly I didn’t mind much because it was raining so nothing was really worth paying for. We got there around 1 PM and I went and checked in at my hostel. I should mention that you could also do this pass as a day pass—but the day packers had to leave on the next bus at 2PM—so it was totally not worth it—I’m so glad I didn’t do that (and I almost signed up to do just that). I was the only one to stay in my hostel—by only one I mean—no one else from my tour or no one else at all was staying there. This sounded great to me –I basically owned the place. It was a really cute place—tucked away behind everything else—called the Pickled Parrot. The owner had 3 dogs a cat and a parrot, it was very home like. I loved it. After settling into my room I decided to take a walk into the town to see what the beach was like and check everything out. It was still raining unfortunately so before heading far I went into a few tourist shops—bought a few postcards---took some pictures of the beach—you know relaxed. Then I made my way up the road to a Maori treaty house—and then a bit further to a walk that was suppose to lead to waterfalls. It was a bit daunting heading down this path as I was by myself and it was pretty cloudy and creepy out. There were some awesome lookouts along the way and some cool creek beds. Once I got to the point where the path was flooded I decided to turn back—plus I still had another 4km to go before I got to the waterfall and it was already closing in on 4PM. It gets dark in this neck of the woods by 530 so I didn’t want to be stuck in a jungle in the dark by myself. On my walk back I stopped at a grocer and got a can of soup, some water flavoring and two cans of fruit for 8 bucks—doing good!! By the time I got back to the Pickled Parrot it was nearly dark—so I think I planned my day pretty well. After sorting through my things and getting my laundry ready to go I went and made my can of soup—and popped in a movie. Then I joined Betsy (the cat) on the couch and enjoyed my meal and the movie 4 Weddings and a Funeral. It was pretty funny. When this was over I was able to put my laundry in and get that done, yay, clean clothes finally!! Then I opened a can of fruit and devoured that over another movie. I had also bought some internet usage before Rose (the housekeeper) went up to her home so I used that—finally got to read my REU offer in print!! YAY, I can’t wait. Ya so it was just a chill evening watching movies and preparing for the rest of my trip—finally it felt like vacation!
Day 3 Paihia
Today I was up by 715 to take a shower and get going for the day. It was pretty chilly so I stayed under the hot water as long as possible. Then I had a free breakfast from Rose—toast, cereal and coffee—gosh I love free things! And again I was all alone—it really felt like I had my own vacation house—and yes I would love this place as my vacation home. I guess I’m moving a bit far as I don’t even have my own home yet.
I left Rose a note as I also left my bags in her living room because I didn’t want to bring them with me on the days events. I had to meet some others from STRAY outside their hostel at 830 so I had to rush off. Met a few of them and we proceeded to the boat pier where the final member was waiting. We got on the boat—which was actually a really nice boat. This dolphin cruise was free with the Jack Pass—so not a bad deal. There was an option to swim with dolphins—but it was dependent on both the weather—which was crap and whether or not their were babies in the pod—which there were—so obviously we didn’t swim with them. The cruise was pretty good—I stood out on the bow nearly 1.5 hours taking photos and feeling the wind. It was good. But eventually the wind and waves were too strong for even me so I went back in. Soon enough another boat was calling us –telling us they had spotted a pod of dolphins!! Yay—so we swung around and went to their location—where I filmed the dolphins—babies and all! It was soooo cool. There are restrictions on how long a boat can hang by dolphins—as to not stress them out—so when our time was up we went off to a port called Russel. We were suppose to go land on some island but the weather was just not working in our favor. Russel was an interesting little port—I guess it was initially founded for the whaling industry, but today it has little tourist shops and cafes. I bought some crackers—1.50NZ—and that was my lunch—cheap but certainly not the best choice—oh well its one week—I’d rather save money than eat properly haha.
When we were finally back to Paihia we had just an hour before our bus was suppose to leave—not enough time to really do anything but not little enough time to not do anything. So I looked around town at more tourist shops and mailed some postcards—then walked really really slow back to my hostel to pick up my bags—still I had way too much time when I arrived back at my pickup point. Finally we were off—and it was suppose to be an express back to Auckland—we made one toilet break and that was it. On the way back Hoover popped in a movie—Whale Rider—really good movie—I never realized it was made by the Kiwi’s and also that it was about the Maori people. Way cool!! Oh yea the Maori people I guess are like the aboriginal people of NZ.
Hoover dropped us back off at our hostels by 530. I ended up being in the same room as two days ago in the hostel—but luckily this time there are actually friendly nice people here so it’s a lot less stressful of a place this go round. My roommates names are Laura and Ellen and they are both from Tassie---there is also a girl Nikky from England. The Tassie’s are quite nice—they invited me to have dinner with them—at Nomad Fusion you get a free dinner—it was springrolls mashed potatoes and salad—the tiniest proportion of each but pretty much all I needed. We sat and talked about Tassie and Australia for a while then I decided to go for a walk around Auckland since it would be my only chance before I left. This was quite nice—I brought my ipod and camera and walked around the city—I thought I would need a map but I did just fine without it. I saw Starbucks and had to go—but this was yummy—and warm so worth the 5.50 NZ to have it. Highlight of my walk were a library and the massive sky tower. Yup tomorrow I head out on the Tom Pass-a 5 day tour. I’ll be back here July 4th—the off back to Australia!