More driving excitement, plus snow! 8/19

After our relaxing time in Rotorua we jumped into the rental car and took off for Wellington, in the rain. Mom was sick and I was stressed from driving, so we made a lovely pair as we drove south to Taupo, which is nestled on the largest lake in the southern hemisphere. I wish it hadn’t been overcast because we could barely glimpse the vastness of the lake as we drove alongside it. North of the town is Huka Falls, a very short (maybe 6 feet tall?) waterfall, with enough water flowing over it every second to fill two (!) Olympic-sized swimming pools. The entire lake drains into this one small waterfall, so the force of the water is just astonishing.

After that brief stop the real driving begins. Depending on traffic, Rotorua to Wellington is about six hours, though for us it ended up being seven and a half. One of the most bizarre things about New Zealand is the vastly different terrain you can cover all in one day. South of Taupo is gently rolling hills covered in sheep and trees (to be honest, ¾ f the North Island is gently rolling hills covered in sheep and trees. No joke.), and then suddenly you pass a sign for a National Park, and the terrain instantly becomes a little more barren. As you continue, it’s alpine trees mixed with a whole lot of nothing, which devolves into nothing, and suddenly you’re on the Desert Road. Not a true desert, of course, but three massive volcanic mountains on the west side of the road create a shadow where traditional kiwi vegetation doesn’t grow, and thus it looks desert-ish. One of these mountains, Mt. Ruapehu, was shot extensively in LOTR, so I was especially excited to grab a few pics, except that the rain was pouring down and the mist had settled so that we couldn’t see anything but the low hills directly in front of us. So no mountains for us. Instead, we got snow!

As we slowly climbed the low hills we increased in elevation, and all of a sudden the rain turned to sleet, which turned quickly to big wet snowflakes falling all around us. Of course this meant we had to get outside and play in it, because snow is such a rare occurrence for us - I haven’t seen snow falling from the sky since I was 12. We made a few snowballs and took a few pictures (and laughed at the British couple doing the same thing, only in shorts and flipflops!).

The rest of the drive was uneventful, and we arrived in Wellington just as rush hour hit. Oh boy. Speaking as someone familiar with Los Angeles traffic, driving in Wellington was horrible. Our hotel was in the business part of town, which was bumper to bumper, with pedestrians darting out in front of you every half a block. The setting sun was in our eyes, and half the streets are vertical straight up the side of the hill. Once you figured out how to get back down again you inevitably wound up on a one way street going, you guessed it, the way you absolutely did not want to go. Mom and I estimate it took us 45 minutes from first passing by our hotel to finally find it again, and we actually had to pull over at one point because we were so giddy with fear that we couldn’t stop laughing. Did I mention that all of these streets are tiny, and we were whipping by parked cars with barely an inch between us and their mirrors.

Our first evening in Wellington we walked down to Courtney Place and had an excellent Indian dinner at the Great India restaurant (Mom’s first!) before walking back to the hotel room. Our hotel was pretty nice, though our rooms were on the 22nd floor - the top floor. The hotel was undergoing renovation (hence our expedia discounts) and only one elevator was working for all those floors. The plus side was we managed to meet a lot of cool people waiting in various lobbies for that darn elevator to arrive.

That’s it for now. Must catch up soon!

(**Funny story, by the way. Mom and I have been sending postcards like mad, with the stamps that we bought with the postcards. $1.50 for an international postcard, or so we were told. We found out yesterday that the price went up in July, to $1.70, and no one that was selling us the $1.50 stamps told us. So I’m guessing maybe some of those postcards might go through, if the postmaster is feeling generous. The rest will go to the great unclaimed postcard heaven, never to be seen by it’s intended recipient. So….. If you don’t get a postcard, don’t feel bad because chance are we totally sent you one and it never made it out of the country. I swear!)

(Also! To answer a few questions - yes, the water here does swirl the opposite way in toilets, etc, but to be honest you barely notice it. The toilets here are so different from those in the US that the water doesn’t really swirl at all - the flush sends jets of water practically straight down into the bowl, without room for swirling. )