After a week of work it was back to more weekend fun. I was given another opportunity to go sailing around Auckland with Harriet and our other good friend Tom. We joined Basil - the captain, Leith, and Harriet's Aunt and Uncle. Because there were so many of us, Harriet and I had to go on one of Basil's friends boats - Peter.
Under windy and rainy conditions we headed out into the Waitemata Harbour where a variety of other boats joined us. Over the last few weeks there had been a new international yachting regatta in Auckland - the Louis Vuitton Pacific Series, where crews from all over the world compete in racing events. The day we went out was the final - New Zealand Vs Switzerland. The race track was well controlled by police boats as spectator yachts competed for space along the track edge to get the best views. The race wasn't particularly thrilling - as the boating finalists had to simply go up and down in straight lines a few times. Some spectators stayed where they were while others moved up and down the 'touchline' to follow the action better. New Zealand came out the eventual winners and after paraded around the water as the spectators cheered from their boats.
Afterwards, we headed out in the rain to Islington Bay, which is situated on Motutapu - the Island connected to Rangitoto Volcano. There we docked for the night, all jumped onto Basil's Pink Cadillac boat and drank the night away. The following morning, Tom joined Harriet and I on Peter's boat and we sailed back (in fine weather) back to the harbour.
It was great to be back out on the water, even if I'm not really an ocean goer. It was a more relaxed affair this time too - as I hardly had to lift a finger in the sailing department. Still, I never complain just chilling in the sun on a sail boat.......who would!!!
Sunday 22 March 2009
Sailing Auckland & The Louis Vuitton Race
Friday 20 March 2009
One Year - On The Road
I looked down at the calender on my phone during the return journey from the Bay of Islands - it was February 8th 2009, and it marked my one year anniversary traveling the world. When I started out, I actually had a flight home on this day - a British Airways flight from Buenos Aires (Argentina) to London (England). I lost that flight and a few others when I decided to stay in New Zealand for a year or more.
It's weird thinking I have been away for a year now. Although I have traveled 9 countries, experienced and seen so much, met the most amazing people and basically had the time of my life - I still remember leaving Heathrow Airport and waving away to the family as though it was yesterday.
People always ask when I'm returning home or what my plans are and to be honest I still havn't got the faintest idea - I never did and probably never will. Every plan I make seems to change from day to day and it's seemed to work well for me so far. I'd still like to see South America before I return home as I'd always planned and maybe even fit a few more places along the way. I think a big factor in all these decisions will be if I can continue to get work studying volcanoes or where the next volcanology job may be. For now though I'm having a fantastic time, working in a job I love and traveling the country with friends during my time off. It's ideal really.
The night of February 8th 2009, my beloved Tottenham Hotspur played our bitter rivals Ars*nal in the Premier League. It ended up 0-0 but we definately deserved the win and should of taken the three points. Ha Ha. It doesn't matter how long you've been away some things never change!!!
Tuesday 10 March 2009
The Bay Of Islands
It's quite amazing how many public holidays they seem to have here in New Zealand. Either that or they decided to get the formalities over with and just group them all into one month. The weekend that followed my trek around volcanic centres within the Tongariro National Park, appeared to be another period of extended time off work. Not one for missing an opportunity, Tom, Kate, Rob, Harriet and myself decided to go on a little road trip.
With 5 of us crammed into Rob's Honda we headed up north. Geographically, Auckland is pretty north itself when looking at a map of NZ. Yet, take a trip over the Harbour Bridge and you find yourself cruising up a narrowing stretch of land known as Northland. It peaks at a place called Cape Reinga after a ride along Ninety Mile Beach (which isn't actually ninety miles - it's about 60). It takes about 8 hours or so from Auckland to get there and we decided this was a little to far to travel this time around. Instead, about halfway up is a place called the Bay of Islands. Situated in the heart of the Northland region, the Bay of Islands is aparently famed for it's stunning coastal scenery and forms one of New Zealand's major attractions.
As the site of NZ's first permanent English settlement, the region also has enormous historical significance. It was here that the Treaty of Waitangi was drawn up, the linchpin of race relations in modern-day NZ. The Treaty goes back to 1840, when on the 6th of February, the English government and the Maori Chiefs struck a deal for peacful living within the country and the founding document now has a standing similar to the US constitution. We arrived in the Bay of Island's on the 6th February and the public holiday that we were celebrating was Waitangi Day.
After stopping in a few places on the way (and spotting the NZ famous - "Treehouse" restaurant, which is as it says but looks amazing even if you do have to book 6 months in advance of getting a table), we finally made it to a small sea-side town called Russell. It's a mission to drive to so instead you can get the car ferry over a small stretch of water from Paihia. We didn't really have time to look around Russell for now - instead we dumped our bags and got the ferry back to check out the town of Waitangi.
Waitangi on Waitangi Day, as you can imagine, was packed. It was full of street stalls and market stands selling all sorts of items along the beach front. Kids were jumping off a fair sized bridge into the ocean and generally everyone was having a good time in a festival atmosphere. Apart from the odd traveller like ourselves, the area was dominated by Maori's who take this celebration incredibly seriously. We had a look at the famous sight too - the Treaty House where the documents were signed and aside, generally wondered the street's taking it all in. A short walk from Waitangi is Paihia - a small, pretty beach town that has become a major traveller destination over recent years for everyone wanting to chill out. We spent a bit of time looking around before ending up in a pub. After a day of celebrations we caught the ferry back to Russell. Harriet, Tom and myself somehow ended up on Long Beach drinking and playing games until the early hours of the following day. Messy.
The next day, we checked out Russell. It's an historical and quiet town full of cafe's and quaint gift shops. It has a very old feel to it and although seems quite charming now, once had a more shady past. According to Charles Darwin, Russell was full of 'the refuse of society' in 1835 - and with us there - I suppose little has changed in 170 odd years!!!
Usually you don't often have to book hostels or any other type of accommodation in NZ as a general rule. That is unless it's a festival or public holiday. Due to our lack of planning, we thus had to leave our current accommodation in Russell and instead searched for a place in Paihia. Ten minutes outside the town we found this most amazing little place. The hostel had a pool table and table tennis, a great deck with hammocks and a river with rope-swing attached. It also had free use of kayaks. Needless to say, we spent most of the day lazing about and jumping into the river. Later the cards came out, as did the alcohol....... and a few drunken hours later I'm playing Harriet at table tennis and we're both unable to hit anything except perhaps each other.
Just around the corner from the hostel is the Haruru Falls and the following day - Rob, Kate and myself went to check it out followed by a walk in the surrounding forest, known as the Waitangi National Reserve. It's an area of Kiwi habitat but we never managed to spot one. In fact in the 6 months that I have been here, I still haven't seen a Kiwi bird yet - in it's habitat or otherwise.
On our way back to Auckland we stopped off at a variety of locations. There are some pretty cool places between Auckland and the Bay of Islands and we did a good job to see many of them. Before we left we visited the oldest church in the country which suprisingly didn't look as old as I had imagined - although to be honest NZ isn't really that old istelf and I hadn't actually imagined what it would look like anyway. Heading back down south, we stopped at a small town called Kawakawa, which is famous for having some rather artistic public toilets. They were designed by internationally renowned artist, ecologist and architect, Friedensreich Hundertwasser and we admired the artistic form, colours and shapes while relieving ourselves. We also stopped at some other amazing waterfalls, a glow-worm cave where we got a guided walk and marvelled at the bright lighted faeces and also took a break at the town of Whangarei.
Eventually we returned, absolutely shattered - but some of us hard-core travellers still had a last bit of energy to make it to Auckland's Albert Park where there was an Asian lantern festival. The glowing lanterns lit up the night sky, accompanied by Asian food stalls, music and a good time.
It was another packed weekend and certainly a good time was had all round. It would take me at least a week to recover.......oh wait.....it was back to work.
Tuesday 3 March 2009
Back To The Tongariro National Park
So it's 2.30pm on a Friday afternoon and I'm sitting in my DEVORA research office in Auckland, typing away on the borehole project that I'm currently working on. There's only two people in my office, myself and my colleague, an American named Elaine.
Darren and Dan, two others at IESE (Institute of Earth Science and Engineering), where I am currently working, are on a field trip around New Zealand. It's called 'Frontiers Abroad' and consists of 25 or so American students, all interested in the Earth sciences - coming to NZ for 5 weeks and getting taught about the countries unique geology. They then complete one semester in a New Zealand universitiy as part of their degrees back home. They were currently on week 3 of their trip and were somewhere in the Tongariro National Park, which Elaine had been invited to join for a bit of fun over the weekend.
With a burst open of our office door, Leslie (another colleague) rushes in saying that we can join for the weekend if we want. Before I have time to answer I am being pushed out the door and told to run back and get all my stuff. After a hefty drive down south, myself, Elaine and Leslie arrive at the Tongariro National Park.
We stayed in a huge dorm-room apartment within the Whakapapa Village of the national park. Big enough to hold 25 American students and all the helpers. There were beds for us though. On the Saturday we treked the Tongariro Crossing. I had done the crossing before but only in the winter so I was pleased to be doing it again in the summer-time, simply because I was told it would look completely different. It did. The other great thing about doing the crossing this time around was Darren and Dan, who taught the geology and volcanics to all the students as we went round. The principles of volcanology that they were teaching, I already knew, but it was the specific's and history of the area that I was unfamiliar with compared with these guys who have spent most of their lives in NZ.
The crossing was equally as spectacular this time round and equally as challenging. Actually the walk isn't that difficult - it's just long. But the views are fantastic and the volcanoes are immense. In some respects for myself, it was better walking it in the summer. Tongariro in the winter is covered in snow, blanketing a lot of the geological features on display. Now, you could see clearly exposed lava fields and flows, the Emerald Lakes (a series of volcanic lakes, which actually appeared emerald in colour, rather than a carpet of white snow) and Mount Ngauruhoe, which now really did look just like Mount Doom from Lord of the Rings, mainly because it is!!!
We took the walk slowly, chatting to fellow IESE friends and the students. some views from up on the saddle between the two volcanoes (Ngauruhoe and Tongariro) were stunning and although we were sitting almost smack in the middle of the North Island of NZ, from here we could see coast to coast, especially to the West where you could make out the small outline of Mount Taranaki - one of New Zealand's largest volcanoes, situated on the South-Western shore. Because it was now summer, the bare, rubbly volcanic rocks were exposed, really turning the place into Mordor scenery. Thus, at every opportunity I would take Leslie's ring and make people take pictures of me pulling hobbit like poses, and by the end of the day, I felt like Frodo did after he'd just destroyed the ring.....shattered. Luckily I didn't have to trek across Middle Earth to get back to my bed......it was a 15 minute drive away.
On the second day, we headed out to Mount Ruapehu. Ruapehu sits just south of Mount Ngauruhoe and is the biggest volcano in the national park. However, because the Tongariro Crossing walk takes you so close to the other two volcanoes, Ruapehu is primariliy blocked from view. I had never really seen Ruapehu in full during my last trip here from Taupo, so it was a good opportunity to explore.
Actually the reason Dan and Darren had brought the students to Mount Ruapehu was because they provide a great example of lahar (volcanic mudflow) deposits. Such flows are very dangerous during or after a volcanic eruption and in the past have caused huge devestation on some of the world's volcanic slopes. Verne Manville, from GNS at Taupo is an expert on such flows, particularly at Ruapehu. He has studied this volcanic hazard here, for about 20 years. I actually knew Verne from my time working at the Taupo GNS office some months ago. He took us onto the 'round-the-mountain' track and then off onto the lahar flow paths that had torn their way down the slopes here on many occassions, but most recently in 2007.
We strayed mainly in areas which signs said not to stray and looked at deposits mainly consisting of huge boulders that were carried in the powerful mud-flows and which you wished you were never caught in. Verne was a library of knowledge on the subject as we spent most of the day on the volcanoes flank.
We later continued away from the mountain, down the Whangaehu River, to an area called Tangiwai, where in 1953, a lahar in full flow caused the Tangiwai railway bridge (which runs across the Whangaehu River) to collapse, just before the train crossed it and ultimately killing 151 people. Leslie, Elaine and myself then split from the group as they continued on and we drove to a small town, on the southern tip of the national park, called Onakune - for a look around. It's a small town, full of ski and snowboard gear hire shops. We stopped for a walk around and some lunch.
In the evening, pretty much everyone collapsed with a beer in their hand. Two days of solid walking can take it's toll. Elaine was staying on with the group for the next week, but Leslie and I had to get back to work. Early on Monday morning, my Canadian friend and I said our goodbyes to 25 American students, everyone at IESE who were staying on, and left. It was back into work for another week.........but still, 5 days away was another weekend and who knows what doors will burst open as another adventure unfolds!!!
