Words Of Wisdom

11and a half weeks in New Zealand and an unbelievable amount of stuff has happened, the backdrop to my life changes daily and the journey is jam packed with people who I like to think of as bit part actors, people who come into my life for minutes, hours or days who appearer at random and sometimes leave behind pearls of wisdom. One of the best came from 'D' a man on a mission to change himself and New Zealand by being near- insanely nice to everyone he meets. He had a saying which I have been unable to shake from my head since he told me it. 'poetry in motion' This is his outlook on life and the more I think about it the more it makes sense. Life is poetry, sometimes hard to understand but it has an overall meaning and the things that happen in life all happen for a reason, its not always clear why but its worth trusting and following whatever feels right.

Keep on Trucking

No pictures of this as my camera finally gave on life but yesterday I managed to get a ride in a truck! He pulled over just outside Kaiwaka and I could not believe my luck. So for the next 40mins I travel NZ the way it should be travelled in the cab of a truck carrying sheep! One of my all time must do's has been ticket off the list.

Hitching North.

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Some say it could not be done, to hitch where there is no point in going unless you are a tourist, to hitch through dessert, to hitch through rural towns with small inhabitants with shotguns and dogs to hitch to the furthest north of New Zealand well I say to those non believers I came, I saw, I only just made it!
Getting a ride from a couple from my home town of Basingstoke straight off the bat after my trek to Haruru Falls, I new today was going to be a good day. Next a couple of American girls picked me up for a short trip to Awanui where they left to go south and I headed north. Getting a lift almost instantly from Mitch (above with the dog) she took me to hers for a couple of cold ones before leaving me in the middle of nowhere with the mid day sun burning down onto my head. Slightly worried I carried on only to be picked up a couple of mins later by a young German heading for the top. I made the rest of the journey with him with a broken camera (see pic above) Job Done.

Walkabout

Err .. yea ok so its not like Australia where i go walkabout in the wild bush and die from ether venom or dehydration. It was more like, well exactly was a 6k walk (had to walk 1k to get to woods and 5 in it), so no Ray Mears yet. However walking that far through woods and swamp (with boardwalks over) was not as easy as you may think when you are carrying everything you need on your back! check out the posser on the top picture to see my highly refined bag with only essentualls for minimum weight.

Bay Of Islands

Camera started playing up again so only one bad pic of this place but thought I would put in up anyway as from here I went WALKABOUT!

Jafa

Auckland, the one big city in NZ. I expected the city to be my worst nightmare after having been living in the real new Zealand from the last couple of months, from first hand testimonies I had heard I was not expecting much but the city actually grew on me, in the day and a half I spent there, spent being the word to take from that sentence as It cost me a lot, not in hostel fees or supermarket shopping but in fast food! Something about the city made me snap and went on a fast food binge hitting wendys, Mcdonalds and burgerking as well as Dunkin Dounuts the day before. I fled the city on another bus to head for the sanctuary of the Bay of Islands.

By Bus

My journey has so far required, plane, van car, thumb and bus. took the bus from Hamalton to Auckland city. Here is a couple of pictures of the journey. Bus was a nice way to travel with the wide windows letting more of the view in.