Stark Contrasts: A Weekend in Wellington

New Zealand is a land of contrasts. The North Island competes with the South Island for bragging rights as the best New Zealand. The Maori hold on to their distinct culture despite the arrival of the British a couple hundred years ago. Even nature here is riddled with contrasts. Dark green cliffs jut magnificently into the deep blue sea. The kiwi bird cannot fly. The weather can change from dark grey clouds to bright blue skies within the course of 5 minutes.

When I arrived Thursday night in Wellington I grabbed an airport shuttle to the hostel. A man in an LA Dodgers hat hopped on as well. I struck up conversation to find out if he was from LA, which indeed he was, only to discover he is the tour director for an LA based hip hop artist named The Game. Dontay showed me some video footage of the Maori welcome they received at the Auckland airport (imagine men in skirts doing warrior dances while women robed in native attire sing rhythmically). New Zealand was the final stop on a tour that travelled all around the world, and the crew was headed back to LA after a final show in Wellington. To my good fortune, Dontay offered to put Maz and I on the guest list!

So Friday night, Maz and I hopped on the train to Porirua, 20 minutes outside of Wellington. We then walked confusedly through a suburb that clearly has an aversion to utilizing street signs. The arena, which was more like a high school gymnasium than a concert venue, was packed with teenagers, primarily Maori, dressed in baggy jeans, caps turned sideways and oversized sweatshirts with pot leaves embroidered on the back. We were amongst the very few white people in the arena and definitely the only people over the age of 22. That phrase about a sore thumb comes to mind here. But once the lights were turned down and The Game finally took the stage, there was no stopping anyone from getting down on the dance floor. I can’t say it was the best hip hop show I’ve ever seen, but it was definitely a night to remember.

The following night I ventured to another suburb of Wellington, only this time, for a very different set of circumstances. My dear friend Carie suggested I get in touch with her friend Vaughan while I was in Wellington. It turns out that it was Vaughan’s 40^th birthday weekend and he was hosting a James Bond themed party complete with dirty martinis and an Aston Martin parked in the driveway. I made a quick stop at the $2 store earlier that day and purchased a fake strand of pearls and a toy gun to spice up my otherwise non-Bondish outfit. The party was composed of 40-something professional couples from in and around Wellington garbed in their finest cocktail attire. A couple martinis and few new friends later, I hopped in a cab back to the city to get a good night’s sleep before my 7:30 a.m. wake up call.

Wellington is a spectacular city and one I hope to come back to at some point in my life. The streets are dotted with modern sculptures. The people are friendly and hip. The cafes have outdoor seating. And the eateries are neverending.

But as with all good things, it’s time to move on. As I sit on the ferry to Picton, I cannot help but silently giggle at the extreme contrasts of my weekend in Wellington. From a hip hop show packed with urban teenagers to a black tie affair in an upscale neighborhood, anything and everything goes here.

I have just crossed the Cook Straight. Goodbye to the North Island and hello to the South Island. Up next: wine tasting in the famous Marlborough Sauvignon Blanc region and roadtripping along the epic West Coast.

Entering Adventure: Waitomo & Rotorua

Kiwis are thrill seekers if I’ve ever seen any. They see a hill and turn it into a winding luge course. They see a bridge and attach a bungee cord and jump off. They see a rock and repel down it, zip line across it or use it as a launch pad into a lake. There are many adjectives I could use to describe these maniacal blokes, but boring isn’t one of them. I’ve committed myself to doing my best to fit in around these parts.

I started this commitment by venturing down into a cave to see some glow worms. In the frigid cold we stuffed our bodies into damp wetsuits and gum boots and headed into the depths of the earth. The descent into the caves was a little daunting. The rocks were so narrow that I had to twist the top half of my body right while the lower half of my body carefully maneuvered the steps beneath me to the left. Once under the earth, the view was stunning: big limestone rocks immersed in water below my feet and a ceiling dripping with stalactites above my head. Ducking and dodging rocks that may cut through the wetsuits, we walked, waded and swam through this magnificent cave. Deep in its bowels we finally encountered the luminescent creatures we traveled so far to see. And… it’s all a sham! It turns out the famed Glow Worms are actually more similar to maggots than worms. Ew! The sound of Glow Maggot Caves doesn’t really have the same ring to it, so it’s all just a marketing ploy to lure naïve tourists. However, drifting through the caves in an inner-tube in pitch black darkness while the “glow worms” illuminated the rock ceiling in a constellation-like fashion was nothing short of spectacular.

But this was merely the tip of the iceberg for discovering adventure in New Zealand. Today I finally realized my dream of zorbing. Ever since I first heard of this wondrous activity, I knew I must experience it. In fact, this was the main motivation for driving 3 hours from Auckland to the stinky (I’ll explain more on that in a minute) town of Rotorua. Zorbing is, well, ridiculous. You go to the top of a hill, dive into a big plastic ball that reminds me of a toy my pet hamster used to play in, and go rolling down a hill while you slush around in the water within. Maz was designated cinematographer while I endured this madness. But due to technical difficulties, she did not capture my wild ride. Instead, I took some footage of the next person to go to give you a sense of the experience. While you watch this, imagine me inside screaming at the top of my lungs and laughing hysterically.

Since I was already in my bathing suit and soaking wet, Maz and I decided to venture on to take a soak in a famed stream. It’s actually the vortex of two streams. One stream is cold mountain spring water. The other stream is hot, volcanic water. If you sit at a particular part of this river you actually feel both the hot and cold currents, concurrently, which is an incredibly bizarre sensation. The whole Rotorua region is filled with natural thermal wonders. There are a number of geysers, naturally heated mud pools and thermal hot springs, which fill the region with an intense sulphorous stench that gets into your clothes and skin to no avail. Some of these natural wonders are big tourist attractions and cost good money to enjoy. Others, like the stream we visited, are entirely free so budget travelers like ourselves can enjoy as well… that is, if you can find them. We had been told that this stream we were seeking was quite easy to locate. This assumed that we would not turn onto the first Loop Rd., but would somehow instinctively know to turn down the second street by the exact same name. Obvi!!!

Tomorrow I head back to Auckland to catch a flight to Wellington. The weekend will hopefully be relaxing (think a glass of wine and a good book by the fire) and I will recover from the first (though certainly not the last) onslaught of New Zealand adventures. I may sprinkle in a James Bond-themed birthday party for someone named Vaughan, whom I have never met. More on that next time. In the meantime, if you have any Bond girl costume ideas that can be produced by the articles contained within my 30-pound backpack (such as khaki pants, black fleece, sneakers, etc.), please leave a comment.

The Arrival

I imagined the flight from LA to Auckland would be 13 hours of torture. I envisioned being trapped in the window seat, needing to pee constantly but wary of waking my sleeping neighbors, unable to sleep, seated next to some overweight, smelly man who wanted to chat endlessly. I suspected that every second would feel similar to someone taking a tiny needle and poking me in the eye with it repeatedly. To my pleasant surprise, this was not the case. I was seated next to a very cheerful couple from Auckland who gave me some great tips and only chatted me up for the last 30 minutes of the flight. I slept for 8 hours, watched a cheesy, but entertaining movie called Adventureland and witnessed a breathtaking sunrise over the horizon of puffy white clouds somewhere over the Pacific Ocean. It may have been the easiest (nevermind the only) 13 hour flight I've ever taken!

The other fortunate event was meeting an English woman named Maz while waiting for the bus from the airport to the city. She was on the same flight from LA and is also traveling alone. She and I have spent the last few days sightseeing together and she has quickly become a fantastic travel companion. The only problem is that her thick Cockney accent allows me to understand only about 50% of what she says and it's likely I'll start using words like "bloody," "diabolical" and "half six" as compared to six-thirty.

I've spent the weekend here in Auckland. I can't say I've really fallen in love with this city, but I suppose it's a good jumping off place. It is, perhaps, the cleanest city I've ever been. There is no trash on the streets, no homelessness and seemingly very little crime. The downside to this city is that there is very little character. The buildings look like those you may find in Any City, U.S.A. The racial diversity is lacking: there are Pacific Islanders, Asians, Whites and Indians, but I haven't seen a single Black or Hispanic person. And from what I can tell, the American restaurants outnumber the local ones. There are at least 6 Subway sandwich eatiers within a 12 block radius, a couple of McDonald's, a Burger King, a Wendy's and a couple of Starbucks.

Tomorrow is when the “adventure” part of this whole adventure really begins… Maz and I set off on a driving expedition to Waitomo, where we’ll put on full-body wetsuits, grab an inner-tube and float through caves illuminated by glow worms. Should be bloody brilliant!

Reading: Almost French by Sarah Turnbull (thanks Robyn)

Listening: Computer Love by Glass Candy

Eating: The best fish & chips I've ever had from Ponsonby Fish & Chips