Home Update Log Summary of the Trip The Family Album Day 1 - Departing Day 2 - Amsterdam Day 3 - Veldhoven Day 4 - CttM Day One Day 5 - CttM Day Two Day 6 - The Holland Tour Day 7 - Off to Istanbul Day 8 - Seraglio Point Day 9 - Bosphorous Tour Day 10 - Exploring Sultanahmet Day 11 - The City Walls Day 12 - The Asian Side Day 13 - Taking a Break Day 14 - Leaving Turkey Day 15 - A Day in Singapore Day 16 - Arrival in Sydney Day 17 - Exploring Sydney Day 18 - ODDC Day One Day 19 - ODDC Day Two Day 20 - Toranga Zoo Day 21 - Off to New Zealand Day 22 - Road Trip to Tauranga Day 23 - Tauranga to Taupo Day 24 - Visiting Granny Stanton Day 25 - Leaving Levin Day 26 - Return to Auckland Day 27 - The Trip Home | |
Saturday, June 2, 2001.
We woke up to another cold morning in New
Zealand, this time in Tauranga. The cold woke us early, which wasn't a bad thing
- Judy had to leave for work in the morning, and we would be gone before she got
back. Richard had a chance for a nice quiet visit before everyone hurried off.
In warmed up quickly as the sun rose over the
hill and sunlight reached the house. The weather was clear, which is why it got
so cold. Wherever the sun hadn't touched, there was frost on the ground.
We actually left the house last, being given a
key to return to Jeanette when we got cleaned up, packed up and loaded up.
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The sun shining into Judy's living room.
There's only about six television channels in New Zealand, the TV is
rarely on. |
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The now vacant chairs from the previous
night's festivities. The black thing on the left is a propane-powered
heater to get rid of the chill in the morning. |
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Peeking out the living room window at a
sunny morning. |
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Braving the patio - it was actually
warmed outside than in. |
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Judy's dog looks serious, but is
actually seriously harmless. |
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Ray's 4-wheeler: not used this morning,
he went into town with a friend instead. |
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Bob the Goat let's Richard take his
picture, but don't get too close. |
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Doesn't look like Bob liked Richard
much. Must have been that metal box in his hand... yeah, that it. |
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Bob's job - keep the front of the yard
clear of brush. A year earlier this face was covered in thick
brambles. |
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On our way out, Stacy demonstrates how
Bob likes girls better than boys. |
After locking up the house and saying good bye
to Bob, we headed back up the hill to Jeanette and Graeme's place. The usual
suspects were there to greet us.
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The nameless puppy, now chained up,
barks, whines and wiggles a greeting. |
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Zoe the cow dog in her usual demur style
says hello as well. |
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A look at the side of Jeanette's
house. |
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The front veranda with the view. |
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Opposite view of the front. |
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A morning look at Mount Manganui from
the house. |
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And beside the Mount is Tauranga. We'd
head south though from here, so this was our last look. |
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Looking right down the hill, you can see
Judy and Ray's place at he bottom. |
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Pippi the Goat relaxes on the grass in
the sun. |
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Jeanette gets Pippi standing with a few pieces
of brown bread. |
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Graeme decides to restake Pippi so the
goat can mow the other half of the front lawn. |
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Stacy and Janelle have a visit. Janelle
has some family tree records she made in school in her hand. |
We spent the morning with the Nee family,
looking at family history records and lots of photo albums. We took pictures of
some of the photographs, they're part of the Family Album
page. Then we had to get back on the road again - the goal to visit Granny
Stanton down in Levin. Along the way, we thought we'd stop in Rotarua, where the
thermal area and Maori Arts & Crafts center is.
Both of us had been to thermal areas before, and
were prepared for the "rotten-egg" smell of the sulfur dioxides that
are a by-product of thermal hot springs, geysers, etc. But Rotarua was really
stinky - maybe winter makes it worse. We stopped at the visitor's centre to get
our bearings and a bathroom before going out onto the streets of Rotarua in
search of lunch.
It got worse during our lunch search -
apparently the Rotaruans use the sulfury water for heating and cooking, even in
restaurants. Obviously they don't smell it anymore, but the first restaurant we
went into made us both nauseous - who could eat? We went further down the road
and found a relatively non-stinky restaurant, at least sitting in the front. The
ordering process took awhile, and the kitchens smelled bad. Fortunately the
smell did not rub off on the food, lunch was pretty good.
After lunch we drove to the south side of
Rotarua and visited the Thermal Area and Maori Arts &
Crafts Centre. We spent several hours there, until it was getting a bit
late. We still had more driving to do - we wanted to get to a little town near
Taupo lake called Kinloch. We had made reservations at a bed & breakfast
there recommended to us by John and Gail up at Totara Lodge.
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Driving down the highway toward Taupo,
we spot what looks like a nuclear reactor cooling tower... in New Zealand?
Nope, it is a cooling tower, but for a geothermal plant. |
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Lots of deep pine forest along the
highway, some of it down right dark (although in this picture, it doesn't
look all that scary). |
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Rolling meadows and planted pine with a
volcano in the background - a typical New Zealand landscape. |
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Found it! Kinloch Lodge on the northern
shores of Lake Taupo. |
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The very dangerous venus fly trap bed,
so called because once you lie down, its too comfy to get up, and you're
forced to take a nap... Stacy was a willing victim and took a snooze
before dinner. |
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We had the whole upstairs of Kinloch
Lodge to ourselves - it is winter time after all. The pole on the left is
actually a chimney for the wood fireplace downstairs, it has a air
radiator mounted to it to better share the heat with the upstairs. |
After a bit of a rest and clean up from our long
drive, we took advantage of the washing machine and dryer in the lodge to get
some laundry done. There was only one restaurant in Kinloch, called the Tipsy
Trout, so we headed down for an excellent seafood dinner and some fine wine. We
ended the day finishing the laundry and watching the Bee Gee special on
television before heading off to bed.
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The Tipsy Trout, the only restaurant in
the town of Kinloch, serving excellent seafood. The place was half full
that night, surprising for winter time. Must have been all locals. |
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Stacy relaxes watching the Bee Gees on
television with the balance of the laundry folded beside her. |
Kinloch was probably the coldest place we stayed
at in New Zealand - the temperature dipped down to -4 degrees over night. But
the bed had electric blankets (and was wonderfully comfortable), the room had a
space heated and Graham kept the wood fireplace running all night, so we were
wonderfully warm. Tomorrow we would get to Levin and visit Granny
Stanton.
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