Gnuing

Sorry it's been so long since my last waffle - before christmas I know. So what have I been up to? Well, friends from Brizzle arrived in Auckland over the festive season. First of all Sally and Madelaine arrived on Christmas eve, just in time for eating and drinking too much on the day itself. Then Sarah Loo (not her real name) arrived the day after boxing day, just in time to set off on a New Years camping trip.
We headed from Auckland to the lovely Hahei for the camping trip, which was temporarily disturbed by a day of pouring rain on the day before New Years eve. While we were in Hahei, we met up with Tris (who lives in Geneva) and Julie (who ives in Briz). It was really good to see them again and seemed somewhat surreal to be meeting up with them on a campsite on the other side of the world, despite the fact that it was all planed. Fortunately, the sun was back out in time for new year celebrations and we generally ambled about, crashed out on the beach, ate ice creams and relaxed before a restaurant dinner on new years eve and a stroll on the beach. A bit different from the normal freezing cold and rain at home!
From Hahei we headed down to Rotorua for a short stop over, before continuing down to the Tongariro National Park, which was the base for the next daft idea! We spent the following three days travelling down the Whanganui River in caadian canoes. For someone who has never been in a canoe before (me), there was a certain amount of apprehension involved. The main reason for the apprehension is that once you set off on this trip, there are no roads out until you reach the end. You are travelling through a stretch of the river where the only access is by boat and you really are in the middle of nowhere. Also, for much of the time, the river is running through a deep gorge, so there are no handy "beaches" on which to stop.
As it turned out, Sarah Loo and Sally were the only team to come out of their canoe, which happened towards the end of the first day. We were all very lucky in that a Jet boat (the only one we saw that day) happened to come up the river just a couple of minutes after the incident. The jet boat along with Andy and Sarah managed to sort them out, while yours truely was busy trying to just keep a canoe going in roughly the right direction . . The whole trip was an experience well worth the time and effort. The scenery was spectacular and the area had a wonderful sense of isolation.
We are now in Napier, soaking up the sun. Sally and Sarah Loo headed off to the south island just after the canoe trip, Tris and Julie headed off before the canoe trip, Andy and Sarah have just left to head back to Auckland, so now it is just Madelaine and myself. We are going to head back to the Tongariro in the hope that the weather will be good enough for the Tongariro crossing walk to be open. Then I will be heading south and Madelaine will be heading north. Either way, I'll be back to just me, the bike and my rucksack in a couple of days . . . .
Well, that's all for now. I hope you all had a fabulous time over christmas and new year. I'm sorry I didn't get to talk to the whole family on christmas day, but I was thinking of you all. Take care everyone and I'll be back in touch from Wellington before long.