Weekend Road Trip!!!!

Friday I went to a settlement support meeting with jill nerheny. My
Time with her was short because aunty jill, aunty jane, sonia and I
were leaving as possible for a weekend road trip to waitomo and
rotarua. Driving in the car with them is always fun. We played our
music loud and sang even louder, laughing at jokes and memories. We
geocached as we went, even though we didn't find all the caches we
went after, it was a good time. We ate dinner at a place called "the
thirsty weta". A weta is similar to the grasshopper but they are heaps
bigger, grosser, and creepier!!! Next, we were off to the backpackers
place where we would be staying the night. It was a cozy little place
with loud orange paint on the walls and screaming yellow paint for the
doors. I've never stayed in a backpackers stay before and didn't know
what to expect, but I really didn't expect the backpackers to be from
America! There were two girls one from Pennsylvania and the other from
New Orleans. The accommodations were pleasant and the company made
them even better. An unplanned pillow fight and wrestling match later
we were all in bed giggling about who was snoring and who talks in
their sleep. ( a little note for melissa wisley: I can see how
backpacking could me so much fun!)

Saturday, we got up and left our happy little stay to head for the
waitomo caves, but not before grabbing brekkie at a place with
wonderful French toast. The caves were awesome!!! It takes about a
half an hour by van to reach then. The road wound around mountains,
valleys, and erosions alike. The hillsides were filled with untamed
plant like and grazing cattle including sheep and turkeys. New Zealand
can not be photographed properly. The caves were drafty, muddy, and
all together something you would think twice about waking into
atvanytime, but when the lights went off the cave transformed onto a
third demension. Glow worms lit the celings like a starry night. The
sound of a waterfall seemed to come closer bit no sign of movement was
made as our boat floated down a small river. This was a sight that not
even Disney could recreate. Other caves were well taken care off with
hidden lights, cathedrals, and tomos. Timo is the Maori word for hole
which is likewise the word waitomo means waterhole. Some kind of
festival was being held when we returned from our adventures. We were
able to catch sheep shearing races and wood chopping races. This was
the real New Zealand, or so i'm told. The sun was still shining so we
went i'm search fornkore caches which meant tons and tons of topsy
turning mountains sides that even made me car sick!!! It was
completely worth it though when we came to a thing called the natural
bridge which was absolutely captivating. The green light filling the
canyon only magnitizes the beauty of this place. As a trickling steam
ram just beneath my feet I thought to myself "wow God, now you are
just showing off". The ride back to the main roads was much better and
with only few more stops for toilets, pictures, and caches we were
back on the road again to rotarua. I must have fallen asleep on the
way because before I knew it I was dreaming about omelets. Nice, hot,
and mouthwatering omeletes... But before I knew it the beautiful
fragrance my omelets was slipping away and the stench of rotten eggs
then filled the air around me. Welcome to Rotarua. The stench did not
exist in my dream but in my actual existence. Sulfur. Many of you have
experienced the smell of sulfur in water but sulfur in the air is a
completely different experience. Like the smell of coal in a small
mining town the smell of sulfur just hangs in the air of my little
rotarua. We dragged our bags into "the crash palace" and climbed in
our bunkbeds for a well deserves nights sleep.

a.