Archive for ‘New Zealand’

August 9th, 2010

Apologies to Christchurch

Look, Christchurch, about all that anti-New Zealand talk I gave earlier: it’s not you, it’s me. I said those things before I ever got a chance to know you… the real you. Because with so many cafes and bars, and cafe/bars, one could say that you are actually kind of cool. Who was I to judge?

bike art in christchurchBut it was a week, and while I at first wanted only to escape you, I thought for moments that I enjoyed you. Sure, you may have an awkward number of erotic, adult stores – more than one would think suiting for such a small town – but the artwork, and used book stores, and funky fabrics and furniture stores – you could almost be like a mild version of Newtown.

Oh, the times we had together. Remember the time… well… uhhh… you know. Remember the time I walked to the movies in the rain and then proceeded to see Knight and Day by myself? (Don’t judge; it was the only movie on at the time I was there.) Oh, and that other time I got Chinese food because the place looked awesomely packed just to realize it was the worst thing I’ve ever tasted in my life? At least there was Winnie Bagoes to make up for that (except for the fact that people can stalk me there while sitting in another city – you know who you are).

wall music

I think in another life, we could have been friends… maybe more like Internet friends. Cheers.

CategoryNew Zealand | Comment2 Comments »

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July 17th, 2010

Hey, New Zealand, I’m Just Not That Into You

new-zealandIt’s like the tourism Gods were punishing me. Last Wednesday at pub trivia, I let my true feelings about my upcoming trip to New Zealand come out. See, New Zealand and I have a relationship that is based on convenience rather than passion; it’s never really been on my list of places to see, and believe me, there are very few countries that aren’t on that list. For some reason, my intrigue has just never been there.

Yet, this is my second trip to the land of the kiwi, and already it feels like a repeat of the first. Perhaps, I just don’t learn from my mistakes; perhaps the information I received last year wasn’t correct. Whatever it was, I was left shaking my head at the check-in counter as I frantically texted Pat to tell him that, yet again, I was having trouble getting to New Zealand.

If you weren’t a follower before, you can read about last year’s antics here. Basically, it was my fault as I for some reason thought I could enter New Zealand without any flight leaving the country. The goal was to buy my flight back as soon as I got my work and holiday visa as I wasn’t sure if they would require me to get another chest x-ray. But, Jetstar caught me and made me buy a ticket exiting New Zealand before I could get my boarding pass. This is when I went down to the service desk and bought a return ticket to Australia. Problem solved, sort of, since I actually had to change that flight since it took longer to process my visa than most other people.

This year, I was prepared! I simply bought a return ticket to Australia as I did before. However, there was a problem. My visa for Australia was expiring before the return date of my ticket, which means I didn’t have a ticket exiting New Zealand to a country I had permission to enter. Long story short, I had to purchase a ticket from New Zealand to America.

The problem here was two-fold. One, I should have double-checked the visa requirements like a good traveler. Two, the information I received the previous year was either incorrect (my visa expired before my return ticket then as well), or they had upgraded the requirement since then. Me dumb.

To make things worse, I hate cold weather, and I really hate snow. I’ve never been skiing; I have no desire to ski (especially with my bad knee). What else is going on in New Zealand?! I was really hoping to redeem NZ in my mind after my previous trip, but with a start like that, it is going to take a lot of impressing to fix. First impressions are the hardest to shake.

This, my friends, is a clear example of a travel fail.

CategoryNew Zealand | Comment16 Comments »

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July 29th, 2009

From Auckland to Sydney

I’m back in Sydney and finally getting myself settled and situated after my short hop over to New Zealand. I spent my time solely on the north of the north island on this trip – mainly because I was concerned I was going to have to make a doctor’s appointment to get my visa. Besides what I’ve already written, I don’t feel like I really accomplished too much in my time. I think I did a lot more walking, shopping and hanging out than sightseeing.

I did manage to make it to some caves in Waitomo for their famous glowworms. A funny thing actually happened during the boat tour in the pitch-black cave. My tour group was with a French family, and on the boat, I was sitting next to the mother in the front row, while the dad sat behind us. To my surprise, and his wife’s as well, he proceeded to wrap his arms around ME and tickle ME thinking (hopefully) it was his wife! And, to make matter’s worse, it was super pitch black, and we were on a little boat. Talk about an awkward moment!

Also, during my time, there was a huge earthquake on the south of the south island. It was listed at about an 8 magnitude, so tsunami warnings were actually issued for the south of Australia. There was plenty of talk about this subject at the hostel, which is the only reason I actually knew about the occurrence.

Time passed and I finally got my visa for 12 months of work and holiday in Australia. I jumped on a plane and headed home – home in this case referring to Sydney. I’m back to my life here now, but actively pushing myself to make upcoming travel plans. Obviously, living here is costly and I don’t make very much money, so travel plans have to be budget :( Oh, well, should still be fun!

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July 24th, 2009

Hanging Out in Hobbiton

No doubt crosses my mind that it was a completely nerdy thing to do by visiting Matamata, New Zealand for the sole purpose of visiting Hobbiton. However, visiting the partial set of where the hobbits lived in The Lord of the Rings can only happen if you are in New Zealand, so hey, it seemed like a valid plan.

matamata-011

Before I go further, I feel I must make a few things clear. No, I didn’t visit dressed as a hobbit, or an elf. No, I didn’t dance on the party lawn. And, no, I didn’t meet Frodo or Gandalf or Bilbo in the process. Sorry to disappoint all you crazy LOTR lovers out there. Visiting the Hobbiton movie set was merely the viewing of the remaining hobbit holes and the grounds of the beautiful rolling hills that made up the shire.

The tour, however, was quite amusing because of such stories of people coming dressed as hobbits and elves and their kooky ways. Apparently a guy from Germany, being about 7 feet tall, came dressed as a hobbit and refused to leave the movie set stating that it was “his home” and “where he belonged”. Others also came dressed as hobbits and would perform orations from the movie whenever they saw fit. Better yet was the story of an entire busload of people dressed as elves that came only to dance on the party lawn for the entirety of their tour. You just have to love it when people take fantasy a bit too seriously.

There were only a few people in my tour group, but two of them were from Chicago. I didn’t know this at first, and everytime I heard them talking it was strange that it kept subconsciously pulling my attention. I finally realized it was because of the accent when their hometown was made public that I kept turning my head. Even though I often meet other Americans or Canadians in Oz and NZ, the Chicago accent (a fresh version that hasn’t been softened by months of travel or living around other accents) is one that I hadn’t run into in a while. I, myself, probably talk a lot differently after being in Oz for 4 months.

Anyways, being a small group, it was easy to get all those funny little photos taken that should happen when in Hobbiton.

like-a-hobbit

hobbit-hole

After filming, the movie set was supposed to be fully torn down and returned to its original state. However, halfway through the process, it started raining and teardown was delayed, finally resulting in the opportunity for the landowners to cut a deal and keep the remaining set alive. Even though there was not much left of old Hobbiton, the information presented during the tour made it quite interesting. It was really amazing what level the film makers went to in order to achieve the perfect look. Stories of paying 11 grand for the perfect tree – one which was disassembled and reassembled with the painstaking task of gluing on thousands of fake leaves imported from Taiwan (or other country) -purchasing a styrofoam factory to mold a bridge, and even importing stunt sheep that looked more “shire like” ran rampant throughout it.

In addition to a cool tour, we even got the chance to view a live sheep shearing after which we fed baby sheep. We all didn’t quite understand why this was part of the tour, but I guess since the set is on a working sheep farm it just seemed like a logical addition. Either way, I enjoyed it and my nerdy little trip.

baby-sheep-2

CategoryNew Zealand | Comment6 Comments »

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July 13th, 2009

Visa Woes

I changed my flight.

Remember how in my last visa post I talked about wondering if a week would be enough time? Well, I had to make a decision yesterday and I didn’t think it would be sufficient.

In spite of the research I had done asking many other people how long it took to get their working holiday visa for Oz, I had a feeling mine would take longer. See, for them, it took like 2 days to get back, so if you figure that I put my application in last Wednesday evening, one would think I would have gotten my visa yesterday. However, DIAC’s inability to take a full look at my situation the first time they updated my status has led it to still not be completed.

Like I said before, they wanted me to get another chest x-ray even though I already had one in January that should be valid. I even had Patrick call DIAC for me on Friday to make sure this fact was known, however, they still didn’t update the status until yesterday that I no longer need the x-ray. Since processing probably officially started after that moment, I had to figure it would be 48 hrs at least from that time until the visa is approved (or not), and that meant that I had to change my flight.

I know I should be happy about the extended stay, right? But, to be honest, I just haven’t felt New Zealand. For starters, NZ feels like an outdoorsy type of place, and its just bloody cold! Besides this, a lot of the beautiful scenery is better accessible by driving around, another activity that would be better done if I were with other people and renting a vehicle. And, its just more of the money I had finally started to save in Oz, in hopes of exploring Oz, that I’m spending.

Don’t get me wrong, I would love to do New Zealand, but I would have to do it under different circumstances so I can really experience it. Maybe I’ve been spoiled by too much adventure in the past. There’s nothing like the thrill of getting from point A to B when you don’t know the language in a strange foreign country, but here, its just too easy ;)

I’m off people! I need to make some travel plans now!

CategoryAustralia, New Zealand | Comment1 Comment »

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July 10th, 2009

Conquering an Ant Hill

I perused the wall of pamphlets and things to do in Auckland in the hostel until I found a few items that caught my attention. One of these was an adventure over to Rangitoto Island where I could scale volcanoes. How could I pass that one up?!

I hopped onto the computer to check out the ferry details from Auckland only to find myself surprised. No services were running to Rangitoto this week (only) because of pest eradication. What a bummer, yeah? I thought so, too.

So, I went with the second best option and hopped a quick ferry to Devonport, which, from the information I had gathered, had a “volcanic cone” you can walk up. Now, I know what a volcano should look like, but the “cone” part got me. What did that mean?

extinctvolcano

I immediately saw what that meant when I arrived and saw this mound in my view. “You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said to myself. Seriously, I’ve seen ant hills bigger than this “volcanic cone”! On the plus side, I well welcomed the challenge of conquering this peak, which would be nothing like the torturous climb of Mount Pacaya back in Guatemala that left me weak and fearing for my life at every step.

"You've got to be kidding me," I said to myself.

“You’ve got to be kidding me,” I said to myself.

Ant hill or not, I still managed to work up a bit of a sweat. Uphill climbs and I are just not friends – heck, we’re not even acquaintances! Luckily the climb was full of peaks hinting of the final view from the top to keep me going… (that and a 75 year old man kicking my ass on the walk). How am I so unfit if I spend loads of time everyday walking everywhere?!

Finally, I reached the top of my ant hill, only to be amazed at how great the view actually was from a seemingly tiny hill.

industrialness

mushroomtops

ontopsmallAuckland, in all of its industrial looking-ness, sat in clear view and whitewashed in a bright sunshine. Some random youngsters took advantage of the great photo moments a strange mushroom field provided. I looked on in envy as they shared their travels together, a feeling I tried to recreate in this weird self-portrait… unsuccessfully (ha). Everyone on top – except for the poor man that lost his dog – appeared to be fully enjoying the feeling of being on top… and conquering an ant hill.

CategoryNew Zealand | Comment4 Comments »

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July 9th, 2009

New Zealand Visa Run Fun Fun

Ok, fine people, I’ll update my blog already :) I guess I just do so much writing for work nowadays that I’m all blogged out when I’m at home, leaving this little blog hanging. I can’t even begin to pick a place to talk about, so I’ll just start with the present. I am in New Zealand!

After spending four months in Australia, my weird little visa expired, so I came to New Zealand to apply for my working holiday visa. I arrived in Auckland yesterday, but not without the proper set of hoop jumping necessary to make it that much more of an endeavor. To start off the day, when I made it to the airport (thanks for the ride, Pat!) I had to wait in a massively long line. And, not only was it long, it was also SLOW-MOVING, which angers me more than traffic jams. I had to stand there for freaking ever. I’m not sure why it was so crazy slow, but I will say that even a large group of people that was well ahead of me in line was STILL there after I left, and that was no short adventure for me.

Well I did something stupid. Apparently you need to have proof of onward travel from New Zealand BEFORE you can get your boarding pass to go there. I thought I looked this up because it seemed like something I had heard about before, but I must have been misinformed. I only purchased the one way ticket because I wasn’t sure about how long it would take to get my visa.

I had to immediately buy a ticket back for Wednesday hoping that would be enough time. Will it?! I don’t know. The Australian Department of Immigration and Citizenship informed me that it normally takes 48 hours to process an online application. However, something in the back of mind told me that I would have complications because of my travel resume.

And of course, there is a little bit of controversy. Not too long ago, I phoned DIAC asking if I would need to get a medical exam. They said I may need to get a chest Xray, but since I had already had one in January of this year, it should still be on file and valid.

But, I received an email today stating that I need to have a chest Xray. Poo. I emailed the office back because they don’t have a phone number I can call from outside of Australia, so that makes it more frustrating. I can always change my plane ticket back, but who wants to do that?

Hopefully I’ll get it sorted without needing another Xray because who knows how long that will take? Oh visas. Fun stuff!

CategoryAustralia, New Zealand | Comment4 Comments »

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