KeriKeri

Here are some photos at the hot beach I forgot to include:

With more hands and shovels we were able to build hot tub walls that could face the barrage of sea water during "low tide"

kind of

Can you dig it?

The fishing pole we brought from Christchurch turned out to be missing the reel handle, which turns out to be important for fishing...who knew? At first we remedied the problem with an Allan Wrench, but seeing as the bait was the size of a normal fish I would catch we had to rethink our reel predicament. Our very courteous hostel owner when asked for suggestions suggested that we use his pole instead. I think it must have also been broken, because we still didn't catch anything.

We ate a feast of braughts, mashed potatoes, and local grilled vegetables as a pot luck among our fellow backpackers

Yet another glorious beach and night sky. I tried very hard to get a picture of the bio luminescence lighting up the waves, but you just have to see it for yourself.

Where 80s polar fleece comes from

Adorably awkward creatures

We met up with Devin and Emily's friend's friends, Richard and Nicky who graciously hosted us for three nights in their beautiful house in Kerikeri. The first day they took us "quadbiking" near 90 mile beach where we sufficiently shredded the gnar, gripped it, shredded it, and broke it (well, one of the bikes). After our long day of quadbiking we watched the movie "Point Break" to brush up on our early 90s surfer colloquisms. The next day we went out on a boating tour of Kerikeri from the bay, and spent an hour lounging in his parents luxurious launch (unfortunately Richard's father is still convelescing from a knee replacement surgery so we couldn't take the big boat out). We supplemented the boat tour with a driving tour of Kerikeri and the surrounding areas and finished off the night with dinner at his parents house. Tomorrow we leave Richard and Nicky for a slow drive back towards Auckland to drop Sam and I off at the airport for our flight to Tonga.

A warning to other cars

Atop a huge sand dune

Something went wrong with the starter on one of the bikes, so we had to tow it back

We stopped to collect green lipped mussels for dinner

we had many to choose from

Devin and I rode back in the the back of the truck with the rain cover tucking us in like sardines

Abel Tasman and Up!

I apologize ahead of time if these captions make no sense, but I am a wee bit tipsy because it took so freakin long to upload all of these photos (it cost about $26NZD to post all of these as far as internet time goes)

Also, if it seems the captions are incomplete, it is because they are.

Approaching Morikai Beach, or something like that. Unfortunately the tide was high, and we had to run in between waves.

The beach is known for its round boulders, not its stable or scalable beach side cliffs.

Deer farm...oh deer

Kaikoura, a beautiful area where mountains meet the ocean and sam meets seal

These lazy roustabouts contribute nothing to society. They just lay around on kelp all day eating fish and frolicking in the waves.

Two lovely German girls we repeatedly ran into on our journey north

Puka shell!

puka shell (no exclamation point)

Caves!

YAY! a tiny light house.

like money in the bank...our first day in Marahau on the path to Abel Tasman

We spent the first three days along the Abel Tasman trail kayaking very slowly along the craggy coast. Because we were in kayaks we could carry much more weight than we normally would while hiking, so we ate like kings!

I was having an argument as to whether this rock looked like Hades from the Disney version of "Hercules" or Hexes from "Fern Gully", I sided with Hades.

He jumps like a flea

I cannot believe this rock isn't more widely advertised in NZ, because it looks exactly like a kiwi.

what a trooper, smiling for the camera after being impaled

Caves!

I'm Pro Glow Worms!

Sam experiments with cryptozoology

sea star

chitin

Cave Weta...looks just like a shrimp without the tail

un/fortunately there is no scale, because that weta is about 6in from antenna to leg

Needless to say, we had a feast

tiny mushroom

Huge Stingray about 4ft wing span

Sam's message to his mom

The quintessential website pandering. In order to get the letters reflecting off of the water I had to write the message while up to my thighs in icy water

terrifying yet endearing

If you look closely you will see my dazzlingly white thighs and boxers beneath the writing

Pristine water on a glorious day!

seeing as it is hard to pass the camera to sam, i had to make due with another chin shot

When we first paddled up this river there was nothing, and my first comment as we were freezing our arses off was "shouldn't there be baby seals frolicking around us?" And sure enough

After about 10 min the pups warmed up to us and were easily within clubbing distance

If you ever wished you could be a bird so you could surf the air currents, seals will make you want to change mediums...but then I guess you could probably go for some sort of ocean bird that does both...i don't know, but the point is seals make swimming fun again.

Reasons for paying attention to the tide

I was like totally all up in this crabs grill

low tide in the estuary

Oyster Catchers

I fell twice into this stream trying to get these pictures

luckily i had waterproof shoes. On the down side the water went up to my thighs

Mushrooms!

I thought they might have glowing mushrooms in NZ so I went back at night about 30 min into the trail, but a possum surprised me and i lost my nerve and turned around.

Ducks!

I know i know, its backwards

river at night under the full moon

totally looks like a fake seal with eyes too big for its head

I would try to onomatopoeia you some seal sounds, but I just don't think we have the vowel sounds in english to give them the right guttural sound...maybe in Cyrillic

Eric: "that's a jumping starfish"
Sam: "why do they call it a jumping starfish?"

Sam: "I guess I answered my own question"

the most unfriendly part of NZ

It was okay though, because there is a ridiculous cafe in the middle of the Abel Tasman track for when you need to wake up after those early morning river crossings

Crossing the Deleware

Ripe for photoshopping

Experimenting with blur

Sam's eyes were bigger than his stomach (i was trying to do some sort of pun with his eyes eating light, but then realized it was wierd and obscure, hence this side note)

Early morning river crossing

Throwing rocks at the sun to wake it up

It worked

Lychin! my favorite

A fire in one of the few fire pits along the track with some more lovely German girls

We got a water taxi back from the northern most part of the track. We would have been stranded there had there not been a pay phone near by, because they wrote us a ticket for the correct day, but scheduled us for a day later pick up.

We met back up with Devin and Emily in Picton where we took the ferry across to Wellington

Wellington was bustling, has a sweet museum, and was totally windy

Fumerols near Rotorua

This expression captures so much, I like to think that sam is thinking, oh god, there are going to be some photos posted on the blog that I will regret immediately. Undoubtedly, his intuition is correct.

Boiling mud!

High Five with tiny Emily

Sacrificing herself to the vocano

...it threw sam back

There it is, and a nickname is born

Whenever I am driving, I feel uneasy because it looks like the car is winking at me

Hot water fall! At kerosin creek

bunch of soggy degenerates if you ask me

Hes got that look in his eye

water cape

bigger hot waterfall

Zorbing...matilda's revenge

Ever since I saw Jackie Chan's Super Cop I have wanted to go zorbing, but I always thought it would be too expensive. This was very reasonable if you look at the extreme sports ratio: $/adrenaline

There are two options for zorbing: strapped in and dry where you tumble head over heals, or suspended in hot water as a glorified waterslide. Both are fun, but the water one looks desterbingly like a frog egg where you burst through the ectoderm in a barage of water practically naked and screaming

Yet another free hot river that meets a cold river so you can find just the right temp and nook

In the "town" of Hahei...Hey Haw

Obviously I have cruised timber

If you look very closely at this sea gull you will see that it is missing its right foot.

no words, except maybe "nice job ruining a perfectly good picture with your goofy looking face Devin"

You may recognize this sea arch (Cathedral Cove) from the movie Prince Caspian, although I hope you won't have, because it is a terrible movie

Devin Djinn

abstract... 4 min exposure with the camera held to my chest while hiking

Flash with above abstractness

Even NZs pests are adorable. Here is Emma displaying a balled up hedgehog, ready for croquet

"low tide" at the hot water beach where we frantically tried to build ourselves a hot tub in the sand while the waves pummelled us.

I forgot to tell people i was taking a picture

Well, that is all the pictures for now. We are currently in Karikari staying with a friend of a friend of a friend and depending on weather going boating or 4 wheeling. Hopefully I will survive tomorrow long enough to post pictures.