Belated Merry Christmas!

I am a big enough person to admit that my patriotism (only word I could think of) towards the north of England has been known to descend into prejudice against the south. As it turns out, that patriotism/prejudice extended to cover the North and South islands of New Zealand too – my mind does some strange and inexplicable things. For no reason I can fathom, I was expecting the North Island to be better than the South Island but, having now spent a couple of days amongst the Smelly Southeners, I can confirm that this irrational, judgemental conclusion is complete and utter (if you’ll pardon my French) bollocks. So far, I actually can’t pick a favourite between the two, though the South has undeniably had better weather...

Tuesday we were in Wellington, and – true to North Island form – it was bucketing down. This being the case, we went to the Te Papa museum (indoors, you see) and learned some genuinely interesting stuff about Maoris, the first New Zealand settlers and giant squids (I’m not sure why either). The museum is the biggest in the country and was very impressive, but museums with my family tend to result in arguments – mum walks too slowly, dad walks too fast, my brother couldn’t give a toss about any of it and I want to look in THAT exhibit over THERE. In any case, I would certainly recommend it to anyone who visits Wellington (see above). We also had a wander round the shops, and it was here I learnt that Wellington is New Zealand’s capital (I had previously assumed it was Auckland) – I know it’s awful that I didn’t know that already, but the thing is, Wellington is really small. I’d bet money that my hometown is bigger, in population and physical size, and it certainly has more shops. (A bit of research into this led me to the intriguing discovery that New Zealand’s entire population is just shy of 5 million. I’m pretty sure that’s less than Birmingham.)

On Wednesday we got the ferry to South Island, which would have been beautiful (we were sat right at the front of the boat, facing floor-to-ceiling windows) had it not been for the shrill, obnoxious children who insisted on sitting directly between the window and me and just smacked my leg out of the way when I pointedly stretched out. The journey was three hours, and frankly any longer might have pushed me to murder (my mother was impressed that I made it three hours), on the other side of which we had a longish drive to Kiakoura. The views on this drive, for the first time since we got here, were NOT shrouded in mist and rain, which made a rather nice change. When we got to our hotel, we actually changed into our shorts and spent an hour on the beach. We were pretty shocked too. The view from our balcony in Kiakoura were incredible, actually; a bay of turquoise sea, leading onto a golden sandy beach and then straight on up to snow-capped mountains – it was quite a sight (see below for proof).

Thursday we arrived in Christchurch, which was trying so hard to be England it was almost funny. Cobblestones, place names, brick houses – they even had Cambridge-esque punts on the river. I’m mocking it, but it was actually quite nice to see the town (or maybe city – it’s kind of hard to tell here) up and running – they were hit by an earthquake a few months ago that shook many buildings down to the foundations. Nobody was killed, so English newsreaders didn’t think it worth their time, but there’s still a lot of scaffolding and fresh concrete about Christchurch, though they do seem to be largely back to normal. We actually re-met up with my mum’s friend (who’s staying with her parents in Christchurch for Christmas), which was really nice – after two weeks of motels, it’s surprisingly lovely to be in someone’s home again.

Today we drove over Arthur’s Pass, running away from the rain with all due speed, and it was quite a long one – arguably not the best way to spend Christmas Eve, but to be honest it doesn’t really feel like Christmas. As I type, my dad’s fixing baubles to the hotel lights, serenaded by Annie Lennox’s carols, whilst my mum sits on the balcony in her shorts, listening to the ocean with a beer in hand. See what I mean?

Just as a quick add on to this (which I wrote a couple of days ago), Christmas day and Boxing day were also spent driving, which I rather enjoyed actually, and there were lots of stops to see various stunning views along the way. Could be worse, really.... :P

Going Native

Just to save you all the filthy look my ignorance earned me, the natives of New Zealand are not an offshoot of the Aborigines. The Maori are, in fact, much more closely related to the natives of Hawaii, due to some massive navigation balls-up that I can’t be bothered to explain. Another difference is that the Kiwis seem to have been considerably nicer to the Maori than the Australians were/are to the Aborigines. For one, they’ve persisted with the Maori place names (to my mother’s consternation; you try asking for directions to Tewhakarewarewa and see how you like it), and – more importantly – they’ve let them keep their own land (or, in some cases, given it back after nicking it several decades ago) and villages.

We visited one example of which – the name of which is so long and convoluted it’s generally shortened to Whaka – the other day, and this one was particularly significant because it was a thermal village. This basically means that they get free, unlimited hot water for cooking, cleaning and bathing, but the additional disadvantage of a permanent odour of rotten eggs. The sulphur beneath the ground here causes the water to heat up (or possibly vice versa...), resulting in steam pools, bubbling mud, bright green sulphur lakes, active geysers and the occasional eruption of boiling water.

But to be honest, I was far less interested in the science of the thermal village, and far more intrigued by the Maori people themselves. Because this village is still lived in, by 23 different families, and still clings to all the traditions of their ancestors. Our tour guide – who had lived in the village since birth – was an absolute mine of information, and delved into fascinating detail regarding their traditions (like funeral procedures, penny diving and native dances), their cooking methods (45 seconds in a steam pool for a hard-boiled egg...lucky buggers) and their skills (8 weeks to make a skirt that’s a masterclass in proficiency but utterly useless as an item of clothing). To be honest, if I went through all of the fascinating information and demonstrations the guide went through, you’d be reading a distinctly patchy and insensible 5000 words worth of boring blog, and we can’t have that, can we? Though what does deserve a mention is the dance demonstration we went to, where a group of the Maoris gave us an example of their traditional celebratory, love and war dances, which were brilliantly performed. The war dance involved a lot of knee-slapping, arm-waving, eye-bulging and tongue-wagging, which sounds hysterical but let me tell you – were I an enemy tribe, one look at that would have had me legging it in the opposite direction (watch the beginning of a New Zealand rugby match to understand why).

Oh dear, that was a very long paragraph...

Anyway, that was probably my favourite activity of the past three days, even though that afternoon we went to a luge track. For those who don’t know, a luge is like go-karting on a slope (or sledging without the snow) – in other words, very fast, slightly scary and massively exhilarating . My mum wimped out after one slope, but my dad, brother and I threw ourselves down a couple more times. Dad and I stuck to the intermediate slope but my brother (being my brother) had to try the advanced course on his third go – I thought this was a bad idea at the time, but when I got to the bottom of the slope and saw my brother, knee-deep in the remnants of a sand pit and wearing a distinctly sheepish expression, you had to see the funny side.

That was all on Saturday, but Sunday (yesterday) and Monday (today) have both been less interesting. Sunday involved a walk round the sulphur lakes (during which it threw it down) and a lot of driving, and today has consisted almost entirely of driving. I say less interesting, but give me a driven car, a fully-charged iPod and some pretty views, and I’m happy as Larry for as long as the iPod battery lasts – so I’ve rather enjoyed it anyway.

But I used this abundance of time to come up with two very important lists, which I was going to save until later in the holiday but have spontaneously decided to write down now instead: -

Things New Zealand Does Better Than England: -
1. Countryside (kind of goes without saying)
2. L&P ( a drink that is high on flavourings, E-numbers and preservatives, and thus delicious)
3. Fanta (again, extra colouring makes it the proper orange stuff – no healthy yellow crap)
4. Tim Tams (like Penguins, but so much better)
5. Thick pillows (this might be specific to hotels, but still)
6. People (it’s lacking in terms of my friends, but the general population are much friendlier)

Things England Does Better Than New Zealand: -
1. My friends (again, goes without saying)
2. Tea (but my mum brought her own stash of Yorkshire tea bags, so we’re good :P)
3. Chocolate (this goes for more or less every country, I’ve found...)
4. Mugs with handles on (this was intensely confusing to begin with)

You could argue that the proportions (ratio? Maths words were never my strong suit...) of my lists suggests I’m going native, but since I have to turn the computer off now to eat my takeaway fish and chips, I’d say I’ve still got a fair amount of British-ness left in me...

(Couldn't post any photos on this due to my dad hovering behind me, breathing fire about it being my brother's turn on the laptop.)

A Very Promising Start...

If anyone ever finds themselves in the Bay of Islands, I would thoroughly recommend they stay at Cook’s Lookout (the above photo is evidence as to why). Though I was slightly disappointed in discovering that the fantastically named owners, Norm and Sheila, were from Liverpool. Still, Cook’s Lookout was a brilliant two-night stopover in the breathtakingly beautiful Paihia (pronounced Pie-hee-uh, and not, as my mother insisted, Pie-high).

The Bay of Islands is my new answer to anyone who asks me where I would emigrate to, and for many good reasons. The sheer gorgeousness (is that a word?) was one, the friendly people were another (though it must be noted that, of these lovely people, one was from Derby, two from Liverpool and one from Ireland), and the general atmosphere was a finishing flourish.

But the boat trip we took was the cherry on top of a fantastic location. What with the warm (if cloudy) weather, top-deck seats and the tall, rather gorgeous Kiwi who charmingly gave me a hand onto the boat (I suffered a sudden and brief loss of balance on approach...it was very odd...), I was already pretty happy. But the three hour trip had only just begun. Even though my dolphin phase was several years ago, I can’t tell you how thrilled I was to see bottlenose dolphins in the wild, and that was before they started doing somersaults (and, less fortunately, mating) a foot away from our boat. I’m a sucker for boat trips anyway, but this one surpassed all others; performing wild dolphins, gorgeous crew, witty tour guides, fascinating stories and beautiful islands. My grin was virtually splitting my face.

I could have happily stayed on that boat all day, despite the cloudy weather. Though, apparently, the New Zealand sun pwns (I can’t believe I used that term either...jet lag is setting in...) all obstacles, clouds included, and I have once again been bitten in the arse by the Gods of sunburn. I’m particularly sore (pun...get it?) about this occasion, partly because there was no effing sun visible, but mainly because I was wearing sunglasses all day, and thus am sporting the oh-so-sexy anti-panda eyes. That, plus a recent lack of access to competent straighteners has resulted in the vision of perfection you see below. (I don’t know why I put that photo on the internet either.)

Anyway, this morning I was dragged (kicking and screaming) from the Bay of Islands and back to Auckland. Here we met up with an old friend of my mum’s, who was – thankfully – exactly how I like my family friends to be; talkative, blunt and slightly batty. The fact that she promised I could stay with her in my gap year and has a 6’4’’ son didn’t exactly embitter me towards her, either.

I was all geared up to say that Auckland had been a bit of a disappointment, but this morning I saw it from a whole new angle. Literally. My brother and I both jumped off the Sky Tower (the tallest building in New Zealand), which - to give you the statistics that meant nothing to me - is 192 metres, 630 feet, 11 seconds of freefall high. That's big. And I have to say, it was not as terrifying as I expected it to be -- my knees held out throughout being suited up, all the way up the lift, during the thousands of checks and even whilst walking onto the platform. The only moment where I really felt The Fear was when my toes were hanging off the edge, I was staring down at nearly 200 metres of air and the guy said "3...2...1 GO!" By the time he got to '2', I literally had every instinct in my body screaming abuse at me: "WE HAVE KEPT YOU ALIVE FOR SEVENTEEN AND A HALF YEARS, ONLY FOR YOU TO THROW YOURSELF OFF A BLOODY BUILDING ON PURPOSE?!?!!?!??" (Which, coincidentally, was more or less my mother's attitude as well.) But the free fall was absolutely incredible, and I'd recommend it to anyone who isn't made physically ill by heights...

That should have been the highlight of the day, but then we drove down to an area called Matamata, which was the location used for Hobbiton in the Lord of the Rings. Now, for those of you who don't know, I am a hardcore film geek, and Lord of the Rings is a particular point of nerdiness in me - I was in heaven. Especially since after the initial trilogy was filmed, the 'hobbit holes' at Matamata had been demolished, and all that was left were plywood fronts and big empty circles where doors used to be. BUT....they are of course re-using the set for the filming of The Hobbit, which begins production some time next year. Cue; embarrassing levels of excitement. This basically means that they have rebuilt the Hobbiton set from scratch, and not only does it look EXACTLY the same as it did in the original films, but there are EXTRA BITS!!! And these are so secretive, that I had to sign a contract saying I wouldn't post my Hobbiton photos on the internet :P So obviously I can't really expand, other than to say that it was one of the nerdiest, and happiest, afternoons of my existence.

So, all in all, it's hard to see how the rest of the holiday is really going to compare......

Alcatraz and America's Answer To Blackpool...

I realised this morning that I’d never actually seen a prison before, meaning that what I was expecting from Alcatraz was basically directly plagiarised from The Shawshank Redemption. And do you know what – because I’m not sure whether or not this is surprising – that was pretty much bang on. I was having Shawshank flashbacks throughout the (remarkably good) audio tour. One thing that did surprise me was the size of Alcatraz – it’s really quite tiny, particularly considering I was picturing something more like the Isle of Wight...

But it isn’t the physical aspects of Alcatraz that make it fascinating – it’s the stories. In the 48 years it was used as a prison, there were 36 escape attempts, and of them, only 5 prisoners remain unaccounted for (which could just as easily mean fish food as free). And what cracking stories they make. There was one poor sod who escaped his cell, successfully swam the 1 ¼ miles to San Francisco – by which time he was so cold he couldn’t actually climb out of the water – only to be dobbed in by a bunch of kids who saw him struggling in the water, tried to help and called the police. Oops.

But the only successful escape attempt took place in June 1962, and was immortalised by Clint Eastwood in the subtly named ‘Escape From Alcatraz’. Basically, three blokes made fake heads to cover their absence in bed and dug out their air-vents with spoons. Yes, that’s right, spoons. Now that is dedication. They managed to slip past the guards and build a makeshift raft, and were never seen again. The chances are they simply drowned trying to swim to San Francisco, but I’d like to think they made it to freedom – they certainly deserved a break after that....spoons, for crying out loud...

It has to be said that I was looking forward to Alcatraz more than anything else in San Francisco, and it didn’t disappoint, unlike Fisherman’s Wharf, which was so touristy and tacky my mum christened it ‘The American Blackpool’ which – coming from a woman who grew up in Blackpool, is fairly scathing. Pier 39, by contrast, was exactly what Fisherman’s Wharf should have been; authentic, quirky and enjoyable. The shops were brilliant – there was a memorabilia shop that could have kept me entertained for hours (though everything in it was laughably out of my price range – the most ludicrous being a guitar signed by Elvis, which was going for the bargain price of $25,000) and a specialised shop that sold exclusively socks. I love America.
We also biked the Golden Gate Bridge in our time here, which – despite being a cold and distinctly windy experience – is a very cool thing to have done. Overall I thoroughly enjoyed my time in San Francisco, however brief, and would happily come back – though I would stand by my initial impression that it just doesn’t have the vibe of New York, or the friendliness of Canada. Though the visit reignited my general irritation with Americans’ complete inability to identify a North British accent – in the two days I’ve been here, different people have asked me if I’m Australian, Scottish, Irish and – my personal favourite – Dutch. I ask you.

But right now, I am sat in the international terminal of LAX airport, following a brief internal flight and waiting to begin the dreaded 14-hour ordeal to New Zealand. Point of interest though – due to the time difference, Monday 13th December 2010 will never exist for me – we fly out of LA on Sunday night and arrive in Auckland on Tuesday morning. So how ‘bout that?

Airplane! And First Impressions of San Francisco

I think it says something about my internal age that, when faced with an 11 hour flight and a list of about 20 films, the 3 I chose to watch were Shrek Forever After, The Incredibles and Toy Story 3.

I have to say, Heathrow to San Francisco hasn't been one of my worst flights so far (with 4 hours left to go...though the sudden realisation that I'm barely halfway through was a bit of a nasty one...). Which is surprising really, since I've spent the past 24 hours brewing an absolute stinker of a cold, and have spent the majority of this flight sniffling and trying to locate the least-gross place to secrete dirty tissues. But we are over halfway there now, and boredom hasn't completely killed off my braincells. Yet. But between kid's films, my book - which I'm intentionally taking desperately slowly - and my iPod, this really hasn't been so bad. I've only accidentally nearly tripped three people (long legs and no leg room - bad combination), successfully avoided the plane food and only once been spotted surreptitiously fishing my iPod out of my bra (no pockets...).

I mean don't get me wrong, I'm still itching for the plane to land, but the dulcet tones of Alex Day/Charlie McDonnell, witty writings of Jonathan Stroud and re-runs of Doctor Who will see me through...

*LATER*
So after an average to bad flight (turns out the pressure of having a cold plus the pressure of descending in a plane results in your head feeling like it's literally going to explode), the taxi from airport to hotel felt like quite the adventure. It has to be said that whilst San Francisco doesn't quite have the buzz or notoriety of New York, it certainly is not lacking in variety. I was making mental notes of 'weird things on the streets of San Francisco' throughout the drive, and after the lone woman sitting casually outside a cafe dressed as a pirate, the man standing in the middle of a five-lane motorway handing out Chinese menus and the lunatic drivers, I thought I'd seen it all. Then came the billboard of the Last Supper, with Michael Jackson's face superimposed over Jesus'. Only in America.

Still, it was nice to get to the hotel (despite the fact the corridors look eerily similar to those in The Shining), and I'm looking forward to properly exploring the eccentric San Francisco.

Packing. AAAAAAAAAAARRRRRRRRRRGGGGGGGGGGGHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!

You always know it's coming. As much as you look forward to a holiday, it's always lurking at the back of your mind...and as the Big Date approaches, it begins looming over your shoulder, waiting to pounce....and this year, a full fortnight before we fly, it began.....

"Bex, have you packed *insert completely pointless object here*?"

This phrase literally haunts my nightmares.

Just to be clear, my mum and I get on really well -- generally speaking, I'm of the belief that she's the best mum in the world. But there are exceptions to every rule. And, in my house, packing is one of them - one of the only things that will inevitably result in a blazing row between myself and my mum. And I don't think I'm generally being unreasonable about this; but see for yourself. This is a genuine conversation/argument my mother and I had earlier: -

My mum: Bex, have you packed your black shoes?
Me: No, I'm wearing those on the plane. I've packed my trainers.
My mum: Well, you can't do that.
Me:...because...?
My mum: Well they're far too big. They won't fit in the case.
Me *through gritted teeth*: They're already in the case.
My mum: *pause* Well they won't fit after you've packed you're 74 zillion t-shirts and thousands of unnecessary pairs of pants. And have you considered packing a gas mask? You know, just in case the world explodes whilst we're away...

Okay, so maybe I edited the ending slightly, but you get the gist. And it wasn't helped that when I got home from school today I was in a foul mood, owing to the long list of things that needed doing tonight. However, I was barely five minutes into task #1: finish English Language coursework, when the past week's worth of post arrived (this being due to the snow and a bloody lazy postman). At first this worsened my mood (there were two book rejections with my name on them smirking up at me from a pile of birthday cards for my brother), though when I discovered that the two CDs I'd ordered from DFTBA had arrived, my whole day perked up considerably. That was a pointless little anecdote, but it's the soundtrack to which I'm writing this, so I thought I'd add it. :)

Anyway. Packing. It is the devil incarnate. Though actually, I think I'm more or less done now - I fended off the miniature sewing kit and two-metre length of string (I'm not kidding), and have a bag that is pleasantly three-quarters-filled with books, toiletries and clothes. And it has all been packed under strict instruction, within plenty of time, and with only about six arguments. Possibly a new record.

And though I am UNBELIEVABLY excited about tomorrow, it has also just occurred to me that next summer I'm going to have to pack up my entire bedroom to go to university. FML.

So This Is A Thing That Is Happening.....

I'm going to New Zealand on Friday.

*pause for freak-out*

And actually, that's not technically accurate - on Friday I'm getting a plane from London to San Francisco, spending a couple of days there and, on Sunday evening, flying out to New Zealand. When I first tell people this, their standard reactions tend to be: -
1. Are you emigrating?!?!?!
2. Oh.....like a gap year thing?
3. You lucky *insert swearword here*
So, to avoid confusion, no I'm not emigrating, no I'm not going on a gap year (yet) and yes, I am a lucky *&~#. No, it's actually just a family holiday for me, my little brother and parents. I say 'just' a family holiday - it's the longest and most expensive one we've ever been on by a LONG way, but since it might be our last time going away all together (because I'm off to uni next year), we thought we'd pull out all the stops.

And I'm not just posting this on my blog to gloat. Ha. I'm actually posting this as a sort of introduction to what I'm hoping will be a series of travel-blogs, which my friends can keep up to date with (read: forget the existence of) and which I can read back in a few months time and remember how good life can be.

So the plan for New Zealand is to drive from the top of North Island to about halfway down South Island (I'll give you place names when I'm actually there -- at this point I actually only know random names like 'Christchurch', 'Rotorua' and then a series of places that sound like someone listing Chinese food through a sneeze). We're going to be there for just under three weeks, on top of a couple of days in San Francisco on the way out and a couple of days in Los Angeles on the way back. I am, understandably, obnoxiously excited about this - more excited than I think I've ever been for a holiday, and there are several personal goals I want to accomplish whilst I'm out there.

One of these is to keep a regular blog. Obviously I don't know how much internet access I'm going to have, or time to write, but I'll do my best and I HOPE I'm going to be able to update twice a week, at least... The theory behind this is that if I'm doing some kind of regular writing again, hopefully it will wear my writer's block down a little, to be able to make a fresh start in the new year...

Another of these aims is, frankly, to cheer up. One way or another, I've been feeling quite down lately, what with writer's block, an overactive imagination and a general feeling of being ignored by anyone and everyone in any professional capacity. And when other people are down it winds me up, and it has now actually reached a stage where I'm winding myself up, so my attitude is -- if I can't buck up in New Zealand, what the hell hope is there??

My third aim - which kind of relates to aim two - is something I stole from nerimon's video blogs. I wear a plaited bracelet on my right wrist (given to me by the lovely LadyRosalind), and my challenge is - for twenty one days (or, whilst I'm in New Zealand) to not complain about anything. Everytime I complain I have to swap my bracelet to the other wrist and start the countdown from scratch. I'm sure my friends wish they were around to see this, and I think we all know I'll give up on day two, but there's no harm in trying...

But yeah, I think that's basically it....so I guess I'll see you in New Zealand!

Snow!!

So there are eighteen inches of snow outside my house.

GGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

As cool as this is, however, and as much as I have been longing for such a thing to happen for the past, oh...............seventeen years of my life, I have actually now discovered the flaws of so much snow: -
1. All of my friends are snowed in.
2. It's too deep to actually walk anywhere.
3. Cars/buses/trains/every other kind of transport is not an option.
4. The Madness gig I was supposed to be going to tonight looks like it's off the cards :(

But nonetheless, GGGGGGGGGGGAAAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHHH!!!!!!!!!!!