Tino and I began our second quarter at New River Academy a little early this year. Both being east coast boys, we had a long flights over to New Zealand. Luckily the flight from San Francisco
was on one of the nicest airplanes either of us has been in. We enjoyed
watching a movie of our choice, good meals and plenty of leg room even
though we are each about 6 feet tall. We arrived in Auckland early Wednesday morning,
skipping Tuesday and got through customs quickly. We had a truck rented
and were on the road a couple hours after landing. Next up was getting
a cell phone, which was taken care of right before getting a fantastic
breakfast at none other then McDonalds.
Yes folks, Mickey D’s is in New Zealand, and its better in the southern
hemisphere. Before heading down to Rotorua, we stopped in to check out
the van that we rented for the quarter. It was a great, greenish-blue
Toyota, that should serve us well. With all that done by lunch, we
headed south to Rotorua. Once we got out of Auckland, we began to see
what New Zealand is all about, beatiful rolling green hills and
mountains, covered in sheep, with some amazing rivers. Even though we
had been traveling for about 40 hours, once we had lodging for the
night we had to drive down to the Kaituna River
to have a look. Tino had enough of looking and had to jump into his
boat. He was able to play for a solid hour at this world class playhole
with only me fliming till it got too dark. We made the short 5 minute
drive back to the Lake Rotoiti Holiday Park, which we will be staying
at for about 2 weeks this quarter and caught up on sleep. We continued
the quest the following morning and drove a couple hours down to the
Bliss Stick factory. The people there were super helpful and let us
watch them work for awhile and explain their boat production. They sent
us away with 4 boats to try, so when the school is at the factory we
will pick which boat we want and assist in the production of the boat.
This will allow students to pick custom colors and graphics. We then
drove a few minutes to the RIver Valley Lodge located on the Rangitikei river.
We will spend a week there, with the river right below us and large
cliffs above. Tino and I then made our way back to the Lake Rotoiti
Holiday Park. Tomorrow we will test out the new Bliss Stick boats on
the Kaituna river, just a 2 minute drive and prepare a few more things
before the schools arrival. By coming down early, we insure a smooth
transition into New Zealand, as Tino and I have already made the
mistake of driving on the right side of road, which is the wrong side.
Ian
The Rolling Green hills of the NZ
Sheep! They’re around
The beginning of the mountains here
The truck and the Mountains
The Jungle and the Kaituna River, Our home run for the next few weeks
More Green rolling Hills and Sheep
The good Old Kaituna Hole. At a Sick Level! Just Waiting for our crew to tear it up.
Sunset Over our trusty truck and the NZ
Paddle Hard,
Tino
