Bath time

Helen: Ok, the last post was pretty dull. I admit it. C was standing behind me looking aggitated and hurumphing every 20 seconds or so while tapping at his watch and rolling his eyes. We were behind schedule and supposed to be on the road already. But now...now, I am sitting at my friend Sasha's laptop, in her living room, the cleanest and most relaxed I have been in a whole year as I've just had a BATH and I can spend as long as I like rabbiting on to you lot. C is on the sofa messing about with our new guitar (courtesy of Walt and Tigs on Marnie - it's a cute 'backpackers' version with steel strings which means it even sounds soulful when I accidently knock it - makes me sound like I know what I'm doing - great!) and we have the TV on in the background. How civilised does that sound?

Certainly a million miles away from last night...in a tent by the edge of Lake Waikaremoana, wearing socks and hats in our sleeping bags to keep warm. In the end we decided that the Chicken Tikka Massala was the best of the dehydrated food - but that you should stay away from the Mexican Chicken (although 'small white chunks' might be a more appropriate description than 'chicken' for the contents of either dish). The hike round the lake was wonderfully peaceful, but it made us miss home as it looked like Scotland - the scenery kept changing - rain forest one minute, then pines, up hill (a lot), then down, creeks and shore lines.

So, not much to write about the last 4 days (scenery, walking, sore feet, feeling chuffed that we were fully self sufficient the whole time, camping). Instead I thought I'd make up for the last post being rather boring. What I should have written was this:

- we had oysters with Tigs and Walter. On crackers with chili sauce. On their boat looking out over the Auckland skyline at sunset. It's not often that pre-dinner snacks are special enough to tell people about. These ones were.

- Rotorua was wierd. On the one hand it was full of backpackers who wanted to get drunk and see gysers. On the other it was this old fashioned, very English looking town. The museum was in this mock-Tudor building with a croquet lawn and a rose garden out the front. It reminded me of the Japanese who take English pubs and transport them brick by brick to Japan. So perfect it felt fake. The museum was pretty good (full of the obligatory 'god, I'm so bored' school groups) but all the information was so difficult to read as all the names are in Maori. I felt the same trying to read the book on Al Queda on Nomad - I couldn't pronounce all the Arabic names and it was hard to concentrate on the thread of a sentence. The locals don't ever seem to have a problem with Maori pronounciation though - they must get taught it in school or something! One of the most interesting things in the museum was a bit written by the local Maori iwi (tribe) about the Treaty of Whatangi (treaty that ceded NZ to the settlers). The iwi said (in so many words) that even if they didn't agree with it, their ancestors had signed it and they would honour it today. Not the usual 'we hate white people' rant I was expecting.

- we forgot to turn up to our US Embassy interview (for visas, not cos we'd done anything bad, honest). Oops. (In our defense it was almost impossible for us to call them - you can't do it from a mobile or a payphone and we don't own a private landline). Hope they don't try to arrest us when we go to America the next time...

- the area near Rotorua looks like The Shire! (Well, it would - this is near where it was filmed. We're going to Mount Doom next - will try to take a cheap ring to dispose of in the crater...)

- and finally, thought you'd think this was funny - quarentine here is very strict - you're not allowed to bring in any seeds. Not even popcorn or lentils. But, the Department of Conservation sells 'native NZ seeds' in it's shops that it encourages you to take back to your country of origin. Hypocrites!!!

OK, I'm all out of steam now! Time for the trashy 8.30 movie.
Love to you all
H&C (currently singing the 'campsite blues' on his harmonica) xx