Down Under Part 8...I'm So Fancy

"In that moment, we were infinite"

After our night in Rotarua we had to continue on as we still had plenty to see and do.  We got up that morning and did some souvenir shopping and then ate at Fat Dog Cafe.  I drank so much hot chocolate in New Zealand it was ridiculous.  The cafe was super cute.  Then we headed to the redwood forest.  Yes, there is one in New Zealand too.  I didn't think I would enjoy myself there as much as I did.  It was so pretty just walking through all the tall trees.  We hugged a few of them.  After the forrest we went to Hukka Falls.  And then...we went to our hotel.

I'll admit that when Liz said we could all fit in one room (6 of us) I kinda thought we would be staying in one giant room with a bunch of twin beds kinda like 5th grade sleep away camp.  I was so wrong.  As we were driving into Lake Taupo I saw the Hilton up on the hill and I laughed saying how it was too bad we couldn't stay there...and then Sarah, Liz, and Kristina's car turned into the Hilton.  No Way!  Yep, it was true.  We stayed at the New Zealand Lake Taupo Hilton.  When I saw our room I could have cried I was so excited.  This was probably one of the nicest hotels I've ever stayed at.  Drumroll please.......we stayed in a three bedroom, two bathroom suite with a full kitchen, living room, dining room and four balconies.  I felt like a movie star.  Me and Bri got a room together with our own fluffy beds and a balcony that had a view of the pool and hot tub.  We each got our own bathrobe and slippers.  Oh and while we were at the hotel there happened to be an Aston Martin convention...so we practically went to a car show in the hotel parking garage.

We were only supposed to stay there one night so we packed that first day there with swimming, hot tubbing, eating plates of cheese and meats and bread and such...and sparkling grape (aka fake booze).  We of course had to drink our fake booze out of wine glasses in our bathrobes because we were just that fancy.  We watched the Lord of the Rings first movie because we seriously just went to Hobbiton and we had a fancy hotel to watch it in.  It was a glorious day.

The next morning we were supposed to leave.  I wanted the dang New Zealand chocolate milk that I still hadn't found yet.  So I got my butt out of bed and drove myself to the grocery store at like 6:30am.  It was unpleasant and the people at the store laughed at me.  The problem with that is this isn't china...I speak your language.  I can understand you making fun of me...whatevs.  Anyway I waited and waited and end of story I never got my chocolate milk.  Erin finally found some months after we left.  Someday I will drank that dumb chocolate milk.  It's going to happen...just not for a while.  So I head back to the hotel and Liz, Sarah, and Kristina have decided that it's so awesome and glorious there that they want to stay another night!!  Well so do we...so we do.  It was a good decision.

  

               

We spent that day shopping for gifts for people/ourselves.  I finally decided that I really wanted a Rugby All Blacks Jersey.  It was expensive, but I'm super happy I got it.  I think I would have regretted it if I didn't.  I also got my mom a pretty jade bracelet.  It rained a lot that day so it was nice to go back to our hotel and relax and finish our cheese and fake booze.  The hot tub was next on the to do list.  We met some interesting people that day.  First there was banana hammock man.  Bri got some real interesting pictures of him when she was spying on him from our room.  He was old and had seen way too much sun.  He spent his evening drinking beer after beer in the hot tub (is that safe)?  Anyway he was actually really friendly.  We maybe saw way too much of him, but interesting character to chat with and remember for years to come.  Banana hammock man had a friend named Brent (I called him wineo Brent).  He was young and also an interesting character to chat with.  His drink of choice was wine...hence his nickname.  He game us some good food advice for our next night in Hamilton.  It was quite the evening chat with these people in the hot tub.

 


That night we ended up watching the second LOTR movie since we were there and we could.  The beds there were so comfy.  The next morning we were headed back to Auckland with a stop in Hamilton.  But not before I took one last swim and spent some time in the sauna/steam room.  I loved that hotel and hope one day I can go back and stay for a week.  It was so relaxing and beautiful there.  I loved every minute.

Down Under Part 7...Frolicking through Hobbiton

I am not a big Lord of the Rings/Hobbit fan.  And by this I mean I slept through the last Hobbit movie...in the theater.  I mean I love Orlando Bloom and I like the overall message of The Lord of the Rings.  I think it's a great story, if we could just leave out 90% of the fighting that'd be great.  I mean the fighting could still happen, but maybe I don't have to watch it.  That being said, I loved this day.  Anyway Monday morning the 10th of November we got up at Erin's in Buckland Beach and headed for Hobbiton.  Like the actual Hobbiton. That's right, be jealous.

Totally driving on the right
side of the car!!

Our car was me, Caryn, and Bri.  I started out driving and we followed Sarah, Liz, and Kristina.  Once we were out driving for a bit we stopped to take some pictures at some pretty lookouts and then we stopped at a little diner type place in the middle of nowhere to get some food/drinks and such.  

Then we took one of the prettiest drives I think I've ever been on.  It was probably the long way to get to Hobbiton, but it was completely worth it.  It really set the mood for the whole day.  It was green rolling hills, big puffy clouds, and blue skies.  I took this opportunity to bust out the one song from Lord of the Rings I had on my iphone which I think was the main song and I put it on repeat until we got there.  The music with the drive was seriously unbelievable.  

Then we pull up to this sheep farm (cue the sheep jokes, i.e. I am in sheep, do you know sheep PR?, The sheeps they go baa they go baa they go baa baa baa etc.) and it's actually where we buy our tickets for Hobbiton.  So we buy our tickets and look around and take some pictures while we wait for our tour.  Once it's time for our tour we hop on a giant bus with a bunch of other people and head for the hills.  It wasn't a very long drive.  Like 5-10 minutes maybe.  

It was so neat when we got there.  I don't think I can fully explain it right.  You walk down this path and then all of a sudden you're standing at the bottom of a bunch of hills and there are tons and tons of hobbit holes everywhere that are little houses.  There are gardens and trees and all sorts of shenanigans. I probably have a picture with almost every hobbit house.  Bri and I had our picture taking down pat.  We would swap super fast to take pics so we didn't get in people's way too much...yet.  (I'll admit writing this right now almost 6 months later I'm looking at the beautiful pictures we all took and I'm almost crying because I loved it so much and want to be there again).  So we weren't actually allowed in the Hobbit holes because most of them there was nothing behind the doors since this was the outside set.  But there was one we could stand in and peek our heads out of.  Then we get to the main house...Bag End.  The tree above it is fake and apparently every dang leaf was hand painted.  I guess if you make the Lord of the Rings movies you're allowed to ask whatever you want of people who work for you and they do it.  

So me and Bri had previously discussed frolicking through Hobbiton.  We decided it would be best if it was filmed.  Bag End is at the top of a hill so I had Caryn film and play the LOTR song while me and Bri frolicked in Hobbiton down the little hill.  Some people's reactions were priceless.  It was totally worth it!  We took another opportunity to frolic around the May pole from the party field scene area.  That time we accidentally hit the May pole which had bells at the top so we had to run away fast so we didn't get caught.  Again, it was so amazing there.  I can't even describe the feeling I had standing there looking out at everything.

The last part of the Hobbiton tour was that you got to go to the Green Dragon Pub and get a drink.  Of the drinks two were alcoholic and one was not (the ginger beer).  So we all go up to the counter to order and I start to drink mine...twas not ginger beer, but instead was a delightful hard apple cider.  It was yum...but I behaved and gave it back and got my ginger beer.  Then we went over to order some treats from this cute bar tender dude.  He posed for my picture.  So we all sat there in the Green Dragon eating and drinking until someone discovered that even the bathrooms were themed and cool there.  Of course they were.

      

Once we were done we got back on the bus and headed out of Hobbiton.  We spent a little time in the gift shop getting a few people gifts and signing the guest book.  Then it was time to roll out.  We drove to Rotorua to our hotel.  We had almost a tiny apartment there.  It had an upstairs and downstairs and a few rooms.  After grabbing some good food at the nearby countdown (grocery store) we headed to the bus stop to be picked up for our Maori Village experience.  On the bus they explained the rules that when we first got there they would do this traditional chant thing and it was disrespectful to laugh.  I always worry when I'm told I can't laugh.  I mean if they wouldn't have brought it up I probably wouldn't have laughed anyway, but since they said I couldn't it made it kinda hard.  Me and Bri were not allowed to look at each other until they were done.  

We go into the village and go to different areas where they show us chants and games and the Hakka .  It was pretty interesting.  They then did a little luau.  But let's be honest.  I was there for the dinner.  It was delicious.  There was so much food and yummy lamb.  I really was surprised that the food was so different from a Hawaiian luau.  Still so good though.  On the bus ride home our crazy bus driver gave each group there a chance to sing a song.  We figured people already hate americans enough that we didn't need to give them an extra reason by singing God Bless America or something like that...so we sang Popcorn Popping on the Apricot Tree.  Yeah, that happened.  Then this guy decides he's going to sing She'll be coming around the Mountain while driving so so so many times around the round about.  I believe Sarah later told me she heard me say, "This is my own personal hell".  But we made it back to our hotel and we all quickly went to bed.  We had had a long amazing day.  And we had more to do the next day.

Down Under Part 3 Pamphlets to Hell

The very first thing we did when we got off the plane was...well...go through customs...I hate it.  Helpful hint:  If you have an old passport like I do, just get a new one with the stupid chip in it so you can avoid the 1-2 hour lines.  Seriously.  Traveling internationally, customs gets old real fast.  Luckily this time they were quick and we were shortly reunited with our amazing friend Erin who moved to New Zealand earlier in the year.  We got our luggage, got into her car (the wrong side), and she drove (on the wrong side) to her house where we would stay and meet up with 3 more of our friends in a couple days.  I had to set up my little blow up mattress that I brought with sheets and everything.  Then we chatted and slept.  It had been a long day.

The next morning Erin went to work so Caryn, Bri, and I decided to explore around the neighborhood where we were staying.  It's in the Buckland's Beach area.  It's really pretty there and right next to the ocean.  Erin had told us about a great bakery we had to try so we went down by the water and then "hiked" up the little hill path thing to the bakery.  Well they only took cash and we didn't have any yet. We asked this lady where the closest bank/shopping area was that took cards and she said it was about a 20 minute walk.  She said she could have offered us a ride if she could.  Nice people.  It was a pretty day so the walk didn't sound too bad.  We were hungry though.  We made it to the grocery store (Countdown) and got some meats and cheeses and L&P and pastries and such and took it out to a picnic table to eat.  Again we met a friendly lady who was there and chatted for a bit.  We got some money exchanged and headed back to Erin's. On our walk back we met up with American Missionaries!!  Always fun to run into them.

We chilled until Erin got home and then we went to Hell's Pizza.  I got the Lust Deluxe.  It was really yummy.  While we were waiting for our pizza we took a group shot with a little menu.  When our friend Paul saw it he had to comment that Erin was so nice to make us pamphlets to visit her...inside joke.  I think that night we watched some good ol' Pitch Perfect and went to bed.

               

The next day around brunch time we went to a little cafe down by the water.  It was super windy that day so didn't really enjoy being outside by the water.  I had some of the best hot chocolate (they make it bitter down there) and fish and chips.  Caryn also got fish and chips and Bri got the best waffles ever.  Since it was so cold when we were done we got some ice cream and headed back to Erin's place.  Her backyard has a fence so it blocked the wind which meant I spent some time laying out there and listening to the song "Men at Work" better known for it's line, "we come from a land down under".  Yeah...I love sun and songs about places with sun.

While we were basking in the New Zealand sun the other three girls (Liz, Sarah, and Kristina) arrived.  When Erin got home we went out by the water again to get Indian Food for dinner.  It was really yummy and I saw one of the most gorgeous sunsets.  Then we went back to Erin's and got situated.  Seven girls in a one bedroom house with one bathroom can get tricky.  We made it work though.  Some of the girls stayed up and watched a movie, but me and Bri went to sleep since we had to be up at 3am to catch the shuttle to the airport so we could all go to Sydney.  Super early, but totally worth it. I got up around 2am to get ready for the day since we would hit the ground running in Sydney.  This is when Erin's blow dryer attacked.

Caryn and I had bought a New Zealand approved hair dryer before we got there and had it sent to Erin's.  Erin had hers right there though so while Caryn straightened her hair in front of me I used the blow dryer to heat up my hair.  Bri was also in the bathroom because she was going to straighten the back of my hair when Caryn was done.  All of a sudden...flames started shooting out of the blowdryer. I threw it because it was hot and freaked me out (which happened to land right around Caryn's feet) and the power went out.  It was insane.  See the things that happen down in hell (again inside joke).  Well we got over it and headed to the airport because Sydney was waiting for me.

Down Under Part 2 It's Gettin' Hot In Here

Our flight from Las Vegas to Hawaii was filled with a lovely Benadryl induced sleep.  It was much needed after our early travels to Vegas and then not flying out of vegas until 1am.  We got into Honolulu Airport a little before 6am on November 2 2014.  That was just enough time to grab our bags and head over to the shuttle pick up area to get to our rental car.  The guy who picked us up on the shuttle was great.  He was friendly and made sure we knew where we were headed and how to return the car when we were done.  Awesome customer service.  Then when we got to the rental car place they were super rude.  As soon as you told them you didn't want their "gas refill" option (which means that you can return the car back with half a tank and they will pay to fill it up at a lower rate, but they charge you for half a tank no matter how full you bring it back...this isn't a good option for a one night layover on Oahu) they became terrible and snappy.  Then they saw our luggage and told us we had to get a bigger car and pay an extra $10 a day.  We explained we had done this in another similar car before.  They didn't care.  Terrible customer service.  For reference this company was Advantage womp womp.

We took our car (we named Chandler) and went Kailua to put our toes in the ocean on Lanikai Beach and then to Cinnamon's Restaurant also in Kailua.  So far it's been my favorite breakfast ever.  I got my usual Red Velvet Pancakes, but I also had to get the Guava Chiffon Pancakes too.  If I can swallow my pride gulp I'll admit that the Guava Chiffon ones are better.  I would love to have those every sunday morning.

Next we headed to the North Shore to enjoy some beach time.  Luckily it was early enough in the morning that we got a great parking spot at the Waimea Beach Park.  It was glorious there.  We played in the ocean, soaked up some sun, and took naps.  I love naps.  A couple of us ended up a little lobster like from this excursion, but totally worth it for me.  I could do relaxing beach days like that frequently.

For lunch I wanted to go get food from food trucks.  I had seen a special on the Travel Channel about these little food truck areas on the North Shore and wanted to give it a shot.  I had actually eaten at one of them before.  Giovanni's Shrimp Truck.  Oh my goodness.  It was better than I remembered.  I had a half order of the lemon butter with a side of their hot sauce.  If I lived there I would probably eat that daily.  I also got an Acai bowl with granola and honey and banana.  Caryn lived in Brazil and ate those before and said the ones they have there were legit.  I was not disappointed.  I wouldn't mind that for breakfast every day (except the day I get my pancakes).

 

After lunch I dropped Bri and Caryn off at Pearl Harbor to go out to the U.S.S. Arizona Memorial.  I had already been so I used this time to drive to Waikiki and check us into our hotel.  I forgot how terrible the traffic was in Waikiki.  It's bad, and there are so many one way streets that are allegedly two lane, but seriously should only be one lane.  HATE IT.  Then the hotel elevator only worked when you scanned your card.  Unfortunately I didn't get this memo so I just kept riding around because other people were requesting the elevator on other floors.  I had too much luggage, there was no air conditioning in the common areas of the hotel, it was hot, and I was frustrated.  I was almost in tears when I made it back to the lobby and someone explained it to me.  I got the luggage up there and then went and picked up Caryn and Bri.  It was a glorious 86 degrees that day.

We headed back to the hotel, changed, and walked to Waikiki beach.  We walked around there for a bit and spent some time in some of the stores and then headed to bed for sleep in an actual bed.  It was a pretty good day in Hawaii.

The next morning we got up, repacked, and headed to the airport.  I got to stop by a store that the company I work for owns which was neat.  I met people I had talked to over the phone, but had never seen before.  It was neat.  Then we went and got gas in the car so we didn't get charged the bajillion dollars they swore we would if it wasn't "completely full" and "filled up within 2 miles of the rental car drop off".  In case anyone (or future me) needs to know here's the address for the nearest gas station to the airport:  Chevron Honolulu, Valkenburgh Street, Honolulu HI.  You're welcome.  Just say no to their stupid half take gas fill up program.  We returned the car and got to the gas station and then got shipped out to the nether regions of the airport where there was no food, no shops, one vending machine, and, according to the crazy lady, only one outlet.

Short little story:  We got to our gate pretty early for our flight from Honolulu to Auckland, New Zealand.  Because we were some of the first people there we found a spot in the corner where we could set up all of our bags, plug in our phones, and just chill for a couple hours.  This middle/older aged lady came and sat practically right next to us.  Now this was a huge gate...huge.  And if you saw how it was all set up you would realize it wasn't in the main part of the airport so it's not like random people not on the flight were taking up seats from another gate.  This was just our gate.  She could have sat anywhere.  We were watching videos and a little loud which is why we picked a corner of the airport so we wouldn't bug anyone.  She acted all annoyed and then came up and said she wanted one of the outlets because we had the only ones in the whole gate.  Rude.  There were others.  So we packed up our stuff and moved next to the completely empty outlets.  I hope that lady's phone somehow fell in the ocean.  end of story.

We got on the plane to New Zealand and mentally prepared for our 9 hour flight.  We watched movies, chatted, read, laughed, and ate the whole way.  I might have also taken a small nap.  We got into Auckland around 10pm. on November 4th local time.  This was 20 hours ahead of our home time.  They made us sit there while they sprayed us and our baggage down on the plane.  It was weird.  Then we walked off the plane into NEW ZEALAND!!

Down Under Part 1 The Journey Begins

Isn't there a quote that says something like, "A thousand mile journey begins with a single step"? Well the single step on this journey began when Bri, Caryn, and I got our tired selves up before dawn on November 1 2014 to catch the shuttle from Idaho Falls, Idaho to Salt Lake City, Utah.  It was mostly an uneventful "sorta bus" ride.  They had the heat up to about 1000 degrees and my feet got a bit burned.  We had good weather, and by the time we got to Salt Lake it was in the 60s and sunny.  Pretty nice for Utah/Idaho in November.  We were dropped off right at the airport so we didn't get to do our usual mall/food trips in Salt Lake that I love.  Honestly I was just antsy to get on that plane because I felt like that was the real start.  Then I saw the plane...it looked like a pretty sketchy start.

Do people seriously still fly in things like this?  Guess so because we did.  I loved the fact that the plane was fairly empty.  We each got our own row and the flight attendant (let's call him Stove) was pretty entertaining and didn't seem to care too much about any safety shenanigans which I appreciate since this was not my first rodeo (flight).  We made it to Vegas alive around noon.  I was grateful.

We had rented a car in Vegas, but the rental car place wasn't right at the airport.  We had to take a shuttle to a rental car mall where they had tons of different rental car places and then from there ours was even further so we got on another shuttle (luckily free still) and rode to our rental car place.  It was fairly quick and easy.  Once we paid and probably signed away our first born children to them they gave us a number and pointed out to a lot where our car was waiting with the keys in the ignition.  It was behind a truck so I didn't see it (from here on the car will be known as Beverly) yet.

I'll explain first that we were traveling internationally.  I had a huge bag to check, a carry-on suitcase, and a backpack, Caryn had the same, and Bri was just missing the checked bag.  We also had a couple neck pillows on top of all that.  Basically we had a ton of crap plus the three of us.  When we walked past a truck and saw the car they had rented us I thought we were going to have to strap Bri to the roof. Meet Beverly.

Well we ended up getting all our luggage and ourselves in this little car and headed out for the strip since we only had about a 12 hour layover there.  We parked at the Paris hotel and headed for the Bellagio Gardens.

We also saw the lovely chocolate water fall they have there.  Next we hit up the Cosmopolitan to eat at Secret Pizza.  It's this sweet pizza place that really doesn't have any directions or signs to get there.  You just have to know where it is...or google it.

 It had really good pizza and a neat little hallway to get there.  Not super pricy either for Vegas.  After a little time on the strip we went down to Fremont street.  We got froyo, watched a ceiling light show thing, and saw some people that barely had clothes on.  Neat.  We played $1 each at the slots there since you can still pull the little handle to play them.  Nobody walked away with enough to pay for this trip sadly.

Once we were done down at Fremont Street we still had some time to kill before we needed to be back at the airport so we parked down at the MGM Grand and hit up the M&M store and the Coke store.  The Coke store ended up being the real star of this leg of the journey.  On the second floor they have a little cafe looking area and for about $8 they have a "Coke Tastes of the World" where you get 16 little cups of different Coke products from around the world.  It was so much fun.  I would have to say the highlights were the Fanta Pineapple from Greece and the Bibo Kiwi Mango from South Africa.  The low and by low I mean pretty close to hell would be Beverly from Italy.  Which is how the rental car got the name Beverly.  Beverly is terrible.  The best way to describe it would be to mix bitter with death and add carbonation.  Bri said if she was ever rich...or bored in Vegas she would love to just sit all day watching people taste each drink one by one and wait for the moment they drink Beverly.  I bet that could be a great youtube video montage.

                              

Once we were done there we returned Beverly, made it through security, and camped out until we loaded up for our next flight to Honolulu, Hawaii.