(In a nod to the New Zealand-filmed LOTR trilogy (followed by the prequel-trilogy of the Hobbit), I have written our final adventure in trilogy form and this is the final installment. If you’ve missed the first two parts, here are the links for you: Part I, Part II.)
Oregon is slowly opening up in select counties where the incidence of COVID is low. And so, two nights ago, Heather and I got restaurant food for the first time since March 19th. We are lucky enough to be in one of those counties and enjoyed sitting in a brewpub (about 30 feet from the nearest patron and with no table service). This sense of renewed adventure and freedom brought me back to March 19th, the last time we had restaurant food. Of course, you know nothing about that, yet. I guess it’s time to share and write the final chapter of our around the world story.
Waitomo Canyoning
After the thrills of Rotorua, we hit the west coast of the North Island to follow in the footsteps of my cousin Charlie (son of the famed Audrey & Richard), who, a month prior, joined a pretty epic trip with Waitomo Adventures. We had received photos of his fun and had to experience it for ourselves.
We departed Rotorua early on March 16th, but with our clothes not quite dry, had to fashion a backseat clothesline for the road.
Upon arrival for our Lost World Epic Adventure, we completed the requisite introductory forms and waivers and were then shuttled to the gear-up place. There, we were given thick wetsuits, helmets with headlamps, harnesses and safety gear, and slick tall white boots. Obviously, too cute to handle, we posed for a few pics before getting on with the adventure. (Surprisingly, we wore socks. I had assumed that since we would be in water much of the day wet socks would be bad news, but by the end, with warm feet and limited chafe, I was grateful for the BYOS policy.)
The adventure began fairly immediately when we arrived at the entrance to the caverns. With a bit of a safety spiel about abseiling (rappelling), we were on to try it ourselves. And down we went, descending 100 m into the “Lost World.” Heather and I were the first duo to descend, which was great as we got to explore the Mangapu stream solo and watch the other four take their own descents. The views from above and below were equally stunning, like stepping back into a pristine prehistoric time. Lush greenery covered the parts of the cavern that enjoyed sunlight, and darkness swallowed the rest.
After abseiling, we stopped to enjoy a bit of lunch and then began exploring the caves. We first walked slowly through the stream, getting a feel for moving in water, emptying boots when water levels lowered, minding our heads from surprise outcrops of rocks, and not peeing ourselves when an eel glided past.
In addition to the eel, we saw other critters like the huntsman spider, the NZ-native weta, and plenty of glow-worms.
Despite having done a glow-worm tour in the South Island, we weren’t yet spoiled for it. Our group had this whole underground space to ourselves, and it felt peaceful and intimate. At one point in our trek, we found a fairly comfortable large rock, turned off all of our headlamps, and leaned back staring at the ceiling, which felt like a sky with thousands of stars.
The day continued as we explored deeper in. We rock climbed, swam through underwater caves, ascended a waterfall, and hiked our booties off. We saw fossilized oysters (like millions of years old) as well as a whale bone that had become part of the rock formation. We climbed, fell, slid, sloshed, and awed at the adventure and the natural beauty we were fortunate enough to experience.
Our day lasted from 8 AM to 6 PM, though we reached daylight on the other side of the cave probably by around 3:30 PM. Then, we walked across farmland about a mile and a half to reach the place we had gotten our gear. There, we stripped down, showered, put on dry clothes, and enjoyed a well-prepared barbecue.
Our guides were basically masters. They were tour guides, belayers, nature experts, photographers, and cooks. The other folks on our trip were a lot of fun as well (gosh, it’s been a while since we’ve been able to make friends with strangers…) which made the day pretty primo.
Hobbiton
The next day we had to make it to Auckland, but we realized on the way (somewhere between the Toothbrush Fence and the corrugated animal buildings of Tirau) that we had made no formal plans to visit Hobbiton. This was a non-starter for me. I’m not a big LOTR person (though I do remember fondly my fifth-grade teacher, Mrs. Bries—who finally let herself retire last year—reading us the trilogy aloud). But I felt that it was a quintessential NZ experience and because it takes a lot to get to NZ from the US, I really didn’t want to miss it.
So, there I was on my phone searching for tickets/reservations while we are literally driving there. We were lucky enough that there were two passes on one of their last tours of the day, so we snatched them up and went to the pick-up point.
From there, we boarded a bus and were given a bit of history on our way. Here’s what I remember: When filming LOTR, Peter Jackson & crew had built a temporary set that was basically dismantled after the first trilogy finished. However, upon the decision to follow up with The Hobbit, they also decided to make a more permanent exhibit and put full care into creating the actual Hobbiton that we were able to visit. Now, to be clear, all the Hobbit houses are actually empty because the filming “inside” was actually done in a studio. However, everything else about this little village was pure magic.
Every detail was cared for – from the clotheslines to the wedges of cheese, to real fruit trees, to the petitest chopped wood ever. It was sort of like being back in Japan—where the attention to detail and the affinity for kawaii made all manner of experiences feel immersive and magical.
We were given a walking tour of the grounds, given some challenges such as find the fake tree, and at the end brought to the cutest hobbit pub and given an ale.
A couple of days after we left, Hobbiton closed due to COVID. It is set to reopen on May 30th.
Auckland
Upon driving to Auckland, I felt a surge of both excitement and nostalgia for that Full House episode where Stephanie and Michelle erroneously get on a plane to Auckland instead of Oakland due to misunderstanding a dreamy Kiwi boy’s accent. 28 years later and I finally made it.
We didn’t do much in Auckland, to be honest, it was more of a resting place before moving on. We relaxed in our rented apartment, and then got dressed up in something besides athletic gear (finally!) and walked (trying to stay away from transit #COVID-flu) to a sushi restaurant, where we were the last customers for the night. It was actually St. Patrick’s day, so the Sky Tower was illuminated green, but noticing that was about as touristy as we got. After dinner, we retired back to our apartment.
We had a longer stay in Auckland booked for the original end of our NZ trip before flying to Qatar, so we had planned to return and spend a few more days touring. (Spoiler alert, we didn’t go to Qatar, our Airbnb booking for Auckland was canceled due to COVID, and we left the country in the middle of a shut-down, so… we did not see any more of Auckland except for the inside of a very quiet airport.)
Poor Knights
After Auckland, we stopped at a health-crazed local New Zealand restaurant en route to Tutukaka (so fun to say). We stayed there for the night before our final SCUBA.
Poor Knights Islands are thought to provide some of the best diving in the world. The islands have been uninhabited since the 1820s and provide clear—though cool—waters full of sea life, underwater caves and rock formations, and a wicked fun current to ride.
We prepped for the dives by first emptying our bladders and then donning the thick get-up of vest + hood and a 7mm wetsuit.
We were both over-weighted for the first dive and so I sucked up air way too fast. As a result, our first dive was brief and I, admittedly, was a bit of a sour puss afterwards, almost bailing on the second dive. But, I got my shit together and after a bit of surface time Heather and I were laughing and joking and I was ready for #2. We were also snuggled up because it was pretty chilly out of the water, especially in the shade. Between dives, our boat explored Poor Knights, including tucking into a large cave, and settling near some very active blue mau mau (we had seen pink mau mau underwater on the first dive).
The second dive was quite incredible. Both dives together really were, actually, it was just my air consumption/weighting that had me out of sorts. Some of the favorite discoveries:
Bioluminescent jellyfish
Mau mau
Eel
Rockfish
Nudibranch
A giant lobster that Heather discovered
Underwater rock formations
And then the dive was over. We were anxious to get out of our wetsuits after the second dive, so we peeled them off, donned our sweats, and tried to dry off and warm up in the sun. But for some reason, the boat stunk after we peeled off our wetsuits. Heather and I looked at each other. “Did you…?” Subtle nod. “You…?” Guilty look.
We were told, “Do not pee in your wetsuit. The thicker suits will hold it in and just stink up the boat, and we don’t want that for everyone.” I thought, No problem! I’m a grown woman, I don’t have to pee every time I get into extreme-temperature water. So, pre-dive, we did our duty and peed before getting into our thick and snug wetsuit get-up.
But… well, it was like five hours from that first pee until we could take off the wetsuit. And… the water was so cold, and urine such a warm blanket.
We both peed. We were the assholes who stunk up the boat because we peed in our thick wetsuits. For that, we are so sorry, Dive! Tutukaka. Feel free to use us as your cautionary tale for why not to pee when diving. It smelled absolutely horrific.
Change of topic. We were peckish after diving (hungry for fish, ironically), and nearby was the world-famous Mangonui Fish Shop. This little shop that sits in a coastal town—reminiscent of one you may even find in Oregon—serves all locally caught (with hook and line) fish in an unassuming diner-type restaurant that overlooks the ocean, and if the time is right, the sunset.
The fish melted in our mouths, the chips (fries, duh) were supreme, and the views capped it off. (Had we known we would literally be preparing every one of our own meals for the next sixty days straight, maybe we would have even savored it more.)
That night, we stayed in a nearby Airbnb that smelled like my grandma’s basement. The décor was unique (whale bones, animal furs, nautical touches), but after one night we just couldn’t stay there any longer and instead of doing one more day of tourism nearby (sandboarding), we decided to just skip over to Raglan to our final home in New Zealand. But you’ve already heard about that.
And Then?
We aren’t quite sure what this next chapter will look like for us. People keep asking if we will just go back out and travel, but that’s not really possible given the state of the world right now. We think it’ll be some time before each country figures out what it needs to keep its own citizens safe while balancing the economic boost that foreign-tourism offers. To be sure, we certainly won’t be able to do a trip of this scale in the near future. But we have learned more about the ways we want to live (trip or no) than ever expected, and that is buoying our spirits as we step into the unknown and craft a new normal.
When we came back, we made a commitment to ourselves to ease into things. No job search for two months, don’t buy a car, don’t commit to geography until we find jobs. So, we’ve been staying temporarily in Oregon, unwinding our trip and doing some personal development work, but our time here is almost up (actually, just one week left).
June is when we will embark upon the job search and that includes dusting off our resumes and LinkedIn profiles. This next phase we will be leaning into the goodwill of loved ones, and staying first with some friends in California before heading to Houston to live in my Dad’s half-year home (he lives in WI in the summer). We haven’t sorted out the details, but to avoid airports, we will be driving (thank god Hertz is so cheap right now) and looking to salvage a bit of socially-distant tourism along the way, hopefully finding some off-the-beaten-path natural wonders, or patronizing some national parks as they open up.
I don’t think we’ll continue blogging about our domestic domestication, but if we find any photo-worthy stops, you can be sure to catch them on our social media sites.
For now, be well and please, treat each other kindly.
