Mar 2007

Which means hi in Tongan.

What a different country. It's a tiny kingdom, but the king here is one of the most powerful in the world. He appoints the government, the prime minister (which is usually his son), the works. Hence the riots in November when the last king died, people want to be a part of the decision-making.

The Tongan people aren't very rich, quite the opposite in fact, but they seem happy even so. Captain Cook named it the friendly islands for a reason I guess.
Although, I'm not always sure wether they are friendly or making fun of me.. I just smile anyway, it seems to go down well, hehe.

The Christian missionaries have had theirs to say here as well, so everyone has to wear clothes when thay go swimming, exept kids of course, and it's totally ridiculous. Just the main island has about 46 mormon churches alone! And if I remember correctly, there's about 100.000 Tongans alltogether.. Really weird. So Sundays are quiet, everyone's at church, singing.
And both men and women wear skirts here, people working for the government (and probably others as well, hard to tell) also wear straw mats around their waists. I quite like it.

I've been on an island tour by bus, which seemed more like a spot-the-mormon-church-tour. And an island day trip out to Royal Sunset where I went snorkelling and saw the biggest clam shells I've ever seen in my life! That's also where I first saw pigs running around free. Chickens, pigs and stray dogs all run around in the streets like they own the place.

I'm afraid I don't have all that many photos, it's been pissing down the last few days and then it's hard to take pics without getting the camera wet.. I'll try harder on Samoa.
Which is where I'm going tonight! I met an English guy who's going as well, he's also going to L.A. the same day as me so we can travel together. Makes the flight less boring.

Gotta go get my things, time to go to the airport.
It would be sad to leave these friendly people, palm trees and frangipanis, sandy beaches and crystal clear waters if I wasn't told that where I'm going next is much better!
What a hard life...

I'm at the airport in Auckland at the moment. Flew in from Christchurch at three, and my flight to Tonga leaves at ten, so it's quite a wait.. But I'm lucky to have found free internet here to keep me occupied!

The south island was just as good as the north, in a completely different way! It looks a lot like the west coast back home.
I've been really boring and not done a lot of activities, but after getting a cold I haven't been feeling to well. Hopefully I'll be alright, cause I forgot to get vacsinated.. Hmm.. Not very bright of me, but ah well. Hopefully I'll live, hehe!

We had a different driver in the south, and funnily enough, we knew heaps of the same people from Mission Beach, he had been a river guide while I lived there. How strange!

And we weren't three from the north island, there were two sweet Swedish girls travelling south as well. And we've had so much fun together.
We had a crossdressing party in Barrytown, where I got to dress up as a bus driver. We sat fire on our sambuca shots and the Irsih lad was dancing on the bar wearing only pink bathers! The next morning, Sheena and I dragged ourself out of bed to go bonecarving. I've made a beautiful wave that Rik was really jealous of, him not being able to get out of bed and all, hehe.

After that we had some good days in the wilderness before making it to adrenaline capital of the world, Queenstown. Lots to do and it's all quite expensive. Next time I'll travel with a mate and I'll do it all!!! Not enough time this around.

So now my NZ adventures are over, and it's very, very sad. If you have never travelled like this you have no idea how hard it is to constantly meet people you really hit it off with for so to leave them. I guess I just have to come back and do it all again..

Next adventure; Tonga. Can't wait to chill out on a pacific beach....
See ya soon!

At the airport in Auckland they of course had to take my coconut off me which I have been carrying around Oz for 8 months to bring home as a souvenir.. Not a good start, but there were better days to come!

Auckland wasn't anything really special, just ok. But I only stayed a night and then the Stray bus came and picked me up the next morning.
It wasn't the best bus I've been on, crew wise, but there were some champion people onbord. To Irish girls that I already miss terribly, an English fella, the bus driver and a few more people...

I'm in Wellington (the capital) at the moment, going from the north to the south island tomorrow, and now there's only three of us left.. Hopefully there will be more lovely people on the other side.

First stop was Hahei were we went to a hot beach, dug a hole in the sand and sat in hot water. The north island is full of active vulcanos....

We've seen a rock shaped as a whale's tail in Ragland (a town which has maybe the best surf in NZ), been to a maori show in Rotorua, I've skydived 15.000ft in Taupo and walked the 17km Tongariro crossing at the bottom of Mt.Doom (from Lord of the Rings) It's really been amazing, especially the skydive! Unreal. I'll do it again as soon as I can!

I 've not had any big accidents, just a few blisters and sore legs from the hike and a sore throut. Although, my little waxing experiment in Perth has given me a bit of trouble from time to time. I was waxing my legs when I got boiling wax on my thumb. Which again created the biggest blister I have ever seen in my entire life! I'm gonna be scarred for life! And I'm actually a little proud of it, it gets out the funniest reactions from people, hehe.

But it's all good. I'm still having fun and really looking forward to the south.
Hope everything is well back home, getting a bit excited about coming home now...

I left Alice after only a week, road trip sounded more exciting! I really enjoyed Alice, had an awesome time there, but when I got the opportunity to go to Perth again I couldn't say no.

So off we went! And this wasn't thought through properly, we thought it'd be more fun that way. So monday morning the boys, to my surprise, started packing the car. A couple of hours later we were on the road. With little money and an oil leak that we only found out about the last day we had to give The Rock a miss for this time... Too bad when I was that close, but we're talking a 500km detour! And my mate had just broken his rib jumping into the water from a 20 m high cliff the day before..
So we drove and drove, through red sand, burning sun and the world's most annoying flies! They crawl everywhere!

My mates are very impulsive, and don't always prefer to plan things, which meant that we had an empty jerrycan in the boot..
We just made it to Coober Pedy, but not all the way into the servo station, so we had to push the care, AND the trailer, into the servo to fuel up. At least we made it...

We ended up camping at Streaky Bay on the South Australian coast after 15 hours of driving. I slept in a swag (slags sovepose) on the back of the trailer under the full moon, beautful as only nature can be.

Back in Perth we stayed with my mate's family whick are a crazy bunch, but very lovely! They made me scrambled eggs for brekky every day!

I got to meet up with Sandy and Tanea again, from my Perth-Broome tour up WA, and that was great! Sandy and I went to Rottnest to see the great channel swim, which unfortunately was cancelled, but we had a great time anyway. Rotto is a beautiful little island!

But after a few weeks of relaxing, going to the beach (the whitest beaches I have ever seen) and eating home made meals, it was time to go to Sydney.

Saturday was Mardi Gras and that was pretty crazy. I have never seen so many fit, half naked, gorgeous men dance to Kylie Minogue in my life! Quite an experience, I tell ya!

And for the first time of leaving a place in Oz, there was noone to send be off and say goodbye. A bit sad since I was leaving the country, but at least I've been lucky to have had friends take me to airport etc to say goodbye throughout Australia!

It was so sad to leave, but the bright side was that a new adventure was just around the corner..