Really tired, but as usual, gotta unpack, do the laundry, the housework and cook.
This trip was rather short, just 4days 3nights up to Northland. We rented a car from Jucy which was relatively cheap, $26 per day plus $12 per day for full insurance. But the petrol was so expensive because the place was so deserted. There was 1 petrol kiosk which had rates of 180!!!
We started off from Auckland at around noon and drove all the way up to Paihia. The road signs were kinda different from Singapore and just within 10minutes of driving, we got into a 1-way lane and all of us freaked out and I don't know what happened next but we some how took a sharp turn into another lane. That was kinda a bad omen I guess and I was really afraid we would get into an accident during the next few days. But anyway, we drove across the harbour bridge, across North Shore and on to motorway 1A, passed Whangarei, up to Paihia. It took around 4hours and by the time we reached, there was nothing much to do except checking into the backpackers.
We tried out the backpackers called Saltwater. It was awesome. One of my favourite backpackers. I define good as being warm and clean. We had an ensuite room (with toilet) and the place was so clean and big and warm and I really like it heaps!
This is the lounge and kitchen, but I forgot to take a photo of the rooms:
We took a short drive up to the Waitangi grounds...
Headed back to Saltwater for dinner. They watched a couple of movies while I looked through the comments book. It is a book where backpackers write about their experiences and ratings of hostels in NZ. I was busy copying stuff down, hopefully it would be of some use for the rest who are coming over to backpack next year. That book was quite good and funny. Some backpackers wrote utter rubbish in it! We met some other backpackers there too. There were these 2 Germans, same age as me, flew from Germany, bought a car in NZ, traveled for 6months, after which, sold their car at the backpackers' auction and gonna fly back to Germany. Their car costs only $800! But they had to pay for the WOF etc which amounted to $1700 - which is still quite cheap. Theres another group of backpackers who are on a work-holiday trip and a Japanese undergraduate - Kayo, who stopped uni for a year to travel in NZ. She studies children literature in one of the uni in Osaka - basically she draws and writes children story books. How cool! And I think she is just so brave to travel alone! Rocks!
We set off to Cape Reinga next morning and the drive there was really bad. We skidded thrice and I thought I was gonna die each time. The first time was on one of the turns. He couldn't slow down in time and some how lost control of the car and it swerved to the right and left. I was screaming at the back because I was caught off-guard and thrown to the right and left as well. I saw the whole motion of the car and I thought - thats it, we're going off road and down the coast. Luckily we were in the inner lane and after a few moments we were driving straight again. Man, I was really freaked out. But that was not all. The last 20km to the Cape was gravel road. Drove a lil too fast and the whole car ended up perpendicular to the road. If there was a car behind us, we're goners. We finally reached the cape and I silently thank god I'm still alive. It sounds exaggerating but after feeling what I felt, seeing what I saw, I'm so glad I'm safe.
And yes, Cape Reinga was worth the long, horrible, dangerous drive. It was spectacular. Cape Reinga is the northern tip of NZ, also the place where the Tasman Sea and Pacific Ocean meets. Thats why its blue on the right and green on the left (2 different colours of the seas). The wave movements are really slow there, I'm not sure why, maybe because of the wind. Anyway it was just so mind-blowing. Theres no blockage at all since its the northern tip so theres just the sea and sky in front of you. One word - great.
We rushed back to Paihia because it was getting late and thats when the 3rd incident happened - tried overtaking a truck and again, lost control. This time I didn't scream I just grabbed my seatbelt tightly and I thought, please, please let us get through this. Just 1 more time. I heard that familiar screech of the car AGAIN and you know what...we got through it. My hands remained on my seatbelt for the rest of the drive back. I didn't dare let go of it again. I'm really so thankful when we safely reached Saltwater.
Next morning we drove down to Whangarei via Tutukaka, which was a really bad choice. They said it is a scenic drive but we lost our way a couple of times and even ended up in this god-knows-where place which seemed like some lost-world. We were driving on gravel roads which led to a dead-end and windy roads up and down the hill. I think we drove for an hour before knowing it was the wrong route to Whangarei. On the way out, we saw this:
Of course, we can't bang them like how we bang possums, cats, birds etc on the road (Not that we always bang them, but I think we may have. Everyone does I guess, I saw heaps of flattened possums on the roads!) We wasted quite a bit of time waiting for them while they take their on sweet time grazing. Finally we managed to 'overtake' them and drove out of that weird place. SY had a quite a bad motion sickness after that due to the crazy winding roads and up-down slopes. We finally reached Whangarei and checked into the backpackers. I specially took photos of it so that those who are coming next year can get an idea of hows it like. There you go:
This backpackers ain't as good as saltwater because the toilets, kitchen, lounge were outside and the room was not well-insulated. It was so darn cold I couldn't sleep the whole night. Its nice for summer, but a wee bit cold for winter.
We took a short walk to Whangarei falls to see the falls of course:
Whangarei was really...boring. Town closes at 12pm. Even if its open, theres nothing. We didn't know what to do so they taught me driving. I learned a lil about the engines and how to drive a manual car. We found a place which is kinda deserted for me to try driving and I must say, its much tougher than auto! Not that I've really driven before, but I tried driving auto for say...10meters? haha yeah, thats quite a 'distance'. I learned some basics like how to start the car, change gears, reverse, move front, brake, accelerate blah blah blah but stopped soon after. (I'm really afraid of getting caught!)
Headed back to the backpackers and learned some card games like Taithi or something like that and Speed. Yeah, thats more or less the end of the trip. Rushed back to Auckland the next morning and SY had motion sickness again so I had to read the map, something which I'm really bad at. I kinda panicked when I couldn't find all the road names on it and I didn't really know how to direct the driver. But at last it was alright, I was just a lil too nervous. The map didn't have the road names of the last part of the drive so I had to base on intuition and I was really afraid we were on the wrong road cause we had to return the car by noon. But when I saw the harbour bridge, I let out a sigh of relief.
I'm so glad to be home - safe and sound.
For those who are coming next year, if you are reading this,
please please please drive carefully.
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