08/15/11-08/17/11 – Rotorua (Rotor-Rooter) & Bay of Plenty (Ahiwa)

A lot has happened in the last 2 days.  We picked up our campervan on Sunday and after signing contracts and an in depth tour of the van & “how to’s” we didn’t get on the road till about 2:30 pm.  After an hour-long grocery run, we were off towards Rotorua.  It gets dark here at 5:30 so we had a hard time finding a camping spot in the dark.  We pulled into 2 that were just parking lots and smelled like rotten eggs due to the thermal springs in the area.  The spot we finally found was kinda like a RV / Trailer park…but would have to due for the night.  Woke up in the morning to bitter cold and snow, which we were told was very uncommon in the area.  After checking out the news we found out that we were about to see the worst “polar blast” in NZ in over 50 years.

We had the campground manager look up road conditions for us and found out we were pretty much stuck to the top part of the North Island.  All roads leading South towards Wellington are closed.  There goes our plan to head south straight away!  Auckland got snow on 08/16/11, which hasn’t happened since 1939!  Of course!

Long story short we figured the best thing to due for now is head for the coast and wait out the storm at the beach.  We left Rotorua Monday morning and headed toward the Bay of Plenty.  We arrived at Ohiwa State Park yesterday around noon.  We broke out the BBQ and as soon as we were about to start lunch it starts snowing / hailing!  Literally…on the beach it’s snowing!!!  It didn’t last more than an hour, but again we were told that NEVER happens here.  The campground manager said she’s lived here her whole life and never seen snow in this area.

So we decided to stay another night since we still can’t get to Wellington to ferry to the South Island.  Wednesday our plan is to leave early, check road conditions, and head as far South as possible.  Hopefully by this weekend we will make it down to the South Island, which I should also mention is covered in snow.  The news referred to it as “blanketed” in snow.  Schools are shut down and airports closed.  Hopefully our luck will change soon.

With all this, we are still having a blast.  The heater in the camper is AWESOME, and we are staying very warm through the night.  The spot we are at now is absolutely breathtaking.  We went for a great hike yesterday to the top of the ridge and could see the coast and hillsides for miles.  We also hiked alongside sheep / lambs and cows.  So cool!

There is one other camper here with us and his name is Tony.  He lives out of his camper and travels around wherever he wants.  He’s been at this site for 1 month and plans to stay another month.  He has a great sheep dog named “Cash” after the man!  He invited us over for drinks in his RV and showed us a home video he took of White Island, which is a active Volcanic Island off the coast that we can see smoking  / steaming from our campsite.  To give you an idea about Tony, he has about as much teeth as a Jack-O-Lantern, was wearing jean shorts and no shoes yesterday in the snow, and honest to Christ has no clue what the Internet is!  He’s awesome!

Our Camp. The beach is just over those grass dunes behind us.

On a hike above our camp we tramped through grazing fields for these sheep.

ACTION SHOT!

Oh yeah, Chris also proposed last night, and I said yes!  But I guess most of you sneaky bastards already knew about that!