Category Archives: New Zealand

I visited a place and saw some stuff

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Note: I had to sign a confidentiality agreement before I was allowed to go on this tour of an interesting piece of farm land that had been converted for a certain trilogy of films that shall remain nameless so I don’t show up on search engines and find lawyerly emails and phone calls awaiting me one day. Instead, I shall just make vague references and show you pictures instead. They just had a few clips on the news here showing the area in detail, so I don’t mind showing the pictures. I’ll respect the confidentiality agreement in keeping what I heard from general public ears/eyes though, since a lot of it relates to the ongoing filming and production. If you are really curious about certain aspects, feel free to email me.

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Return to the top

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Tauranga’s one of my favourite spots in New Zealand so far. It’s just a lovely city, and Mt. Maunganui is just another highlight of the area. I hiked up to the top of it once again. The weather wasn’t quite as good, but there were still numerous people making the trek upwards, and the view from the top still very enjoyable after a sweaty hike up.

This time there was a bit more action at the top than before. With the sea-breezes coming off the bay and being driven straight up the sharp cliffs of Mt. Maunganui, this made a great spot for those wishing to fly.

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One of ‘those’ places

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I almost don’t want to talk about this place. I spent 4 nights camping in McLaren Falls park, a 10 minute drive south of Tauranga on the Bay of Plenty. It felt like one of those ‘best kept secret’ kinds of places. It was absolutely wonderful.

For 3 of the 4 nights I was there, I had the place to myself. The entire park could camp well over 100 if it was busy, probably a couple hundred even. They give you picnic benches with free working BBQs nearby. Free hot showers. Wonderful scenery and bird life. Far off the highway so no sounds but nature. All for $5 per person per night. Which they are supposed to collect in the morning, but nobody ever came around to collect from me (probably not worth it with just one car in the park). I walked around the park and just enjoyed the scenery.

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And down we go

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While I was in Costa Rica in April I gave what was called Canyoneering. It involved 2 abseils and two…sort of abseil, sort of ziplines. The 2 full abseils were short, the sort of ziplines were the larger ones. The would have been highlight of the activity was that all 4 activities were over waterfalls. Except it was so dry at the time that there was no water to be found on any of the falls. I was left underwhelmed by the experience.

When a chance to do Canyoning (the local term) here in New Zealand came up, I decided to give it another shot. I was very glad I did.

Early in the morning I was picked up in Thames by a van with 2 guides and 7 other adventurers, on our way to the spot I had just hiked the day prior – the Kauaeranga Valley and the Billy Goat Track.

We packed all of our gear into numerous waterproof sacks. Myself and one other guy got the worst of it – we carried the rope in our packs. Incredibly heavy stuff. The hike was grueling. 40 minutes uphill all the way, with only a short stop. The heavy weight didn’t make things either. But eventually we got to the top, donned our wetsuits and safety gear, and got a quick practice with abseiling. And then we were off. I went first.

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The Pinnacles

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The Pinnacles are part of the Coromandel Range, and while none are spectacularily tall (the largest mountain in the range is ~850m or something), they still provide a good hiking challenge. They would also be home to me for one night – I’m up to overnight hiking now, and using New Zealand’s backcountry hut system.

From the signpost it’s a DOC estimated 3 hour uphill-all-the-way hike to the Hut. One of the biggest differences this time is I’m taking my large backpack, not my small one. Sleeping bag, food, and cooking stuff takes up room! So I had a good extra bit of weight and bulk on my back.

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Along the way

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Going from Auckland to the Coromandel Peninsula normally doesn’t take too long – 1.5-2 hours depending on traffic getting out of Auckland. Since I have time to spare though, I took the more scenic route and camped at a couple spots along the way instead of heading straight there. The Auckland region (which extends north and south of Auckland city by…maybe 75km each way?) has over 20 district parks that are akin to provincial/national parks in Canada. In otherwords, quiet and peaceful areas with lots of activities to do.

I didn’t leave Auckland until the afternoon, so my first and last stop on my first day was Omana Park. It had an enjoyable camping area that somewhat overlooked the ocean.

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Winners

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New Zealand just wrapped up it’s national election on Saturday, with the National Party winning in commanding fashion. NZ is mostly a two party country, between the National Party, akin to Canada’s Conservatives, and the Labour Party, which would sit somewhere between NDP and Liberal in Canada. National had been the party in power going in – they increased their seats and now hold just under a majority, but with two of the minor parties a near certainty to support them, it’s pretty much a National majority. Sound similar to Canada?

NZ has an interesting take on voting – they use MMP, or mixed member proportional. They are one of only two countries in the Western world to do so – Germany being the other. It is different in that you vote twice when you go – once for a representative from your riding, and once for a political party. It’s interesting, in it allows you to choose to vote for a local rep that you might like, but for a different national party if you so choose. All of the regi0nal representatives that win their ridings get a seat in parliament, and then there are a number of seats in parliament reserved for the party vote. Those party seats are divided based on the national percentage of party vote each party receives. This has an interesting effect, in that it results in both more minority governments being formed, and smaller, fringe groups often gaining seats and a voice.

This election, National trounced Labour, and the Greens picked up quite a lot of party votes (13%), their best showing yet. A lot of this came down to the personalities of the leaders – National’s John Key (the Prime Minister) is a like-able, friendly guy who appears easy going and has a well-honed ‘every-man’ image. Labour’s leader, Phil Goff, came off as an aggressive car-salesman. His likability was in the tank, and Labour suffered for it. It amazes me when parties elect such unlikable people to be their leader…and are surprised when people don’t respond to them favourably. Having a blah/boring person is okay (I’d be hard pressed to differentiate between Harper and a robot at times), but being strongly disliked by many based on your personality (not even your ideas) really hurts. Charisma and good public speaking go a long way. The Green Party here was noted as having very likable main candidates and their big improvement in the polls is believed to be in response to that.

It was interesting watching the campaigns – it really felt quite ‘amateur’ compared to what we see in Canada at times. Which was refreshing at times. The two debates I saw were a lot more debating and back and forth, even with amusing sayings such as Key saying Goff would ‘Spend like a drunken sailor’ if in power, and Goff constantly calling Key a liar based on prior promises. There was a 3rd debate open to all parties (including the smaller ones) which was good to see them get some spotlight. The fringe parties I talk about aren’t ‘fringe’ like they are in Canada (ie Communist Party of Canada). These are smaller, more focused parties, like the Maori party and the Greens which do hold more outside views, but are pretty reasonable all the same.