New Zealand Day 14 (13 Apr 2018)

If you were to tell me that today I would voluntarily get in a giant hamster-like ball, filled with warm water, and roll down a giant hill, while in my swimsuit in 50 degree weather, and LOVED every minute of it, I would’ve questioned your sanity.  
Zorbing. Is. So. Fun!  I don’t understand why we don’t have this activity in the US!  (Or if we do, it’s not near me). 
When we selected the track we wanted, from a possible three, we took off our shoes and climbed into a van to be shuttled up the hill. Alex and I were the only ones who took advantage of this opportunity, and what an experience it was!


Since we went in the morning, it was a bit cool to be standing outside in a swim suit. However, you didn’t notice the cold as soon as your nerves set in at the top of the hill!
They have both wet and dry zorbing. However, at the location we chose, they only had wet zorbing, which is what we preferred. They filled the bottom part of the hall with warm water before we climbed in head first. Once inside, they zipped up the opening, and gave us a little nudge down the hill. Alex went first as I cheered her on. 
When I climbed into my ZORB ball, I knew it was going to be a unique experience!  I laughed the whole way down!  It felt like you were on your own personal waterslide!  The ball would roll up the sides of the track and back down. I stuck my arms out so I didn’t flip over. Since there was water in the bottom, it was weighted to keep me fairly level the whole time. 
Listening to the video my dad took of me, you can hear me laughing and cheering at the end. 
You get out of the ball feet first, and it kind of spits you out when the ball is rolled forward. It was so fun!  Have I said that enough?!?  I would totally recommend zorbing!







Alex loved it just as much as I did!  I had so much adrenaline pumping that I couldn’t feel the cold. My parents were wearing two coats a piece, and we were in wet swimsuits.  I don’t think we were really cold until we were sitting on our rain jackets in the car to keep the seats dry. 😏 
My mom decided she wanted to go to Kerosene Creek to swim in the thermal pools for free. We took a wrong turn, and ended up on a 100 kilometer journey, but it sure was beautiful, so we didn’t mind. 








I’m living all the different shades of green here. It makes sense when seeing their black, fertile farmlands, coupled with the rains, why everything is so beautiful!
At Kerosene Creek, my parents were brave eoungh to get in. However, Alex and I chose not to participate, just to watch them. It was a beautiful setting, though the smell of Sulphur wafting in the air from the water, coupled with a wet, cold swimsuit made my decision pretty easy. 






We stopped in the Waimangu volcanic valley for lunch. We didn’t want to pay to hike through the youngest geothermal fields in the world, but we definitely appreciated the view from up top. We also had lunch there. I had hummingbird cake!




We made our way back to the apartment and I took a nice warm shower!  It always feels fantastic to be warm after feeling cold most of the day!
We decided to drive to the lake in Rotura, and it was huge!  I guess there is a lot more to do than I even realized. We didn’t stay for too long, but it was worth the drive. 




The museum was closed, but it was a pretty impressive structure!



Finally, we saw some leaves changing, since it technically is fall here in New Zealand. 




It was yet another fantastic day! 💕

Comments

Post a Comment

Popular posts from this blog

Day 6 - Thailand (13 March 2020)

Image
Today felt like how I imagined Bangkok would feel. We started out by driving over to the Grand Palace. Alex and I were both wearing long capris, and we weren’t sure if they would let us into the Palace grounds without needing to buy elephant pants to cover up our legs. But we made it in without needing to buy the pants! Our guide said there are usually 10,000 Chinese tourists here a day, but we had very few people around us.   The Grand Palace is beautiful!  They have mosaic tiles covering almost every building, and the buildings seem to sparkle in the sunlight.  Everywhere you look, it’s like all the colors wash over you as you soak it all in. There was a decent amount of sun, but it was beautiful to see!  It is an interesting experience to learn a little about cultural beliefs and norms as you are walking around experiencing the things there are to see. It makes me wonder how different life was when there were not tourists walking around.  I was so impressed w...
Read more

Day 5 - Thailand (12 March 2020)

Image
We had another calm morning as we got ready for the day. Here’s the view from our hotel window! After another good breakfast, we met Kris in the lobby for another full day of exploring. Today, we drove about an hour to Ayutthaya. This impressive city has 515 temples!  Some of them are in ruins from when Myanmar burned them, but some of them are quite spectacular! Our first stop was Wat (meaning temple) Yai Chai Mongkol. It means ‘the temple of the boat noodle.’  It was a beautiful temple area with gorgeous flowers, textures, and color everywhere you looked.  However, we needed to use the facilities, so Alex had her first experience of the squatty potty.  It’s authentic!  After we exited the bathroom, we learned that they had western toilets around the corner. Hmm...jerks.  Back to the Wat Yai Chai Mongkol. I really enjoyed this visit. Probably my favorite were the multi colored Bougainville.  I was also impressed with the good condition of the temple a...
Read more

Days 1, 2, and 3 - Thailand (March 8 -10, 2020)

Image
First of all, the coronavirus showed it’s face during the last few weeks of planning time of the trip. We weren’t sure what was going to happen, but all felt good about going to Thailand. So, after a handful of flight changes, we finally got everything sorted.  Sunday morning, we finally found ourselves at the airport!  Make sure you plan on 28+ hours of travel time in order to make it all the way from Salt Lake.  The first leg of our trip was in First Class!   The second leg was in Premium Select. Between the two flights, I finally learned how the other half lives. So. Nice!  I forgot to take a picture of the second and third flights. However, Premium Select is worth the cost of the ticket.   There have been a lot less crowds at the internationals airports, with a lot smaller crowds of people. Every flight we took was probably less than half full. So on the Air Nippon Airways flight for Bangkok, I sat in a row by myself, which meant I could lie down and sl...
Read more