Mt. Taranaki Weekend in the Ketchup Van

Okay, I couldn't figure out how to put the pictures after the text...so read and then look!

Anais and I at the All Blacks game!

The view from our apartment=)



One of our stops on the way to Mt. Taranaki! This was someone's farm...jealous!

I've seen a million rainbows since I've been here!
Our lodge the first night!

Amazing Mt. Taranaki mid afternoon=)

Do you see the waterfall?

The plateu...

Where we had breakfast the next morning, New Plymouth


Elephant Rock! Even has an eye!

Three Sister's

The whole group!

We miss you ketchup!

View from the drive home=)

Opunake Beach at sunset!

Wow! I can't believe it's taken me this long to finally post. So much has happened! Let's see... about two weeks ago I went to the All Blacks game which was amazing! We got to see the Haka and Anais and I went kinda crazy and loved every second of it.

But the most exciting was last weekend! I think it was the best weekend of my life... got up early on Friday morning and caught a bus to the rental car place and hopped into our state of the art mini-bus that was stick shift and only two of us could really drive: Anais and I (thanks dad for teaching me to drive stick!). So with shaking hands I got into the bus and drove on the left side of the road (only once almost taking out a mirror) back to pick up the gang. There were 11 of us all together and it was just the most fun-loving, happy group ever! The forecast for the weekend said that it was supposed to rain the whole weekend, but we decided to just make the best of it and trudge on anyway. On our way out of the city we stopped at a really pretty lookout at the water and saw some pretty ominous (because it was rainy and gross) islands. We also stopped in Wanganui and climbed up a million steps to the stop of this cool tower, where the sun came out and decided to love us! Then we pretty much drove for the rest of the day in the rain and fog all the way up the coast until we got to Egmont National Park and Mt. Taranaki. We didn't get lost once! So we get to the lodge and we were the only ones there for the night. We all sat around eating pizza and drinking and just had a really nice time together.

The next morning we got up pretty early and got ready for some tramping! It was totally rainy and misty out so we had no idea where the mountain even was, though we assumed it was close. We started hiking through the goblin forest that seriously looked like it was a set made for the LOTR movies. It was awesome. Saw some beautiful waterfalls too! About mid afternoon, the clouds started to separate and we were SO excited to finally see Mt. Taranki. I think part of the reason it was so cool was because we had no expectations to even see it because we heard it was just supposed to rain all weekend. The mountain was seriously breathtaking. On one of our hikes we got to a clearing where we all just climbed around on the rocks and through the streams for hours just admiring the mountain. We continued our hike to even more amazing views of beautiful waterfalls with the mountain in the backdrop. I can't even describe how excited and elated I felt and everyone else seemed to feel that day. We were all just so thankful and happy to be a part of what we were experiencing. I felt warm from my head to my toes just because I was in this beautiful place! Anyway, we spent the rest of the day hiking around and made it back to the van (which we had named ketchup...because it was red...it later earned its name even more when we thought we bought tomato sauce for spagetti and it turns out we got three jars of ketchup). To add to the excitement, ketchup wouldn't start and all us girls (cause the boys were still hiking one last trail) pushed the van up and down the hills trying to jump start it. Eventually we met some really nice kiwis and they totally showed us some new zealand hospitality and got the van started again! They were hilarious. We drove for about an hour to our next hostel and found that we were the only ones staying there too! We were all exhausted and ate tons of pasta and just lounged around for the rest of the evening talking about french and spanish gypsies. At the hostel they had a book to write comments in and because I love that kind of thing we wrote them a thank you note writing, "we are 11 gypsies traveling in a ketchup van, thank you for the cake and letting us feed the eels!" Then we said thank you in four different languages. Oh yeah...they had a stream in the back yard and we got to feed eels our leftover dinner! It was awesome they were about as big as my leg...Jill you would have loved it!

So we got back in ketchup and drove to the Three Sisters which was in LOTR and was supposed to be beautiful. I had no idea it was going to be as gorgeous as it was. There were amazing caves and cliffs all around us and just the most beautiful formations. It was sunny and warm and we even had to cross through water up to our thighs to get to the beautiful beach part. Ah it was amazing. I was even able to see the peak of Mt. Taranaki in the background of some of my pictures! The mountain and these rocks were probably the most beautiful places I've ever been. I seriouslsy felt like a kid running around and stompin in the sand, just incredible. Sad as we were to leave, we had about seven hours of driving to get home. Needless to say everyone just about passed out in the van as we made our way home through the beautiful rolling hills and mountain out the side window. Even made it to one of the most beautiful beaches for sunset! It was just an amazing trip, I've never felt so happy on a trip. Hopefully the adventures of the ketchup van will continue...