January 23 2008: New Ziggy
Filed under Travel
I know you’re all probably sick of me talking about my upcoming trip to New Zealand…but I’m excited aight? You’ll have to bear with me for the next three weeks.
Tickets have now been booked, confirmed, and paid for. Accomodation and rental cars have been booked and paid for. Itineraries have been drawn up. This trip is an actuality, no longer a pipe dream.
I’ll be absent from the evening of the 18th till the morning of the 29th of February. Several cities and towns will be graced with my presence in that time - Christchurch, Queenstown, Glenorchy, Auckland, Hamilton and Rotorua. Several extreme sports and activities will have my name written all over them: bungee jumping, canyoning, swimming with dolphins, zorbing, jet boat riding, luge riding, haka dancing, hot springs bathing.
And all this for a grand total of approximately $2300 (flights, accomodation, rental cars, extreme sporting, food and extraneous expenses totalled). This is even the budget version, as we’ll be restricting ourselves on food (eating sandwiches made from ingredients bought from the supermarket (e.g. $3 per person, per meal), rather than actually eating out at restaurants and food joints. We’ve also rented the cheapest car (can you imagine squeezing four people and their luggage into a tiny hatchback for a seven hour drive?), are staying in the cheapest hostels, and will be getting crunk on bottles of spirits in our hostel room before going out for a good time at night.
The only thing we’re truly splurging on is activities. The way we figure it - if we’ve made it all the way to New Zealand, we might as well pay that extra hundred, two hundred, if it means we get our fill of extreme sports. They might not be cheap….but they’re more than worth their weight in memories. What use is travel if you don’t do the things that will give you the best memories?
It’s a good thing that you mentioned “extreme sports and activities” and not just “extreme sports”, because my brain saw “luge riding” and went, “… extreme? Yeah…”
Well, it sounds like you are hitting the big places - if you weren’t touching Queenstown and/or Rotorua I’d be very disappointed in you! Are you passing through/visiting Wellington at all? Because there are a few nice places there, and I’d suggest a visit to Te Papa if you can - it is free, so it only costs time, not money (unless you do a few specific things - the bulk of the museum is free though).
Hopefully the weather is good for your trip (but perhaps a little less muggy and stifling…) and I hope you have fun. A lot of those activities you can’t really do in many places, so it’s nice to have them in one place.
Catherine on January 23 2008 #
Catherine, I think our muggy and stifling weather would be a welcome change from the blistering heat over there! :P
The funny thing is, the best thing you’ll do whilst here in New Zealand is get blindingly drunk with me! But I guess that’s a pretty extreme activity.
Nellie on January 23 2008 #
Oh Amanda!!! Take me with you!! You’re like the absolute traveling buddy :D
Juice on January 23 2008 #
Yay New Ziggy! *squee*
I wanna go.
Rachael on January 23 2008 #
Ooer, can I come? I want to gooooo have crazy times with Amanda! Canada is boring. You should come visit here! Except, I just said it was boring. What I mean is, it’s NOT boring. And it would certainly be more interesting with someone who hadn’t been here.
Can you believe I am actually BLASÉ about the Rocky Mountains since I’ve lived near them my whole life? It’s why I need people to visit me. I can never see the beauty of them until someone who hasn’t seen them before is standing in awe beside me.
Aisling on January 24 2008 #
I hope you have tons of fun in New Zealand! I hope to visit that part of the world someone, especially since I have family in New Zealand and Australia that I’ve never met.
Chans on January 24 2008 #
Haha, I’m glad to hear you’ve got it all sorted =]
Kristina on January 24 2008 #
Oooh, sounds like an amazing time! Please to take assloads of pictures and have the most fun you can in Enn Zed. :)
Xuan on January 24 2008 #
Wow that sounds exciting! I’ve been seeing so many New Zealand advertisements on TV lately and I want to go there so bad! Hope you have fun =P
Katy on January 24 2008 #
*waits for picspam post*
Chien Yee on January 24 2008 #
Sounds like soo much fun!! I wanna go now even though i really don’t like extreme outdoor activities.:D
Noemi on January 24 2008 #