BIG FUN in New Zealand!

It’s been a while since I have been able to update my blog as I have been soooooooooo busy having too much fun here in NZ!! My journey to Auckland last Thursday was pretty good – I was upgraded to Premier Travel Class (between cattle class and Business Class!) so I had a much more comfortable flight! I am staying here with ‘old’ diving friends, Mel and Jamie. However, Mel is back in the UK while I’m here looking after her Mum who has had an operation but Jamie has been a perfect host and has looked after me superbly!

It has been the first time I have been cold since I left the UK! We have had sunny days and very wet days this last week. Jamie had arranged 4 days diving for me – 2 days diving off the Coramandel Peninsula, a day at the Poor Knights Islands and a day on the ‘Rainbow Warrior’. What a star he is!!

On Friday afternoon, after having made sure I have all the kit I need, including a 7mm wet suit, we headed to the Coramandel Peninsula which is north east of Auckland. The drive up was lovely – I am very impressed with the NZ landscape and it reminds me very much of Scotland (which is what other had told me already). We arrived in a small town called Whitianga and met up with the group of Jamie’s friends we were diving with in the pub for a few drinks. We were staying in an apartment right on the seafront on the outskirts of Whitianga. When we got up on Saturday morning, there was a bit of heavy surf on the beach and sure enough, when we headed out on the boat, there was a big swell and quite a chop from a strong south-easterly wind. We arrived at a group of islands called the Mercury Islands and found a sort of sheltered spot at an island called the Maori Lady. We had a group discussion but as 4 people were pretty sea sick and it looked like the dive might be quite surgey, we decided to give it a miss and head back! By now, it had also started raining and it poured down all afternoon and evening! We spent a very pleasant afternoon playing cards and we spent Saturday night in the pub again, eating, drinking and playing pool, so it wasn’t a totally wasted day!

When we got up on Sunday morning, it was bright and sunny and the wind had died right down! We headed back out to the Mercury Islands again and though there was still a swell, there was no chop on the waves so it was quite an enjoyable trip out. We found a sheltered spot at Little Ohinau Island, anchored up and had 2 dives there. We dived a shallow rocky, kelpy reef which reminded me very much of diving at home – with a few additional sea creatures we don’t have such as stingrays, triggerfish and goatfish!

The water temperature was about 18ºC and I soon remembered me why I don’t dive in a 7mm wetsuit in the UK anymore! It wasn’t quite as bad as I expected it to be but I did get chilly and my calves cramped up at the end of each dive!

We headed back to Auckland and had a take-away curry for tea. I had been very surprised that we hadn’t had a curry on Saturday night but divers here don’t seem to go for curries on dive trips – weird!! (That comment may only really be understood by my diving pals so apologies to everyone else who is scratching their heads right now!).

Early on Monday morning (5.30am!), we headed north of Auckland to a place called Tutukaka where we headed out on a dive boat to the Poor Knights Islands. For those of you who don’t know, these were named by Captain James Cook who named them after Poor Knights Breakfast AKA eggy bread AKA French Toast. When we arrived there, a pod of huge bottlenosed dolphins came to play on our bow which was great! Our first dive was at a site called North Arch. There is a large arch in the rock which continues under the water. We dived along the wall to the arch, swam through it at about 20m and then back out again and back along the wall the same way we came. It was a beautiful site – lots of fish, anemones, a stingray, nudibranchs, moray eels and lots more. I lasted nearly an hour until my calves started cramping up again!

For the second dive, we moored up outside Rikoriko Cave, which is the biggest sea cave in the world! Before that, the boat went inside the cave, which is enormous and would have fitted another 3 or 4 boats in at the same time. We dropped into the water and swam a little way into the cave and back out again along the wall of the cave. It was a beautiful dive! There wasn’t as much marine life as the first dive but the geology was interesting and it was a really chilled out dive – the viz was incredible and looking back out from inside the cave was very…..I can’t really think of the right word but it was an amazing dive!

Unfortunately, the dive on the ‘Rainbow Warrior’ planned for Tuesday was cancelled as Jamie and I were the only 2 divers booked on the trip but Jamie suggested we go and dive a really nice shore dive about an hour from Auckland at Goat Island which is a marine park. So I spent the morning chilling out at the house and Jamie picked me up at about 1.30pm. We arrived at Goat Island, got kitted up and headed down to the shore. Goat Island is pretty big and actually too far for us to swim out to but we headed out in the general direction of the island. It was a shallow dive (the maximum depth we got was about 4m) but it was great fun! There were loads of really friendly fish and in particular a blue cod which even let me tickle it under the chin! We swam about amongst the small rocky reefs which were covered in weed and spent nearly an hour on the dive. I also found a nudibranch so I was very happy!

Yesterday, I was planning to head into Auckland city centre but I ended up phaffing about so much in the house that I didn’t get around to it! Jamie and I went out for a Thai meal last night - very tasty. Today is my last day here – I fly out at 7.15pm tonight. My plan was to head into Auckland this morning to have a look around the city centre and then pack this afternoon. But the weather is pretty crap so I’m staying around the local area for the day instead. I am heading to the USA for the next leg of my trip – so here’s hoping I don’t get swine flu!