Up about 8:15, showered, breakfast (porridge), checked out of Hot Rocks and moved to Funky Green Voyager, a small hostel just in a residential district two minutes walk from a big mall and 3 minutes to downtown. It got a rave review from Lets Go, and is apparently one of the highest rated hostels in NZ. Much nicer than Hot Rocks, but doesn't have any pools. Funky Green Voyager reminds me of being in SE Asia, it has a "no shoes" policy inside the house.
AFter checking in, and getting the orientation from Chris (manager/guy working), I talked to Chris about the best spots to do things in NZ, including the best geothermal areas, rafting, skydiving, spas, zorbing, and luging. He was a great help. NZ is definately the adrenaline and death defying capital of the world!! They love speed and jumping off of anything that can be jumped off of, here in NZ.
Made lunch about noon, and was talking with Catherine, girl from England, who is working at the hostel in exchange for accomodations. We decided to go to Skyline Skyriders and do the luge (apparently better here than in Queenstown). And it's cheap too, for $29 you get the gondola ride to the top of the mountain, and 5 luge runs, including chair lifts back up to the top after the luge runs.
After Catherine finished eating, we headed out there (5-minute drive) and bought the package and caught the gondola up to the top of the mountain. AT the top of the mountain is a souvenir shop, restaurant and lots of activities, including helicopter rides, a "super-swing" (0 to 135kph in 2 seconds, they advertise!), a shooting range, and, of course, the luge tracks. And some great views of Lake Rotorua and the town and surrounding area. We watched a couple doing the super-swing, looks fun, but not sure if it's $30 worth of fun or not.
We then turned our attention to the luge tracks. They have three different tracks, the scenic track, an intermediate track, and an advanced track. They require your first run to be on the scenic track.
The luge "vehicles" consist of a small, plastic 3-wheeled cart, with handle bars and a "gear shift" on the handle bars with positions for Park, Neutral, and Brake. You sit in the seat of the cart and grab the handle bars, and move the handle bars to the neutral position, and you're away!
The scenic trip was AWESOME!!! It's a slower track, but still DAMN fast if you don't use your break. But the curve of the corners angle away, so it's quite easy to tip over going around a corner fast (you are required to wear helmets, as well). As I was going down, Catherine kept cutting me off, finally I got by, and caught up to a bunch of really slow Japanese girls, where I tried to take a short cut, while going around a corner, and, going to fast, started to tip over, put my hand down on the concrete track so I didn't tip over, and OUCH! Don't put your hand down!!! Anyway we got to the bottom, and took the chair lift back up to the top. Next was the intermediate! WOWSERS!!!! This is the most amazingly fun thing I've done my whole trip, in the more than six months I've been travelling!! And we haven't even done the Advanced!!!
So, after the Intermediate, we go back up and do the Advanced! AHHHHHHHHHHHH!!!! Man, you FLY!!! Advanced is STEEP, hair-pin turns. Apparently you can reach speeds of 55kph on these little things! There's one section where you go around a sharp corner that's also a BIG dip, with a little bump at the bottom, and you actually FLY for a second or two!!! I did see one guy wipe out on the Advanced run, right near the bottom. He didn't hurt himself, maybe a few scratches!
Anyway, as I said, this is easily the most FUN thing I've done the whole time I've been travelling!!!!!! And cheap too!!!!!! I'm definately going to go back, with my video camera, so I can video tape going down on the tracks.
AFter that heap of fun, which lasted about two hours, we then drove to the Agrodome, which is a farm and adventure park, where they do zorbing (among other things). Zorbing is where you climb inside a big ball and roll down a big hill. You can do it either wet or dry. I just wanted to check it out, and hopefully see someone do it, but alas, there was no one there (other than people working it), so I couldn't see anyone do it. Apparently it's fun, but not $40 worth of fun. And the roll only lasts 15 seconds. Not sure if I'll do that or not.
Got back to the hostel about 4:00, walked around downtown and the mall for a bit, bought a pair of Thinsulate gloves (also bought a NZ All Blacks toque at the Skyline Skyriders store), then went to Countdown, a Superstore-stype grocery store (they keep prices DOWN) and bought more groceries. I'm now hauling around 5 bags of groceries. I need to find a big box to put everything in.
Made supper (sliced meats on dinner rolls). And I must say, I'm really, really missing Miracle Whip. Mayonaisse just doesn't cut it, at all. It's just not the same.
After supper, everyone in the hostel just hung out in the common room, reading, playing games, talking, etc. I went to bed about 11:00.
It started raining late this afternoon, and rained all evening.
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