still surfing in NZ

We have made it to Rotorua NZ, which is still on the North Island. It is one of the most amazing places I have ever seen. It is a town filled with steaming thermal pools, bubbling mud pits and stinky air. We took a long drive around the countryside today. Visiting thermal volcanic areas rich in culture with so much to see and do. We stopped so many times to take pictures of the countryside where we saw grazing Red deer, sheep and cows. We also couldn't get over the views of the hills and vegitation. This could be a place that one could move to....
No, we won't move here, But I would definatly recomend people visit and plan to stay a while.

We are staying (CS) with a family of 3 right here in the city of Rotorua. They live in a quiet area 10 minutes from down town. They have a little boy who is so much fun. We spend lots of time laughing at the kids as they run around and act goofy. We only have access to dial-up here and so we can't load pictures yet, but I will br getting on that asap. They are to good to leave in my camera.

Another very COOL thing that is happening is Dean and Colton are going RED DEER hunting tomorrow. They met a local hunter guy in a hunting/fishing store who offered to take them out. Last weekend he shot 12 deer for food for his family. He doesn't want any money to bring them out, so this is an amazing gift for them. They are so excited. It all I have heard all day ( < ;

Miranda and I might go to the spa and get some thermal mud slathered on us while they are hunting!!

I will upload pictures very soon. I know there are a few people who will be waiting. Things otherwise are going well. We have adapted to driving on the other side and are feeling confdent that we can drive to the South island  next week.

We have been in Auckland for the last few days. We have been couch surfing with a lady called Suzie. Couch surfing is a new thing for us. It would be similar to Mennoniting your way. There is a web site that lists all the people in the world that love to meet new people and also love to host people in their homes. This sounded perfect for us as we love to host people and we also love to meet people. The way to really meet someone is to stay with them. It also gives us an oportunity to be able to spend a little less on travel as we can cook our own food and the accomidations are at no cost.

So our first place ever is at Suzie's house. She has 3 little boys and is a single mom. She also has a young girl who boards with her as she is going to school. We had a great time in her home. She made us feel right at home and part of the family. We could feel free to use her internet connection, and she drove us to the train, bus, grocery and the movies. We are so thankful that there are people out there who love to make it possible for people like us to have a home to stay in while we travel.

This is one of the very pretty cats that Suzie has. She also has 2 bunnies.

This is Suzie's house. It is in the suburbs of Auckland. It is a 1/22 hour train ride to the harbour.

The boys and Colton played lots of lego.The back deck was a great place for Miranda to talk to her friends Michelle and Rebekah and Adam on Skype.

We went down to the harbour and checked out the boats and had a meat pie for lunch. Mmmm meat pies are so good. We look foreward to eating more as we travel.

Our next place is Rotorua. It is a towm that is south of Auckland and is famous for the thermal mud baths. We plan on doing a lot more activities there. These last few days was great to relax and reboot for the next leg of busy travel. As Ang keeps telling me to do. We are slowing down. Thanks Ang.

Hawaiian lady

We met some very interesting people in Hawaii. Our goal is to sloooow down, enjoy everything and meet people and hear stories.

One of the most interesting people we have met so far is a 88 year old woman from Hawaii. She did the flower aranging in the hotel we staye3d at on the Big island. One morning we were having breakfast and she passed our table and we started a conversation with her. She was originally from Japan. Her family immigrated to Hawaii when she was a little girl and she has been through the bombing of pearl harbour(including many weeks of blackouts), 2 tsunamis, many eruptions of the volcanoes, a couple of earthquakes and had so many stories to tell about her life. She was facinating to talk to and we where lucky to have met her.

Auckland, New Zealand -couch surfing with Suzie

We said good-bye last night to Hawaii. It is an amazing country filled with lush rainforests, very friendly people and lots of fun things to do.

There are majestic trees. If you look really carefully, you will see us under the big tree.

There are vines hanging down from these trees that attach to the ground as roots when they touch.The beaches are quite windy at times which makes really big waves like here on Bondi beach.

We went to a real Hawian Luau and watched a really cool show. They wanted to charge us $15 for a picture. So I just took this picture of the picture. Hee hee.

One of the entertainers was a fire juggler. He had a really good show.

Bye Hawaii!


We are finally here!! New Zealand is amazingly beautiful. The city is built on rolling hills that are filled with greenery. We arrived at 6am in Auckland and took a city bus into downtown, switched buses and took another bus to the suburbs, where our first Couch Surfing host lives. She picked us up at a stop near her house. She lives in a quiet suburb with her 3 children. We dropped our bags and thought it would be a good idea to get some groceries. Suzie offered to drive us to the butcher and the grocer to pick up the food we will need while we are here. We decided to BBQ supper for her and her kids for supper. She dropped us at her house and went to a movie with her mom as her kids where visiting with their dad till the afternoon. We thought it would be a fun surprise to clean her house while she was gone. I warned her that we have been known to do something nice tfor people when they do something for us. Considering we will be staying at her house hfor the next few days we thought it was only fair to do something to help her out.

After the house was nice and clean we BBQed ourselves some fresh lamb chops, baked potatoes and corn on the cob. Yummmmmy, it was sooo amazing. We could eat that meal every day. We will bbq some hamburgers for the kids, Suzie and 2 other couch surfers that are here. Tomorrow we will start to explore the city a bit before moving on.

Hilo, Hawaii

April 5, 2010

Hilo, Hawaii

We arrived in Hilo on the 4th to rain and it hasn’t quit since. It didn’t really stop us from exploring the island by car. It only slowed the foot travel. At times the rain slowed to a fine mist and it gave us the opportunity to run around without getting to wet. We drove up to Volcano national park to see if we could get a close look at flowing lava. We heard this would be the place to see it in Hawaii. Though once we got here we were told that the lava stopped flowing 2 months ago. We did get to see the red glow of the lava deep down in the core of the volcano once it got dark.

We also hiked through a lava tube in the park. The lava tubes are formed when the lava falls down hill and the outside layer makes a crust but the inside lava keeps flowing. When the lava quits flowing it leaves a hollow tube behind. So what was left was a 300 foot long by 12 foot high lava tube that we could walk through. Very cool!

We drove along the rim of the volcano getting great glimpse’s into the center of one of the dormant volcanoes. We also got to see the old 1970’s lava sites where the hardened lava took over roads and the hills surrounding the mountain. In certain places in the lava there were ancient petroglyph drawings that we hiked out a mile or so to see. Just as we were h

During our travels outside of the park we drove to heights of 4000 feet above sea level and then back down to the southern most part of the U.S.A. While at this southern tip of the island we heard about a green sand beach. We just had to take a look at this beach as we had never heard of such a thing. When we arrived it was 4 :30 and we had about 2 ½ hours of light left. There was a family that had just gotten back from the 2 ½ mile hike and said it took them 2 hours against wind to reach the sand but it was so amazing to see the green sand and the blue water. We looked at them and decided we could do it faster than them and took off at a jog so that we could make it back before sundown. We had to follow the rugged hills along the ocean with Dean in the lead and the rest of us trailing behind. We knew we had to push ourselves because finding our way back in the dark was not an option.

As we rounded a bend we came upon a jeep that was coming back from the beach. We thought how nice it would have been to have a 4x4 to take this trek with, but our Ford Focus would have bottomed out at the first bend. We stopped them and asked how much further. Jogging behind Dean for 45 minutes was getting a little tiring as we hadn’t been walking too much yet to be in great shape to follow.

The jeep crew said we were right around the corner and we were.

As we approached the cliff overlooking the beach we noticed the greenish sand that was getting washed down the sandy cliff must have been formed by the coloring of the volcanic rock at the base.

We didn’t stay long as we once again saw the sun slowly creeping nearer to the earth. We took a few pictures. Scooped some contraband sand into a small baggy and headed back the way we had come from. Picking up garbage left behind by other less outdoor friendly people. We though by cleaning up God world it would make up for moving some of His sand to Manitoba. We of coarse made it back before the sun went down. The apparent 3 hour round trip only took us 1 ½ hours son we had lots of time to spare.

During the day we also stopped at a black sand beach to find some Green back turtles. There happened to only be one magnificent creature on the beach at this time. But it was well worth the stop. Apparently this area has a group of resident turtles that come up onto the beach to rest and are not afraid of people, so it is a really neat place to visit and get a close up view.

April 6, 2010

We are still at Uncle Bill’s resort in Hilo Bay. We are still having a lot of rainy weather. Today we decided to drive over to the North part of the big island. Because we left Hilo the rain has let up a bit and we are finally seeing some sun. The coast road was an amazing drive that reminded me of the drive we once took through a dried up riverbed in Jamaica years ago. As we drove along the narrow road we passed through green tunnels of lush tropical rain forest.. The road meandered along over deep gorges filled with small waterfalls and babbling brooks. As we climbed higher and higher up the mountain, the ocean views became more and more amazing. The waves far below us crashed against the rocky coast creating white foamy sprays that seemed to reach up to the clouds. We took as many of the scenic pull offs as possible so we could get off the road and soak up the beauty that seemed to entrench us from all around.

We stopped at a roadside stand and bought the most tasty pineapple imaginable. This pineapple was grown by the guy that sold it to us. He also sold fresh cold coconut that he would cut open for passing visitors to enjoy.

For lunch we tried a burger and soup in a tiny town near the Akaka falls. We also found we could “borrow” a bit of free internet and do a quick update of the blog and got to talk on skype to the Heppners again.

Hilo Bay is having a hula festival and we got to see them give demonstrations.

Hawaii

We have had a really hard time with internet access here. We have spent the majority of our time zipping from here to there in the rainy Hawaii islands. We have been doing the Klippenstein-go-as-fast-as-humanly-possible travel and hope to slow down in the near future. I will try to post some pictures in the next few days.

More on Colton and Miranda's blogs

Hawaii

We are here!! It has finally started. The big trip....

We had a very long day to get to Hawaii. We started at 6am from the Winnipeg airpot. Had a 3 hour fllight to Vancouver. A 7 hour layover in Vancouver airport a 7 hour flight and finally got to our hotel in Haiaii at 9 pm Hawaii time ( 3am Altona time).

Today we did a lot of walking and some naps in between.

Tomorrow we fly to the big island to see the lava!