Lousy Kite & Taupo Hot Tubs

Took a few days off for work. The girls want to do the Tongariro Crossing. So we move to Turangi at the southern end of Lake Taupo. The road goes right through the heartland of the North Island. Long stretches of gravel track. It’s called “The Forgotten World Highway”. I couldn’t think of a more fitting name.

Early in the morning, I take the girls to the start of the Tongariro Crossing up into the national park. Within just two weeks, a lot of snow has melted on the volcano and the weather is also much better. From the start you can already see Mount Taranaki 150 kilometres further along the coast. The crowds of visitors are also increasing. Today there must be 200 people at the start before 8am.

I have to do some web design work in the morning. After my initial work, the owner of the hostel asks me for my references. He likes them, and 30 minutes later I have to create a new homepage. The design is finished in the afternoon and I pick up the girls. One more day to relax.

Then it’s on to Taupo. The wind at Lake Taupo chops between 0 and 60 km/h every 10 seconds. Lousy kite: The lousiest wind I’ve ever kited in. Still, it works halfway. The Vegas is a real gust killer, I never lose control. With my old nitro, it would have simply shredded me in this wind. The next day the wind is fairly steady but unfortunately onshore and too weak. Not enough to get away from the shore. The shortest downwinders ever. I finally need the right wind.

In the evening I go to the Taupo Hot Tubs with a nice guy from Stuttgart. There are always wonderful new things to discover, whether you’ve been there before or not. The hot tubs are fed by natural hot springs. It’s really hot at the top, each pool down is a little cooler. At the bottom you jump into the cold river. We drink beer, smoke a cigarette and watch a scattered cloud glow orange in the sunset. The best things in life are for free.

New Zealand is more German than Germany. If I can find a few more Turks now, I can go home again. In every second hostel the German rate is over 50%, in some it’s significantly higher. You can buy schnitzel in the supermarket. The beer tastes like in Bavaria. Some flavours are guaranteed never to make it to Germany – “Speights”, for example.

Apart from the volcanoes and palm trees, the country looks exactly like the foothills of the Bavarian Alps. Kiwis – if you ever meet them among all the Germans – are almost as mouthy and sometimes snotty as Bavarians. But don’t you dare survive your first beer with them – it’ll take a long time.

Just like the next day. The girls go to Rotorua, I look for the wind again in Mount Maunganui. Nothing again. There’s one hell of a party at the Mount Backpackers Hostel. There’s noise, dancing, half the hostel is destroyed. The neighbours arrive for the first time at ten. I stay out of it all, the world travellers are all too young and too drunk for me at the moment.

I watch a film with lots of fire. Suddenly a drunken hostel employee comes into the dorm. She presses a phone card into my hand and slurs: “If there’s a fire, dial 111”. I can’t help but grin once again. Oh yes, for this service I get one night’s free internet :-). Off to battle.

New page today: www.einsteinstheorie.eu. Forum against stupidity

I’m sitting on the beach at six in the morning, watching the first surfers in nice two-and-a-half metre waves. The sunrise is indescribable. Especially after this night. I was working while the whole hostel sank into a collective alcoholic frenzy. The first neighbour arrives at 10 pm. The next one at 11 pm.

The local youth juxtapose with their tuning boxes around the block until three. Their machines are so powerful that they can set off nearby car alarms with a blast of gas in the right place. It’s good that they only run for 3 minutes at a time. Bad that the youngsters only need 5 minutes for a lap around the block. There will be many laps.

The first zombies come home at three o’clock. The music starts up again. I ask for quiet a few times until five. It gets louder every time. One pisses on the porch before deciding to snore behind me. A drunken Englishman is lying on the floor in front of the door and can’t get up. A German snotty bastard asks me, the relaxing cigarette smoker, “Hey, bro, what’s up dude?”. Bad, really bad. I advise him to go to bed if he still wants one tomorrow.