USA Day 6. Lombard Street

Today after a yummy bagel for breakfast (they really do Bagels all the time here) I set off the see the decidedly quirky Lombard Street! The Street itself is actually really long, but one particular section is pretty… different.

 I only realised when I got to the top of the hill but if I'd just gone one street over I'd have been able to miss a lot of the steep inclines - ah well you live and learn. All I can say is my legs got a bit of a work out today and I finally instant SF's reputation for being hilly!

 A beautiful church commanding the top of one of the hill

(one of my favourite photos of SF so far)

 Looking down from one of the hills - got to say the weather was beautiful and the views down the streets from the tops of the hills more than made up for the walk up!

 San Francisco is just such a beautiful city in the sun - all the pastel houses and quirky details!

 Looking out to the Bay Bridge!

 You can just see Telegraph hill and the tower that often dominates the skyline away from downtown

 And I finally got to Lombard Street!

 As you can see it's fully functional, people live up here and park their cars and plenty of tourists queue to be able to drive down it's crazy bends!

 personally one of my favourite bits was the view after climbing the steps!

 After seeing the quirky road and the view I headed back down to the Bay - and was rewarded to lovely glimpses of the Golden Gate Bridge on my way down!

 After climbing all those hills I was more than ready for a Ben and Jerry's ice cream (I am definitely abusing the fact they have stores here) and relaxed by the waterfront

Where I sat looking out with my ice cream

as I was daydreaming I spotted this little guy! A Sealion just bobbing his head above the water!

 After feeling suitably baked I set off to Fort Mason Meadow

 Something about this building perched on the cliff really entranced me, 'Hour of Days'. I just love it. 

 Looking out to Alcatraz 

 Walking up to the Meadow through the trees

 The beautiful grassy area where I inevitably lounged around for a lot longer than planned watching some impressive kite-flying!

 After pottering about up on the hill by the Meadow I couldn't really be bothered to do the walk back to my hostel and Downtown so I was going to catch the Cable car but this was the site I got! A massive queue wrapping all the way around the street. 

 I figured I'd walk back since it was a gorgeous day and save the Cable Car ride for another time!

 As it was a saw this super quirky house on the way back!

So now I'm back in the hostel packing things up to ship out tomorrow! So excited to get to LA - fingers crossed everything goes smoothly and we both get to Union Station OK!! 

Day 14 Whakatane

After watching some football with people from the hostel (not the way I’d normally choose to start the day) I caught my bus to Rotorua. I’m pretty sure I’ve mentioned before that you can smell Rotorua before you see it, and today was no exception. We rounded a starp corner and got a strong whiff of eggs – lovely.

Rotorua was just a brief stop before I was on my way again. The bus driver for the second half was… interesting. He yelled a lot, told two girls to ‘get away from me’ because they were asking whether this was the right bus for them and he knew they weren’t on his bus. And he refused to put my backpack in the luggage section, telling me I had to take it on with me, which is fine on the big coaches, but on the tiny little buses there’s just no room, so I had a cramped 2hrs. But worst/funniest of all, he left someone behind! The guy had obviously checked in with the driver, put his bags on a seat and then had to run to the toilet, well the driver didn’t double check the people (that’s the first time I’ve seen a driver not double check on the smaller buses). And we got to the guy’s stop, no one got off, and so the driver had to ring the office and drop the bag in the nearest town!

Aside from the rather eventful bus journey, I got to Whakatane with no problems. Well aside from having to say the town’s name… it’s pronounced ‘Fak-ah-tan-ee’, you say that out loud without worrying about it sounded wrong.

(I love how there's just a huge cliff in the middle of the town!)

I was greeted by beautiful skies and a blustery river – makes a change from all the clouds I’ve had recently!

(a very windblown picture of me at the river!)

I popped into the isite to find somewhere to stay and long story short, the girl who was helping me finished, and the guy who replaced her, well turns out he was a bit rubbish. All I wanted was somewhere for 3 nights, preferably a hostel, and not more than 1km out of the centre… We decided on a particular hostel and he got ringing… I guess it’s my own fault for not triple checking (because I did double check) but I’m not at a hostel 3km from the centre…

The only up side is because it’s so far from town they give you a free wifi voucher – not much, but it’s something to be able to check my emails from the comfort of my bed!

After popping my stuff on my bed I decided to see just how far I was from the centre and walked in. Turns out it’s not ‘too’ bad, a little annoying though since I’m hopefully going a few long walks tomorrow and the added walk from the centre to my hostel isn’t going to be fun when I’m tired from a 8hr walk in the scenic reserve…

All along the front there are lots of sculptures made by locals artists, these two in particular stood out for me

this one, 'kiwi boy', mainly because I actually found it kind of creepy

I just loved this little cafe!!

Whakatane is a really pretty turn, and surprisingly big too! I pottered along the river, before sitting at a little café outside and enjoying the sun and the views.

I also made a little detour to Pohaturoa which is a massive rock jutting out that is sacred to the Maori as a point of several rituals and important rites 

There's also a hole, which used to be a cave, where baptisms were done

I’m in a room with 2 boys, one is asleep (it’s 5pm…) the other I actually met in town when he started chatting to me at the café and asked for my number… Not awkward at all… nope. not .at. all

Day 13 The Mount

For the first time, the weather forecast was actually right - sadly.

I hopped on the bus over to the mount anyway and decided to give the base walking track a whirl, as i figured that was a good way to test out my ankle. The sea was pretty impressive in the wind, and all I can say is I'm very glad I wasn't out there on the water!

 Look at this random sheep along the walk!

 a random statue!

 It quickly became clear the track to the summit was bad, a few of the paths leading up there were closed off as the strong wind, and persistent rain were set to last the day

 (just after i took this photo they put a sign up advising people not to go up)

By the time I finished the first path there was a sign telling people not to attempt the summit. Which was bittersweet, on the one hand it saved me from having to make the decision of whether or not my ankle was up to it, but on the other I really wanted to go up!

It was surprisingly busy around Mt Maunganui – there were tons of people braving the blustery weather to walk along the beach. And there were even some people surfboarding!

(I thought this was cool!)

I didn’t spend too much time on the beach since I’d sunbathed there before with the Girls on a weekend trip and it was damn cold - instead I headed to the tiny shopping street!

Its almost entirely privately owned businesses, most of the selling a bizarre assortment of knick-knacks. 

(this is typical NZ btw, a house selling grapefruit from the gate and just trusting people to pay)

That’s it for today, I caught the bus back when it was starting to get dark and now I’m in my room typing this up while new people move in!