Thurs 19th-Fri 20th Feb: To Wellington via National Park

I left Auckland at 9am on an intercity bus going south to National Park in the centre of the island. I have a bus pass valid for a number of journeys and this is what I'll use to get around in New Zealand. I'm heading for National Park to do the 'Tongariro crossing' one of NZ's most spectacualr one-day hikes. You pass through 3 volcanoes on the route one being Mt Ngauruhoe which served as Mt Doom in the Lord of the Rings trilogy.

Its a beautiful morning as we leave Auckland and doesn't take long to pass from the city centre to the outskirts, no gridlock here. I was surprised to hear that Auckalnd has a population of 1.3 million. It doesn't have the feel of a city that large. Out in the countryside I immediately start looking for fields full of sheep. I don't see any. I hear later that most of NZ's 50-60 million shepp are on the south island.

We pass through Hamilton and on through green, rolling countryside to Te Kuti where we stopped for lunch. It was a small, quiet, picturesque town, nesteld beneath green, wooded hills. We left Te Kuti and entered hill country and the odd volcanoe reared its cone off in the distance. Looking at some of the smooth green fields that covered these hills and valleys I couldn't help thinking we were passing through Hobbit country. The whole Lord of the Rings vibe, no doubt is going to follow me around New Zealand. I haven't actually read any of the books so I'll have to try and make a start while I'm here.

As the bus approached National Park the sky clouded over. National Park itself turned out to be a tiny settlement a few miles from the big volcanoes which were now shrouded by the clouds. A 5 min walk took me round to the hostel where I am staying and I got a place in a 10-bed dorm sharing with 2 others. Another German/ Israeli combination. This is the second time in NZ that I've shared a dorm with a German and Israeli and both times they haven't spoken a word to each other. The forecast for tomorrow is terrible. Heavy rain and 80km winds. Normally the hikers leave the hostel at 7.15am and the lady of the house said she wouldn't cancel the hike until she saw what kind of weather the morning would bring.

I woke up a couple of times during the night and heard rain pouring down outside. Long before 7am I knew there would be no hiking today. A cyclone which had worked its way down the Australian east coast causing heavy flooding in Queenstown had moved out across the Tasman sea to dump the remnants of the storm over New Zealand. As a result we had torrential rain for the day. I wasn't going to hang about. I didn't have time. I decided to catch a bus south to Wellington in the afternoon and try to do the hike at a later dat on my waty back to Auckland.

After spending the morning pottering about, reading and looking at the internet to kill some time. A gaggle of blonde haired, blue eyed Scandinavians skipped around the hostel as none of us could go outside. We all looked at the rain pounding down. YOu wouldn't know there were some tall volcanoes a few miles away. Visibility was very poor. You could barely see the road 100m away. The bus to Wellington came through 40 mins late. As I waited I chatted to a middle aged couple from Dublin who, like me, had planned to do the hike but because of the weather were moving on. They were over to visit their daughter and newly born grandchild. THey must have been from a posh part of Dublin because I actually thought they were English.

Once the bus got out of National park the weather began to improve. We passed through a series of small towns with unusual Maori names, Raetihi, Kakatahi and Wanganui. We changed buses at Bulls for Wellington and as we got close to the capital city the weather closed in again. We arrived at around 8.30pm in a light shower. I hadn't booked any accomodation in advance and, what I or a handful of other backpackers hadn't realised was that most of the accomodation in the city was booked out. There was a festival on in the city over the weekend and the city was full of visitors. I went to four hostels, each of which were fully booked. In the last of these the girl at reception allowed me to use a phone around the remaining hostels in town. I was beginning to get worried that I wouldn't find any bed for the night. At last, I got lcky. One of the hostels said they had a vacant bed, the last one in the house. It was only 400m from down the street from where I was. So, relieve, I skipped down the street to claim my bed.

I was moving on again first ting in the morning so I went out for some food and to take a look around the city centre. Sure enough the place was gearing up for a festival of some sort. There were plenty of workmen out erecting stages. It was a Friday night and the area was busy with the usual crew out for the weekned. The street was busy with people going to and fro, heading for the bars, restaurants and clubs. Before too long I was back in the Hostel, showered and in bed, hoping without much optimism to get some sleep. I was in a noisy, 6-bed dorm. Regardless of the noiseit would have taken me an agae to get to sleep. My back still hasn't fully recovered from the burn itrecieved in Tonga. It has stopped peeling now but the skin must be very tender. Some soap suds got into a particularly sensitive area around my right shoulder blade and when the itch started it was severe, worse than pain. It came in waves which had me squirming in the bed. I couldn't get comfortable. I was trying not to scratch but the itch was so severe I couldn't lie still. I went back to the shower, soaked my back and then tried lying on a damp towel to ease the discomfort. Eventually I drifted off to sleep.