Heading east

I really have been sloppy with my blogging of late, for which I am very sorry. Nevertheless, as my blog's statistics suggest, people have still been coming to the site through search engines, and invariably being disappointed with what they've found, if what they've been searching for is anything to go by...

Search engine queries used to find this site, exactly as they were entered:

• Gay full body massage Chennai
• Are celebrities overpaid?
• Counterfiet [sic] watches
• How to pack for a trip to London in November
• How big is my van
• Weird massage experiences
• Porkinson sausages
• Photos of a drunkards liver
• Nathan smells

I'm in a list-writing mood, so here are some facts about New Zealand, now that I have been here for thirty-eight days:

• There are more sheep than people in New Zealand.
• Sheep have been trained to sniff for drugs at airports, and are now used as seeing companions for the blind as well as in bomb disposal.
• Sheep who fall off hills and land on isolated rock ledges can survive for years on the grass they find there -they are known as hermit sheep. Their wool grows so long that they cannot see any more and resemble giant balls of wool.
• A sheep called Tundra in the South Island just off the West coast can talk, draw simple diagrams, and re-wire household electrical appliances.
• Green spaces and squares in Christchurch today were once used to grow potatoes to send to England after World War II.
• New Zealand's less well-known food export after lamb and wool is cheese, which is extracted from mines near Rotorua. New Zealand has been mining cheese since 1867. The cheese is infused with gases common to that area produced by geothermal activity, imparting a distinct flavour and scent. It is most often packaged as The Laughing Cow, Dairylea, and Tesco Value Cheese Spread.
• Maui rental campervans are predominantly hired by Germans with no sense of humour.
• Wellington has a bitch of a one-way system.
• Coin-operated showers at all campsites are all set to operate for precisely fifteen seconds too little.
• The Cosy Corner motor camp at Mount Maunganui has the nicest smelling toilets in New Zealand.

I can't provide proof of all of the facts above.

I left things off in the last entry with a trip to Doubtful Sound, which now seems like ages ago, and opportunities to get on the Internet have been few and far between. Nevertheless, I will be catching up with things as soon as I get the chance - I've seen lots of places, met some great people, and gone slightly mad. Now I'm in Auckland, and in a few hours I fly to Tahiti, about which I know nothing more than a perky-breasted maiden there once got together with Fletcher Christian and sparked the mutiny on the Bounty. The next entry therefore will hopefully cover the rest of New Zealand, including Doubtful Sound, stunning glaciers, musical toilets, the day I nearly gave up the trip, chasing cows, getting lost in Wellington, and much more.