Hag Sameach

We are now at the south island, we got here 2 days ago (we took a ferry with our car).
It is very beautiful here and on Sunday we are going for a 3 days track called "Abel Tasman".

We want to wish you all the best holiday, try to have as much fun as we are having here.
Think of us when you dine well in the "seder" while we are eating canned food.

Tomorrow we are uploading some new pictures from Wellington area (BTW - I rock in golf) so make sure you check them out.

Once again, HAPPY HOLIDAY!!!

Doron & Gali

Hello From New Zealand

We landed at Auckland and for the first time in a bit more than a month we didn’t have a tight schedule, as a matter of fact we had no schedule at all. We checked in at the YHA (Youth Hostel Association) for a cheap room that literally contains only a bad. After 2 nights of shared bathrooms we decided that when we are in civilization we can allow ourselves a bit better accommodations so we moved to an actual hotel room which eventually only cost us 20 NZ$ more.
Auckland is very nice and is not that different from any big western city. We spent most of our time shopping for camping gear (tent, sleeping bags, gas cooker, etc.) and the rest of it just having fun (Starbucks and Cinemas). We even got to see Saint Patrick’s Day which seems a bit like our Independence Day eve only in green.
We debated a lot whether to buy / rent a vehicle and should it be a private or a van / campervan. Eventually after checking all sort of options we find a really good deal for renting a Mazda Demio 1997 for only 20 NZ$ a day (that’s just under 60 NIS).
After four days in Auckland we started heading south, we decided to tour the south island first and then to come back for the north one since the winter get to the south island first.
The minute you get out of Auckland you start to see sheep by the hundreds, they are everywhere!
On our first day on the road we stop at a camping area near some hot springs and Gali got to sleep at a tent for the first time! The next day we continued to Hamilton which is a medium size town south to Auckland, we bought some stuff that we were still missing and continued to Waitomo caves. Waitomo is a very small village that is known for the many caves that surrounds it, the special things about those caves is that they are filled with glowing worms (kind of like fireflies only much cooler). We spend the night at a nice B&B motel and at the next morning Gali did some extreme cave touring that included rock climbing, snepling and crawling in small places at the dark. I passed on that one for the sake of my back and did some hiking routes instead.
Now we are at New Plymouth heading toward Mount Taranaki.

Doron & Gali

Bora Bora – a.k.a. Heaven

Hi guys,

We are now onboard flight NZ023 on our way to New Zealand.

Our honey moon was AMAZING!!! Though we haven’t been in all the places on this planet (you have to admit that we are working on it) we can say without a doubt that there is no place prettier than Bora Bora.

Our flight from Los Angles landed in Papeete, (one of Tahiti’s bigger islands) where we had to wait a couple of hours and continue with a 45 minutes flight to Bora Bora. When we finally landed at Bora Bora there was a Le Meridian (our hotel) booth at the airport, the guys there (which already knew our names) took our luggage and escorted us to a small boat that will take us to the hotel. The cruise took about 15 minutes, when we got to the hotel we were taken on a private tour of the hotel. The tour ended at the reception desk where there was waiting for us our room key and two tropical cocktails. By the time we got to our bungalow, our luggage was already waiting there. That’s what I call a service.

Our overwater bungalow was very cool, and had a glass floor which you could see the fish through. Each bungalow has a porch and stairs going into the lagoon, the color of the water in the lagoon is the brightest possible.

We spent the first few days snorkeling, kayaking and just hanging out at the pool or on a hammock (Arsal) near the beach eating cocoanuts.

The day before we left we took a boat to the main island (only 6 minutes cruise), rented a bugster (some kind of very small jeep) and tour the island. The main island is very small (its perimeter is about 40 kilometers) it’s basically a mountain covered with a tropic jungle and two small villages at the shore at the opposite side to our hotel.

The only two bad things we have to say about Bora Bora are:

1. Dinner at the hotel’s buffet costs 80$ a person!
2. It is owned by the French.

Doron & Gali

San Francisco

Hi Guys,

We are now at the LAX airport waiting for our flight to Bora Bora. San Francisco was very nice (Although the pictures didn’t come out so good), we even defined it as a place we will happily live at. The first 3 days we toured the city and then dedicated our fourth day to shopping. We found a big outlet (70 miles from the city) with all the big brands you can think of, Timberland, GAP, Guess, Quick Silver, Billabong, Tommy Hilfiger, Sketchers and many more.

We really don’t have anything special to add about San Francisco, mainly because we are thinking of Bora Bora all the time.

Check out next week for pictures of (what we hope is) Heaven.

Doron & Gali

Las Vegas & The Grand Canyon

Hi all,

We got married on the 1^st of March (Thursday) at 10:30 am.

We took a taxi down town to the marriage license bureau. Things went really smoothly. They didn’t ask for any of the translated papers we brought from home (and cost us a lot of money). Afterwards we headed to the court house to get married. On the way, few people bothered us on the street and offered us to do the ceremony at their chapel.

When we got to the court house, we realized that we are short of a witness. We started asking people around if they mind, all as a matter of fact did mind. Some because they worked over there and some just because they are asses!!!!!

Finally, Doron found a man on the street (Jonathan). I though it was very generous of him to help us but when the whole thing was over, Doron told me he paid him 20 bucks. And I say….”where is the love”?

Anyway, back to the ceremony…
A woman was sitting in the front desk and asked us for all our papers. Afterwards we entered the chamber with Jonathan and waited for her a lifetime…
Finally, she arrived and the ceremony began. We stood one in front of the other and took our oaths. Doron found it a bit funny and I must add that it was a bit absurd but we got married J.

The rest of the day was casual…we took a taxi back to the strip and continued our touring. I’m taking comfort in the fact that next week we are going to our honeymoon at Bora Bora.

So far our gambling budget is still on the plus side, Doron won 130$ playing the roulette and lost 50$ playing Poker. So, for now we are up 80 bucks.

The day after our wedding we rented a car and started our trip to the Grand Canyon. We started our ride at noon cause we stopped to buy a new bag and to ship some clothes back home. We bought an orange colored bag with wheels and with an option to carry it on the back (“Hores”).

The driving went great until we decided (According to our stupid GPS program) to get off the main road and drive through a different one. That was a huge mistake. The road was unmarked with no road signs, only for speed limit and animals crossing the road cautions. No cars except us and sunset (Not in a good way… I mean dark). After a little while we started to think that maybe it’s a good idea to turn around and go back to the main road. For an unknown reason, we didn’t. We continued on the dark scary road. Like that was not enough…soon animals begin to attack us. It started with a bull that decided to cross the road right in front of us. I saved our lives and hit the breaks although the bastard did see it coming. After calming down, we continued, few minutes later a skunk was running across the road. Again, I saved lives. Other then those two, there were a rabbit, a deer and a giant squirrel that attacked us and the fuel was running out with no gas station in the horizon. We decided to turn around and head back to the main road.

We found a “holiday inn” on the next town and spent the night there.
The next day we went seeing he Grand Canyon took a lot of pictures and drove back to Vegas.

On Monday we are flying to San Francisco and a few days later to our honey moon at Bora Bora.

We uploaded some picture from Vegas and the Grand Canyon so check them out.

Gali & Doron