Last New Zealand Post- Turangi

We are sitting in the international terminal of the Christchurch Airport. Our flight to Melbourne is scheduled to leave in four hours. I think that when I last wrote we were in Mt. Cook National Park. Well, Since then we have been to Christchurch where we visited the gardens, the art museum, and an old University built similarly to a castle. Christchurch is said to be the the one city in New Zealand which has the most likeness to Old England. We had a nice time. Let's see....what else has happened. Oh, from Christchurch we traveled north to a small town called Kaikora. Where we had some wonderful seafood (fish and chips) and visited with one of our German friends who we had been meeting up with since Nelson. We shared a nice dinner of Bangers and Mash (sausages and mashed potatoes). The following day we took the ferry across the Cook Straight (again), this time from the South to the North Island. Jess and I spent a good portion of the three hour trip up on the top deck where there are good views and where the wind is powerful. Once back on the North Island we spent two nights at the YHA Hostel in Wellington. We visited the most famous museum in NZ called Te Papa. One of the displays was the only collausal squid ever caught (believed to have been a baby) measuring up at fourteen feet long. It was preserved in formalin in a large viewing case. Just incredible...
From Wellington, we went North and were dropped off from our bus. We said many goodbyes to all of our friends on the bus who we had met up with again, and had literally been traveling with the past 25 days. We stayed in the small fishing town of Turangi. Turangi is the self proclaimed trout capital of the world and Jess was back for more fishing. First thing we did after checking into the hostel was go to the tackle store in the town square. Jess rented his gear and went out for the evening. I was worried when he didn't come back until after dark, but was so excited to see see him upon return with a four to five pound rainbow trout, and a smile. This was the perfect gift considering it was his 25th birthday. Jess gave the fish to a nice couple who had spent the last twenty years living in Papau New Guinea. We visited with them that night.
The next morning Jess and I went out on the Tongariro River (the most famous river in NZ) and spent a few hours fishing (he fishing, and I reading). Jess caught two more beautiful fish. By then he had had more success than the locals and we were both so hungry we headed back. One of the men who worked at our hostel brought his smoker over to cook the trout. We ate one and gave him the other.
New Zealand is often called the ultimate fly fisherman's challenge. The water is extremely clear and the levels low, which adds to the difficulty. The fishing will really come alive later in June once it starts raining. Rain causes the river to rise. Once risen, tens of thousands of adult rainbow trout swim upstream from Lake Taupo (NZ largest lake) to spawn. It is estamated that only one-third of these trout will return to the river the following year. The others are either caught , stay within the river, or die. This world famous river becomes very busy with angelers in the winter. All rainbow trout in New Zealand were intoduded from Northern California in the 1800's.
The next five days we only saw one angler who had caught a fish. Jesse thanks the Lord for hooking the fish up for him and for the amazing experience he had. We spent five nights in Turangi then took the Kiwi bus up to Taupo for the night. The next day we hopped on the bus and headed north once again. We picked up 30 people in the next town, five of them were our good English girl friends from our bus who we had just said goodbye to, and three of them were Irish boys who we bunked with in Queenstown. We had to laugh from then on every time we said goodbye, knowing that it is more than likely that we would see them again. We made it to Auckland and completed our full tour of NZ. Though we have loved our experience here and it is hard to imagine having a better time , we are happy to start the next chapter of this trip.