Taking the scenic route

Even before you land in New Zealand you can see why it was chosen as the setting for the Lord of the Rings movies. Even if you found the films incredibly dull (I did), you can appreciate the scenery. As our plane descended into Auckland airport, all you could see out of the little windows were tumbling green hills, harsh rock faces, intense blue sea. It was all very dramatic looking, and very beautiful. I did have a small moment of panic when the plane looked like it was going to land in the sea. But just at the last minute, the airport came into view and we bumped along the landing strip. I don't know whose idea it was to put the runway so close to the sea, but it definitely made for a more interesting landing than usual, for me at least. Good one, guys.

We spent just two days in Auckland before heading to Wellington – we were due to start another HelpX work exchange in a nearby town. The bus journey from Auckland to Wellington was 10 hours, but it was easily one of the most fascinating bus journeys I've ever had. It's amazing how often and how dramatically both the landscape and weather change en route from the north to the south of the island. In the space of our 10 hour trip, we drove past tumbling hills, snowy mountains, an enormous bright blue lake, huge barren patches, rocky gorges, and miles and miles of flat green fields used for sheep and cattle farming. So many sheep! New Zealand has a population of about 4million, and I'm pretty sure we saw close to a bajillion sheep on this drive alone, so it must be true what they say about the country having more sheep than people. You'd think that lamb (my favourite meat) in New Zealand would therefore be cheap and plentiful. But actually, the majority of it is exported, and what's left is sold at very high export prices to local people, so many can't actually afford it, which I thought seemed very unfair. When we spoke to people about this, they looked quite shocked and slightly appalled when we told them that legs of New Zealand lamb are on special offer every other week in Sainsbury's!

Anyway, back to the coach trip. We also experienced clear blue skies and sunshine, dull grey skies with wind and rain, the odd rainbow, and – to our enormous surprise – white skies and snow blizzards! From our startled faces, the bus driver must've thought we'd never seen snow because he made an announcement along the lines of “Ladies and gentlemen, if you've never seen snow before, this is it!” To which everyone started to take photos. Including us.

And we thought British weather was unpredictable.

Wellington, when we finally arrived, turned out to be a great little city. Much nicer than Auckland which is decent enough but ultimately quite plain. Wellington is full of nooks and crannies and interesting side streets. It's bright and lively, and has a really nice harbour. The only downside was the wind. It's the blusteriest (new word, means 'most blustery') place I've ever been!

Karl shelters from the wind

It has a brilliant museum though, called Te Papa, where we learnt all about earthquakes. Did you know, New Zealand experiences an earthquake almost every single day? I mean, they're generally quite small scale (usually under 3 on the richter scale), but still – that's a lot. While we were in the country, the town of Christchurch on the South Island was still recovering from it's big earthquake a few weeks back, and was still having big aftershocks almost daily.

We also sought out Wellington's only Welsh pub for a glass of Penderyn (Welsh whisky) on the recommendation of Karl's aunt Keili. I'm not normally a fan of whisky (or whiskey for that matter), but this was lovely and smooth and warming. We've been promised a trip to the brewery by Keili when we get back next year, so I'll stock up then.

Welsh boy in a Welsh bar

From Wellington we moved on to a small town called Featherston, where we were met by, our HelpX hosts Jan and Maryanne, with whom we'd arranged to stay and work for a week. Our first work exchange had gone so well, and saved us loads of money, so we'd decided to do another in New Zealand. Another huge bonus is that, by living with an Aussie or Kiwi family, you get to learn so much about a country. Finally you have people who can answer all your questions about how things work on the other side of the world. And Karl had an unlimited supply. In Maryanne's words, he's “incredibly inquisitive”, which luckily she thought of as a good thing!

Jan and Maryanne emigrated to New Zealand from Holland about 20 years ago. Their property, Whispering Winds, is a stunning lifestyle block. A lifestyle block is something that's much bigger than a garden, but not really a farm. Whispering Winds was about 12 acres, and they'd dedicated much of it to planting some 100 different trees, from eucalyptuses to fruit and nut trees.

It had gorgeous views of the mountains, and was a very peaceful place to spend the week. The work we did varied from removing wire mesh from around the youngest trees (it had been put there to prevent small animals like hares from breaking the branches) and collecting hedge clippings, to cleaning windows and helping out with the new greenhouse than Jan is building.

One of the best things about staying with Jan and Maryanne was definitely the food. Maryanne is an amazing cook - like Annie, everything she cooks is from scratch, and most things are from the garden. We had lasagne, risotto, quiche, pizza, a hearty meat and veg soup and mezze. Plus Jan bakes fresh bread a few times a week, which made for some delicious suppers. Breakfast was homemade yoghurt with fruit and muesli. And much to Karl's delight, twice a day we would sit down for coffee and cake/biscuits. Twice a day! We haven't been this spoilt since we were last at home!

We also learnt a lot during that week, which is the great thing about work exchanges. You meet some great people who are so willing to teach you new things. Like Rick and Annie, Jan and Maryanne are dedicated to living as sustainably as they can. As well as a veg and herb garden, they also have a cellar which Jan built himself. It's half underground, and it houses a huge variety of pickles, chutneys, jams and preserved fruit. It can also be used to store things like root veg. It's something people used to do all the time, but very few bother with anymore because supermarkets make everything so convenient. But how amazing would it be to have access to your own home-grown produce all year round, without having to depend on supermarkets? Your own little food house!

Maryanne also makes her own soaps and shampoos, and we spent an afternoon doing just that. It's a difficult process to master, and a lot of effort goes into getting it just right, but it's well worth it. She very kindly gave us a bar of the soap to take away with us, and it's so much nicer than that Dove or Palmolive stuff.

After our week was up, we headed back to Wellington for another couple of days. Then it was on to Napier, a little coastal town with lots of art deco buildings. We went to a gypsy fair, strolled along the beach, ate hot chips while enjoying the views, went for coffee and pie, and generally chilled out.

From here it was on to the gorgeous Lake Taupo. It's more touristy here than Napier, but just as nice in our opinion.

The weather was sunny, there wasn't any wind to mess up my hair, and there was skydiving.

When we set out on this trip, it was with the assumption that somewhere along the line we would scuba dive and skydive. Scuba diving turned out to be one of the best things we've done on this trip. But the nearer we got to skydiving, the more apprehensive we became. We uhmed and ahhed quite a lot – was it too expensive for our little budget? Did we still really want to do it, or was it just that we felt like we should? Ultimately I think we were both just a bit chicken. It was slightly terrifying but also a huge relief when one morning Karl just went and booked it. Two hours later we were being picked up and driven to the DZ – the Drop Zone. I wasn't sure if I wanted to be dropped.

Going up in the plane was nerve-wracking, because as the plane ascends and the world gets smaller beneath you, you realise how high you're jumping out from. Falling out from. You're just falling – literally falling through the sky at 200km/h from a height of 12,000feet. Who would do that??

Don't look down!

Me. I would do that. Again and again. It was amazing. When they open the hatch, there's a moment where your legs don't want to move and you suddenly want to say “No, I've changed my mind!” except your mouth has gone dry and you can't make the words come out. But by this point you're tightly attached to your instructor guy. And besides, it's too late – by now, you'd have to pay whether you jumped or not. Luckily you don't really have enough time to think this whole thing through or translate your thoughts into words. Before you know it, the instructor has sat you down on the edge, you're asked to turn your head for a picture (a very clever distraction from the drop view), and then before you know it you're hurtling towards the earth.

Smiles and grimaces. Why does my instructor look more nervous than I do?

I don't even remember the moment we jumped out. I just remember suddenly falling, and thinking how weird it was to be falling. Being scared would be pointless because by now there's definitely not one single thing you can do about it. So you just forget your fear and just enjoy it. It's a brilliant feeling, all the air rushing past you, the coldness, the views, and then the jerk when the parachute is opened and suddenly you're vertical not horizontal, and floating not falling. Karl enjoyed the falling best, but I loved the parachuting. Just gliding down, enjoying the view, with lots of swooping and sweeping through the air.

We landed on our bums, with Liam possibly sitting in some dog poo, although I'm not sure as I just thanked him quickly and then ran off to jabber excitedly to Karl about how great it all was. And it really was.

Post jump

Then it was back to Auckland. That was it. Our three weeks in New Zealand was over all too soon, and it was time to embark on the final leg of our trip – South America.