Planes are for Wimps

(Jason) Landed in Tokyo and the first job was to get our head round the spaghetti junction of the metro-what a mess it looks on paper.Our first night there we did old blighty pround in the international jenga game,2 South Africans(who were off to climb Mt Fuji the next day), 2 Germans, 3 Canadians, 3 Americans and us, that finished about 2.30 am! The plan for the next night was for a quiet in but, as normal, the plan went out the window and we ended up on the streets of Tokyo at 5 am looking for a karaoke bar with an Irish couple( Olivea and Brian) and an Australian( Leigh) who we met , Leigh went to catch a flight at 6 am so the rest of us ended up at Tokyo fish market which is an amazing fest of sights and especially smells (not good after a night on the beer) and every kind of fish you can imagine being killed, gutted and auctioned.
After a day in bed to recover we spent 2 days chilling at Tokyo Disney and Disney Sea which are fantastic and are probably better than Florida( even though it was during the back end of a tropical storm)
Everyone is so friendly and polite and Tokyo has to be the cleanest city we have ever seen despite there being no bins anywhere, no one eats or drinks while walking and its rude to blow your nose in public.
We went in pursuit of the fabled Mt Fuji which we could just about make out apart from the top!! Only the best bit!We ended that day at a genuine local Japanese restaurant and both had a fantastic meal followed by some Sake, followed by beer to wash the taste of the sake away.
We also stocked up on our frequent user pints at Hard Rock Tokyo on the last day, i hear we get our own restaurant at the end of the trip with what we can accumulate.
The strangest thing happened when we flew out to Sydney, the ground staff all bowed to the plane as it taxied to the runway, i didn't know word of my fame had grown that much!
(i have just been reminded to tell you that Vicki cheats at every game she plays and no matter what she say's later she is lying, she claims to have beaten me at draughts, monopoly, sh*t head(cards) and downfall-remember she's lying!!)

Our connecting flight from Sydney to Auckland had the Austrailian Rugby league side on it for the Tri-Nations which i hear England are going to get thumped in as usual.

(Vicki)
The Campervan leg of the tour!
Very bizarre to have to go shopping in the supermarket but so cool to be able to go where ever we want whenever we want and to be able to pull up by the side of a beautiful beach and make a proper cup of tea!
New Zealand so far is just breathtaking, everywhere you look the scenery is stunning, 60m sheep running around everywhere, gorgeous beaches, waterfalls hidden away, great walks, huge snow capped mountains, the people are great fun and we are loving it here it is real picture postcard stuff. I will try and just mention the highlights but we really have seen so much it will be hard.
From Auckland we went to the Bay of Islands which has some great beaches, in Russel we went to Long Beach which was just beautiful but it was totally deserted. We then drove to the most northerly point of the North Island - Cape Reinga - where the Tasman Sea and the Pacific Ocean meet, a powerful force & sight. There is a lighthouse on the cliff top, again it was just us there totally worth the 20km drive along an unmade road to get there.
Now the problem with having the campervan is that Jason won't let me drive - he hates being a passenger and it has nothing to do with my driving - honest! - but that means that I have to navigate, well that can only mean trouble and sure enough having JOINTLY decided to take a shortcut we ended up driving 30 minutes up a mountain on an unmade one lane dirt track and when we got to the top the road back down was closed!!! This resulted is a bit of key throwing by Jason in my general direction - he wasn't actually aiming at me apparently!
Back on the right road travalling down the west coast, we stopped off at Waipoura forest to see some 2,000 year old Kauri trees, they were huge, one was 51m high and another was 5m wide! Both really cool but according to Lonely Planet it's the one with the big girth that is the most impressive!
We stayed the night next to a Kiwi reserve, I was convinced I could hear them in the night but Jason still reckons it was the ducks on the pond next door! We saw the Kiwi's the next day, funny little creatures, they have no tails and sort of bounce around foraging for food with their really long beaks.
Next to Waitomo to go inside the caves to see the glow worms, there are about 3,000 in these particular caves and we went on a boat ride in the dark, when you look up it is just like looking at the stars, very cool.
Next stop Rotorua which is full of geo-thermal activity, we saw bubbling mud pools, geysers going off up to 20m high, thermal pools which are different colours from blue to orange to yellow etc depending on the mineral content. We also went to some open air hot springs which we bathed in looking out over the mountains.
We went on a jet boat to the Huka falls which was a good laugh as on the way there and back it sped along and did several 360 deg spin. Next door was a prawn farm which had a golf driving range where you could play Killer Prawn Golf - seemed a bit too cruel and you won prawns which we weren't sure our stomachs could take after the jet boat ride.
On to Tongariro National Park, when we got there it was raining and there was really low cloud, Jason didn't believe me that there were actually mountains that you could ski on. I was proved right the next day when we woke up the cloud had cleared and the mountains appeared. We drove to the ski resort but decided to save that experience for Canada.
As we hadn't seen Mount Fuji properly in Japan we decided to see if we could see Mount Taranaki, which was used as a double for Fuji in the Last Samuarai. It was spectacular, apparently we were extremely lucky the day we went as it is normally covered partly in cloud but it was a crystal clear day and the snow was sparkling in the sunlight, we saw it from 90km away on the drive there.
We caught the ferry from Wellington to Picton (South Island) from there we drove to Hamner Springs a ski/spa resort town with an outdoor spa complex of 9 thermal pools with the backdrop of snow capped mountains - Bliss!

(Jason)
The next day was back to Kaikoura and out onto the high seas to go whale watching. What an amazing experience, we saw 5 giant sperm whale, they float on top of the water for about 10-15mins before you get the fantastic view of them diving back down with the tail coming up before disappearing for about 45 mins. Totally awesome. We also spent an hour at the side of the road 20 kms north of kaikoura watching a colony of about 80 wild seals complete with pup's and everything, you can't pay for an experience like that.
To top that we went sea kayaking(with Vicki not liking water i was amazed she went for this) around the coast of Abel Tasman National Park. We spent a couple of hours kayaking about 6km which was great followed by a cruise on a catermaran which turned out only to have us on it along with Capt Mat. An afternoon on our own private yacht, none to shabby!!
We then went down to Fox glacier where we caught a helicopter up to the Glacier and had 2 1/2 hours hiking around it.It was totally amazing, you get your crampons and walking pole and off you set.The colour of the ice is incredible, with caves and crevices everywhere it is just stunning.The Blue ice is amazing when you look into the caves so clear and natural.The helicopter came and fetched us to return us to the ground.

How do you top that???

Oh i know.

On the 1st November 2006 at 2.30pm we BOTH jumped out of a perfectly good plane at 12000ft.!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!
We went SKYDIVING.
What an incredible amazing awesome thrilling unbelievable experience.
Vicki was actually the first one out of the plane and i was last but i landed about 3 mins before her!!
We both were in free fall for 45 seconds(dropping about 6000ft) before the shute opens and you glide down.
We did it over Queenstown and the view was amazing, with snowcapped mountains and the lake below us.I don't know how to describe to you the feeling of jumping out of the plane its just sheer adrenaline.
I really don't know how to top this!!!