Rotorua, New Zealand

This place is like a movie set. Little chocolate-box houses sit on freshly manicured lawns protected by cute little fences. The roads are dead quiet - there's little traffic. The first thing you notice is the eggy stench as you enter the town. There's steaming egg flavoured geysers everywhere - even the church car park has steam hissing out of it. This is why people come here - and the various geo-thermal wonderlands (Wai O Tapu being the most famous) attract many day-trippers from around New Zealand.

I checked into a Nomad hostel again! I know I said I wouldn't after Auckland but the travel desk told me it was much quieter - which it is. Unlike Auckland the rooms are huge and airy, with big opening windows letting in lovely fresh egg-air! On arrival I had an 8-bed dorm to myself.

Geysers tearing up the street - and not pissed-up London geysers!

Maori pattern

The lake

Rush hour

I went for a walk to the thermal area next to the lake. There's a few spa's here using the natural heat from the ground for the jacuzzi's and mineral pools. I was keen to have a spa, but it was quite pricey, and there were lots of couples - I would feel a little odd sitting there alone. Past the thermal area is the stunning old colonial bath house - now an art gallery and museum. With the bowling green in front it's screaming England at me! I chat about the weather with a friendly bowler, like a true Englishman.

Further round is a visitor centre, a few cafe's and a helicopter tour operator - with landing pads floating out on the bay. I sit and watch the heli-tours come and go. I have this geeky obsession with aviation, in particular helicopters. Several times I've thought about blowing my savings on lessons, with the view to becoming a pilot in some beautiful part of the world - Alaska, the Caribbean, Norway, Pacific island hopping... but it costs (on average) $90,000 to get a basic commercial licence - then you need 1000's of flight hours to even be looked at by one of these exotic positions - and there's minimal positions out there (I've checked!). Most likely you'd be servicing oil rigs, or flying rubber dog shit out of China.

I continue walking around the lake then turn back when the zinging midday sunshine fades and an evening chill starts to bite - I love this weather.

That evening four mid-twenties German girls check into the dorm. One is half-German half-Thai - a pleasing combination. They're all very friendly and certainly not shy - getting changed in front of me doesn't seem to bother them in the slightest (do they not know my ageing heart can't cope with that kind of stress??) They try and get me out on the pub crawl but I decline, stating that I don't drink (not actually too far from the truth at the moment), and get into bed with my laptop (at this very moment I can hear face-palming!)

Ubud, Bali, Indonesia

I wanted to get to Kuta to pick up a motorbike so I could go inland to Ubud and further north to some more volcanoes. Bizarrely there's no bus to Kuta (the main tourist area) from the capital. I grudgingly pay 50,000 for a minivan to take me. In Kuta I hire a motorbike for 5 days and head to the hills.

Getting out of Kuta and back though Denpasar is a nightmare - the traffic is horrendous. Once out though the roads are great, and fairly empty. I keep going north and ascending higher and higher. As I approach the mount Batur caldera is starts to rain. I have no raincoat and get soaked - which is extremely refreshing at first but the cool altitude air soon makes you cold! After seeing Bromo in Java this area is nothing special but still nice. On the roads around the caldera people actually ride up to you on their bikes and try and sell you tours or trinkets, or stop you to "talk" - in all the times I've had to say no to someone selling something it's the first time on a motorbike!

Quite cold now I head for Ubud, further back down to the coast. I stop at a coffee plantation for a kopi Luwak. A Luwak is a cute furry thing that looks like a weasel. They eat the coffee beans and poo them out intact. People collect, clean and roast these beans - the beans journey is supposed to add to the flavour. The owner brought out a range of different coffee and tea for me to try (and ultimately buy from the extensive shop). I would say the Luwak kopi tastes rich, and like chocolate - but would never replace traditional coffee for me. I wanted to say hello to the Luwak out of the cage but it was sleeping and the guy said no :(

Many flavour coffee and tea - Luwak kopi in the china cup 

Sleepy Luwak

Ubud's nice. There's a billion spa's and art galleries and some FABULOUS architecture. Traditional Balinese architecture is incredible - the most beautiful and geometric I've ever seen. The shapes and details are truly astonishing. Hindu temples containing this wonderful art are everywhere - even most homes have their own temple. I stayed at Eka's home stay which has a fine family temple attached. 

I went to the monkey forest! On entrance you can buy bananas but as soon as you walk in you're mobbed - monkeys climbing all over you trying to grab the bananas! A particularly large one jumped on me and took the whole bunch. I love monkeys, but not all over me. Even when you have no food they tug at stuff, or try and grab your water bottle or sunglasses - keep everything locked down is the rule here.

On the ride back to Kuta I got stopped by the insanely corrupt police. I've heard that most tourists get stopped at least once on bikes - I spoke to one guy who'd paid out over 1,000,000 Rupiah in fines! The reason for stopping me was that my front wheel was on a pedestrian crossing when stopped at a red light. When he told me this I seriously thought it was a joke. As we were speaking, locals were JUMPING the red light with no helmet, some were even going the wrong way over the red light!! Corrupt policeman #1 showed me a piece of "official" printed A4 paper stating a 500,000 fine. I said that I wouldn't pay it... I can't pay it - I literally didn't have that cash on me. I had 250,000 and he said "give me this" I said no, and that I would give them 20,000. At this point another corrupt policeman turned up and they had a conversation. The corrupt policeman #2 turned to me and got angry, saying I must pay now or I go to court - he was certainly trying to freak me out. Corrupt policeman #1 was now making 'don't mess with him' faces at me. I slapped 200,000 in his hand and he put it in his pocket then said "go".

Back at the guest house I was speaking to a Balinese lady. She said "Just get a court slip from them and leave - pay nothing. Nothing will come of it. I know because my husband is a policeman! You can't do anything in Bali without being ripped off, everybody is corrupt!" - then she ranted about a printer cartridge that she'd taken in and it'd been swapped or something.

I wanted to get stopped again, to test the theory - but never did! :)