TAUPO.

Here is a review I posted to Hostleworld yesterday.

I gave this hostel a 2 because it's only the SECOND worst hostel I've ever encountered. For starters it's located ridiculously far from ANYTHING, way out in the dead-lawn burbs. The guy at the front desk was shifty and rude, and didn't bother explaining anything (although, to give him credit, he did show me a map and draw some lines on it). The room was filthy. The bunks lacked ladders. The mattresses were practically holes, soft, sagging through the lower bars. And the toilet plumbing dripped and gurgled throughout the night. I woke up at 2:00 am to catch a spider crawling on my back. Next morning I left despite having booked two nights. Keep the change.

Yup. Hated that place. The town itself was okay, a bit drab, but the lake was gorgeous.

AND.

She held the camera to her eye, watching the lake, the shifting clouds and waves, and the light painted her dark hair an almost-blue. Her name is Marcina Marie. She smiled and we walked to the harbor. The plan? She had hopes to crash a boat tour to the Maori Rock Carvings across the lake. We specked the place like old pros, noting the shuttle, bobbing at the docks, and the captain, kicked back on the shore.

The tour was pre-booked, likely packed, and she would merge unnoticed with the crowd. We discussed integration and waited for them to arrive—gleaning useful information from a foursome of Belgian girls, just returned. Turns out, the Captain was shifting shuttles for the last go-round. From a jet-boat, party ship, to a small sailboat. Which is awesome, but wouldn't make things any easier. Marcina suggests I join her, but smuggling two could provide difficult, I think. Could ruin her last chance to see the carvings before leaving. We decide to meet up in a week in Queenstown. The crowd—mostly Brits—arrived, shuffling down the docks, cases of beer under their arms for the guys, wine bottles projecting from the purse of the females, and integration seemed unlikely as the captain counted heads and called names and rejected several passengers. But we did it. She sat silently on the boat amid the Brits and I waved goodbye, seated on the bulkhead as the captain undid the riggings. He looked at me—in my snappy-cap and ascot and bare-feet—and said, “I need a hand with the ship,” then nodded for me to come aboard. I slung my bag over the rail and leapt onto deck. The Captain piloted the ship from the dock and the harbor and into the open sea… 

After awhile he summoned me to the wheel and had me guide the shuttle nice and easy toward the peninsula and the Carvings. Marcina got some good pictures. The sun set, and we sailed under the night sky and stars atop an inky sea of glass.