New Zealand - North Island

After an initial disaster involving a ' misunderstanding' with the camper van company we finally hit the road a day late. To cut a long story very short, the office was closed when we arrived so we spent the first night not in our rolling home but in a airport hotel (note to you all - if you come to NZ and hire a campervan don't use TUI Campers as their service is terrible! I could go on (and on) but I wont). However, every cloud has a silver lining and we did get upgraded to a monster five berth camper (good shower, fridge and joy oh joy a colour telly!). Finally sorted it was time for a few domestic chores - even a trip to the supermarket entails a certain novelty value when you haven't had to go to one for so long. So after stocking up on all the essential grocery items as well as a fair few luxuries and a couple of Yorkie bars for good measure, settled in mobile domestic bliss off we went on our quest for the ring my presiousnessessesseesss.......(sorry).

Departing Auckland then, with the aim to see as much of the northern most part of the north island we drove up the coast to Whangerai for our first night under fiberglass. After an early start and a quick run down to the beautiful waterfall next to our campsite it was back on the road and onto the Bay of Islands. We had intended to take a boat tour of the area but in the end we didn't bother owing to slightly dodgy weather and the fact that we had already taken a tour of Halong bay in Vietnam - another bay chock full of islands. The two are probably hugely different but with so much to see and so little time available the decision was to push on up the coast onto the Aupori peninsular and towards Cape Reigna. This is the northernmost part of NZ and the tip is where the Tasman Sea meets the South Pacific. Driving through the countryside is a hugely enjoyable experience, there is so much to look at as you travel. Its kind of like driving through the nicest parts of the west country but without the traffic and on a bigger scale, the further north we drove the quieter it became until on the peninsular itself we found other road users a real rarity. It's incredible the amount of space Kiwis have here! The people are very welcoming as well although you do get some real oddballs at campsites!

We stopped short of driving all the way to the top of the cape as it's just one road up and down and we wanted to avoid backtracking if at all possible. So after spending a night in a quiet campsite in Pukenui we started heading south. We stopped briefly at 90 mile beach (bit of an overstatement as its more like 90 kilometres long) Lingering here only long enough to do a little exploring in a dune buggy hired with strict instructions that it was not to be used on the sand dunes!? Zipping along the beach was great fun even when it started coughing and spluttering about a mile from where we had parked the van - eek!

Our route south took us through the Waipoua Kauri Forest. This national park and world heritage site is all that remains of what was once a huge Forest of Kauri trees. These trees are massive. The size of the trunks have to been seen to be believed and as usual our photos can't really convey their scale. We couldn't resist a little tree hugging, if you are going to hug a tree it might as well be a big one.

Our next stop was Auckland having driven a mini circuit of the Northland. One of the highlights of the trip has to be the Dolphin and Whale safari we went on departing from the Harbour. After claiming our backpacker discount (given to anyone wearing a backpack?!)we boarded our Catamaran and headed out into the open waters of the South Pacific. We cruised around for perhaps an hour or so before our skipper spotted a large group of Gannets circling over a small area or water about half a mile away. This was a sure sign of dolphin activity. The Gannets have a birds eye view (obviously!) of what is happening under the clear water. The dolphins round up schools of sardines who's natural defence when being hunted is to swarm into a ball and hope for the best. The dolphins then herd this ball until it is tightly packed before charging into it to gobble up as many fish as possible before it disperses. Meanwhile the birds continue to circle overhead until all of a sudden they start diving into the water from great height and carrying some serious speed to catch their fish. Hundreds of them disappear under water, then 30 seconds or so later they all pop up on the surface together. Awesome! As if that wasn't spectacular enough, every so often a huge whale surfaces in the middle of it all having charged through the ball of fish from below. In the 2 hours or so spent watching we must have seen over 100 dolphins hunting together in this organised way as well as at least 2 whales and countless of those circling gannets. Our guide explained that below all the action there are usually a few sharks lying in wait for any fish that dive deeper in a bid to escape the feeding frenzy. As well as all the hunting there were plenty of dolphins riding the bow waves and jumping out of the water alongside our boat. An absolutely incredible experience, all it needed was David Attenbourough hypnotically explaining away to complete the picture! On some safaris swimming with the dolphins is a possibility but due to slightly rough seas it was deemed too dangerous getting off and on the back of the boat. Pity as the dolphins seemed as interested in us as we in them!

Our next stop heading south was the Waitomo caves. Although we spent a reasonable amount of time exploring caves in Asia we really wanted to visit these ones as they are full of little glow worms! Once inside the guide takes you on a little boat ride and when you look up there are so many of the little glowing lights that it looks like the night sky, albeit with a slight green tinge. Definitely worth a visit!

New Zealand is actually a very active volcanic region sitting on the boundary of the Australian and Pacific plates. This is the reason for the extreme variation in the terrain. In addition the NZ Southern Alps range is the fastest growing mountain range in the world. Because of all this Volcanic activity there are a fair few hot springs and mud pools dotted around. The most famous is the Whakarewarewa (Rotorua) which is a particularly spectacular Geyser which erupts every half hour or so. This was also worth a visit although we didn't stay too long as all the Sulphur in the water stinks like rotten eggs, don't care how therapeutic it supposed to be!

After a brief visit to Havelock North in the Hawkes Bay area to visit my good friend Tim and his family (thanks for the free camping - good to see you buddy!), it was an early start for a bit of an epic drive over the Taihape pass. This spectacular 160km drive over the mountains is the most direct route from the eastern side of the island over to MT Egmont on the west coast although over 30kms is unsealed and pretty bumpy! Not a problem this time of year but in the winter it must be pretty hairy.

Reaching the west coast we planed to spend a couple of days touring the Egmont National Park area but typically the weather closed in and shrouded the main attraction Mt Taranaki from view. We did get one picture before that happened though (see below - a bit average!). Mt Taranaki, also known as Mt Egmont, is virtually a perfect cone shape much the same as Fiji in Japan, so much so that Mt Egmont was used as a stand in for Mount Fiji during the filming of 'The Last Samurai'.

So with our brief tour of the North Island nearly over we headed south towards Wellington to catch the inter-islander ferry to the south island. Due to unseasonal heavy rain we didn't do much in Wellington apart from sit in cafes but that was all good! Splitting the time 1 week in the north island and 2 in the south has meant rushing around a fair bit to try and see as much as possible. Both of us are now looking forward to a more relaxed pace on the south island for the next two weeks.