Day 3 – Levin to Wellington

Uneventful day really. Pottered 90klms down the highway to Wellington. Loved this city nestled in amongst the hills.

We visited the Te Papa New Zealand Museum. I only wanted to see one thing 

 

 hehe. You’re not supposed to touch it, but I did.  Close up its an amazing piece of machinery, but it also has the many quaint touches like standard electrical crimped wire connections. Beautiful none the less displayed all by itself in the cafe.

We then drove the wrong way up Mt Victoria 🙂 and drown the right way.

Spent the night parked at the head of the que for the Cook Strait ferry which was a mistake as there was so much noise all night that we hardly slept.

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Day 2 – Rotorua to Levin

Had a bit of a late start today. Spent a bit of time with the hosts of the POP (park over property) and couldn’t shut them up long enough to escape.
Headed for Taupo and HuKa Falls (see picture). These are spectacular; Norma figured we should whitewater raft them, I figured we’d end up dead.
Kept going south and lunched on the shores of Lake Taupo which is actually the crater of a giant volcanoe.
From here we took the western route around the mountains. You’d have to have a death wish to live near here, these mountains are active which is easily seen by the recent huge craters on their walls. Absolutely spectacular sights.
Its pretty mountainous country through here but the van did well even if it did guzzle a fair bit of juice.
Stopped at The Chateau  for a coffee and had a chat with my brother Phil on the Gold Coast.
Down through Raetihi for fuel then across to Waiouru and Taihape. The road winds through a valley that is flanked by the huge cliffs of a river. We took a back road through to Feilding that took us in and out of this valley, up and down across the river. Would have loved to have had the Guzzi; great riding country.
Feilding to Palmerston North and then Levin at 7pm where we looked for a POP and found one at the local Cosmipolitan Club.
It had been what seemed like a long day but we only covered 400klms which isn’t far by Aus standards but in NZ where its a constant up and down, round and round, it is a long day’s travelling.
Tomorrow we’ll head for Wellington (only 100klms away) for a look around before taking the ferry across Cook Strait on Saturday morning.
CYa

Day 1. Auckland to Rotorua

We got away at 5am as scheduled and headed south on a clear morning.
I wont bore you with the route we took, but needless to say it wasn’t the normal one.
We stopped after about 1 1/2 hrs and had a snooze before breakfast, then onto Matamata and a quaint little town called Tirau where virtually every shop was either a cafe or a tourist knick knack shop. They didn’t get any $s from us.
From there it was onto Lake Rotorua where we stopped for an early lunch and another snooze before heading for the white water rafting place. Norma couldn’t wait, I could tell because she wasn’t saying much :))
If you haven’t ever done some serious white water rafting you really should have a go. This one was once classified as a stage 6 but is now a stage 5. It has a 7mtr drop, and as you can see from the photoes you get seriously under water – well we did anyway.
A huge amount of fun, and Norma thoroughly enjoyed it; hasn’t stopped talking about it. Cost was NZ$220 with the photoes which will be one of our only big tourist expenditures unless I can get Norma roped into a bungy jump ::))
From there we went into Rotorua before driving south to a little place called Reporoa where we stopped for the night at what is called a ‘Park Over Property’. These are dotted all over NZ and are homes of people who have an interest in Motorhoming. Anyone who belongs to the NZ Motor Caravaning Assoc can park their motorhome in the people’s yard for about $5 for the night or less.
Had a quiet night.

CYa

Ready To Travel

Tomorrow morning at 5am we’ll be hitting the road. The idea is to get through Auckland’s ridiculous early morning traffic before it gets to bad.

Norma’s keen to do some whitewater rafting so we need to be at Rotorua by midday – shouldn’t be a problem.

We spent the day getting the motorhome ready and shopping for all the stuff we’ll need.

Had my nephew Aran and his fiance Cory for dinner tonight.

I probably wont get to post again before Saturday by which time we’ll be in Blenheim at my cousin Peter’s place.

CYa

Arrived Safe And Sound

The sun is shining and its lovely to be with family altho sad to leave kids and grandkids.

Flight was pretty average on a real old plane that let the cold air in. Two ppl didn’t show for the flight so we had to wait for 20 minutes while they off loaded there luggage which put us at the end of the arrivals que. Got to my sister Diane’s at 1.30am.

Today is perfect weather and I’ve been helping Di & Ray move their office: earned my keep 🙂

Am now off to my Mum’s place so will report tomorrow