White House Bay Of Islands Russell

We took the pretty scenic West Coast Coromandel Drive which winds along the rugged coastline taking a good few hours to complete, we made a stop in Coromandel and bought fresh food for dinner from the local butchers. We got caught in heavy slow moving traffic just outside of Auckland for over an hour which delayed our journey north and meant we had to find somewhere for the night in the dark which is never ideal. We ended up finding a small campsite at Waipu Cove for the ...

... I really liked it and so did my Dad, but my Mom and Lu did not like it so much. We jumped huge waves going 100km an hour. When we got to the huge hole in the rocks, we saw a bunch of bottlenose dolphins swimming all around us. They were feeding on fish - there were thousands of silver fish everywhere. We went into a huge cave in the rocks then we drove through the hole. The driver said that a huge rock had fallen on the boat once, so we did ...

... through waves rather than going over them - allowing the weight of up to 7m of water on top of the windscreen! Cool boat. We stayed for two nights in Russell giving us time to eat local oysters and mussells and watch England beat NZ in the Wellington 7's final in a bar - have that! Though the reserved englishman in me (and the bar full of huge Maori's) ensured a muted celebration!

... echt riesigen Kauri Baum, wenn auch nicht der Groesste in Neuseeland. Hosteltechnisch bemerkten wir gleich, dass es besser waere alles im voraus zu buchen. Denn Paihia unser Zielort erwies sich als ganz schoen voll und ausgebucht. So kam es dass ich allein im Bay Adventour untergebracht wurde und die andren in einem Hostel in der Naehe. Als das dann soweit erledigt war machten wir eine Kajakfahrt die angeboten ...

... a long story short, we couldn't get there (easily), but managed to get the tickets transferred to the next evening. Always flexible, we relaxed in the hot tub for half an hour with a glass of wine. If only I'd known how they worked, then I could have used the one at Aspen Manor at Hamilton when I was there for two weeks! But I was very wrinkly when I emerged, but that's a cheap price to pay for a very pleasant ...

I had a very peaceful and deep sleep last night and even had the luxury of sleeping in this morning until 9:00. wow, was that nice. I got up feeling refreshed and eager to begin the next leg of my Northland expedition, which would involve me rejoining the MAGIC bus for the remainder of my trip, and taking it north about another hour and a half to the beautiful vacation area of the Bay of Islands. my base for the next three days would be Paihia, a ...

... to say our feet were a little sore. The trail is buried in lush vegetation and it's a beautiful hike. The falls at the end were well worth the walk. Though they were a little small, they still had all the majesty of a mightily waterfall. I took lots of pictures in hopes of capturing the magic this forest possessed. For dinner this evening we had chicken drumsticks with salary fried rice, steamed cauliflower and chard. Sorry for all the spelling mistakes, Sabine Ng

... yielded sawn timber of unsurpassed quality for building. The gum, too, became essential in the manufacture of varnishes. Gum was obtained through digging, fossicking in treetops, or, more drastically, by bleeding live trees. The exploitation of forests increased with the demand for more and more cleared farmland. Kauri forests once covered 1.2 million hectares; now they have been reduced to 80,000 hectares. Facts Of Kauri Trees -Ancestors of the ...

... ostetud päris suur hulk erinevat kraami. Edasi otsisime üles internetipunkti, kus sai tiba blogi üles laetud ja maile vaadatud. Käisime Axiga korra Opias, kus pakuti purjejahte rendiks, aga need osutusid sellisteks rontideks, et matsime selle mõtte hiljem maha. Korteris läks kõvemaks vaaritamiseks. Mina tegelesin sea sisefileega, Gerli salati ja muude lisanditega. Serveerisime selle rõdule ja lasime toidul heamaitsta. Meeleolu hoidis üleval mõningad pudelid valget veini ja hea seltskond.

... day so we had some lovely views over the country as we worked our way north.

About 90 minutes later we landed in Auckland again and this time knew the drill!

I waited for the bags while Katie sorted out the hire car (smaller car & a manual this time - bit of a shock apparently after all the automatics!), and then we headed north, through the city, over the harbour ...