Hokitika Holiday Park

... lamb at the Stations Inn where both dishes won awards. I have to agree it's worthy of the award as it was simply delicious!<br>As for yesterday, we had a very long day thus no entry. We didn't arrive back into Auckland until close to 1AM after going up to Bay of Islands for the day and taking a boat cruise where we saw dolphins and the famous Hole in the Rock. I will fill in more on that day later.

We didn't have a great deal of time to get up to Waiheke Island for Spud and Kims wedding (more to come), and as a result spent most of the next few days on the road. We did get to stop at several attractions including the impressive Fox's glacier as well as some scenic lake side stops for picnics. We spent our first ...

... the road to show us one of her favorite sites. The Tasman Sea is pretty rough with 4 meter swells and up to 4 meters of rain a year - luckily although the sea was rough the weather was kind and so we had great views of the Pancake rocks in Punakaiki. There is plenty of native bush and temperate rainforest with the ubiquitous Rata adding a splash of red, tree ferns adding touch of light green and tall Piau ...

... stop where you can see some rock formations that look like pancakes and there is also, what is reported to be a spectacular, blowhole.  However, the hole was not blowing when we were there. It seems that it only blows when it is near high tide (which is not until around 6pm ...

... hall to take my noise outside only to be confronted by a small person on a rowing machine just ourside the door. Don't ask ... Suffice it to say he made a good deal of noise for a small person and any noise I had been making was completely obliterated! The bus to Greymouth was heaving and there was only just enough room for all our luggage. There was lively bunch on there - they'd all been travelling together since Christchurch (3 or 4 days) so it was quite noisy until ...

It was our original intention to do a heli-hike to the top of either Fox Glacier or Franz Josef Glacier, two glaciers just a few miles apart from each other. Heli-Hiking is where you fly up to the top, land, and with the aid of crampons etc., you hike around the glacier for three or four hours seeking out the blue ice caves, which, if the brochures are to believed, are truly spectacular. However, when we arrived in town to book this, the weather was awful and few helicopters were ...

... voor ons alleen zouden hebben. Lekker op tijd naar bed en uitslapen.... Een zwitsers echtpaar kwam binnen, maar ook met z'n vieren was er ruimte en rust genoeg om te delen.<br><br>De hostel-eigenaar verstoorde ons plannetje: later die avond zou er een groep van Hiking-NZ binnenkomen en aangezien het maar bleef regenen, kon het nog wel eens zijn, dat zij de overgebleven bedden in beslag namen.<br>En jawel, dat deden ze. En aangezien hun leider jarig was, hadden ...