Kingsgate Hotel Whangerai Whangarei

... At this point we had gained an audience of two slightly more helpful hikers who couldn't belive that it wasn't even our dog!!!<br>After the rescue we had lunch and took the dog back to the Hostel were we phoned the owner who came down shorly after. We later found out she was called Lara, and had escaped from here owners back garden, who lived quite far from were we found here. They gave us choccies which was cool. But it was all in a days work for Mark &amp; Helen DOG RESUCE!<br>

... movies. Starting<br>off with beetlejuice. We later went to bed ready for a day out<br>tomorrow.<br><br>The following morning after checking<br>out we decided as we had not seen a winery in Australia we would try<br>here instead. We headed to noe which had been recommended. It was<br>open but nothing was growing so we had a 5 minute walk around the<br>vinyards as it was free and then back to the car. We drove towards<br>Keri Keri and spotted the chocolate factory that Michelle ...

... and would hang upside down half a metre away from you, staring at you with their big wide eyes. I did get a little concerned though when I had one seal under the water, bearing his teeth and another on the surface barking at me...the guide assured me this was "normal" seal behaviour when I asked if they were being aggressive or playing.....hmmm, didn't quite answer my question! It didn't stop me doing acrobatics in the water trying to get their attention ...

... explorable cave. It had more water and more passages. We wandered in a little ways, but soon got worried about the water, and the possibility of getting lost. So we stopped and looked at the twinkling glowworm lights. We tried to capture the lights on film using long exposure, but it didn't work. So the pictures remain only in our mind! Mission Glowworm accomplished, we headed out of the caves, and finished our afternoon exploration in the ...

... land of people holding out pie's &amp; warm drinks. As I arrived the sign said 'Welcome to Waipu a Hundred thousand welcomes' I though one would have done but it is always nice to welcomed. The town was paved normally and unusually by NZ standards had no obvious signs of pie shops but it had a cafe and that had lasagna and less traffic (especially in the cafe). I t also stopped raining briefly, so all in all, Waipu was pretty good.

... noordelijke eiland. Dit om de voornaamste reden dat het hier in het noorden normaal warmer is dan in het zuiden (ja dat hebt ge nu eenmaal aan de andere kant van de wereld, onderstenboven). Karibu Creek is ni echt een boerderij, eerder een backpacker/camping/wwoofer/tea garden en winkeltje. Onze host is Maxine, geboren in Zimbabwe, opgegroeid in Zuid Afrika en uiteindelijk tot rust gekomen in NieuwZeeland. Ze woont hier samen met Mongo de hond, een stuk of 50 kippen met veren op ...

... Kanchanaburi, I decided that Thailand was one of the most beautiful places I had been to - up there with Tanzania and not much else. So I vowed to return. Aaron, I'm sure would much rather have gone back to the very glitzy and civilized Las Vegas, but he's so sweet (I mean macho - for any Mark Cromie Readers) that he agreed to some adventure tourism instead! Yay! Our travels will take us ...

... De volgende dag ben ik even wezen winkelen en besloten Anna en ik samen naar een middagvoorstelling in de bioscoop te gaan. The Bucketlist bleek een wat aangrijpende film, over twee mannen die elkaar ontmoeten in het ziekenhuis, net voordat ze een chemokuur ondergaan. Als ze horen dat ze nog slechts 6 maand te leven hebben, besluiten ze een lijst te gaan maken van alle dingen die ze nog wilden doen "before they kick the bucket". Woendags besloot ik een ...

Now everyone will try and tell you that there is nothing on the North Island and that you should head straight for the South Island, cos its far more beautiful and thats where all the action is. Never ones to listen to the advice of others, we decided not to head south straight away and instead headed up the Northland hitting all the beaches on the west coast first. So with our brand spankin set of wheels we headed for the black sand beach of Muriwai ...