Mercure Windsor Auckland

<br>Hi All,<br> <br>First blog of our trip begins at 3pm while I wait for my second to last day of work to end. <br><br>It's been about 6 months since Matt, Hays, Nat &amp; I grabbed some cheapo Aerolineas seats to Buenos Aires in South America, &amp; now we are almost at crunch time with only 6 days to go!!<br><br>Still to pack - everything<br>Still to plan - nothing, everything important is good to go, between times we will float wherever the wind takes us.<br>Still to purchase ...

... which traditionally girls aren&#8217;t supposed to do, while we learned the poi pois. We then showed each other what we&#8217;d learnt&#8230; hilarious!<br><br>After having a few days on the bus I decided to hop off in Rotorua. It is know for its geothermal activity and the whole town basically bubbles and steams, oh ye and stinks of eggs, very bizarre! We visited a thermal village where people live amongst the hot pools and use them to produce all their ...

... Tank, Sonny, and Thomas, are fun, loving, and sweet little dogs. They are constant entertainment! I mailed some stuff home from the post office, which is really expensive, and enjoyed another bench conversation with Kelley and Isla before busing back up to my aunt's friends place outside of Auckland. The next day, I headed to the airport, and was on my way to Melbourne, Australia!<br><br>The first leg and month of my journey is over, and I ...

... got some food and drink and had a picnic in one of the parks. Next day we headed off round the windy rounds for a daytrip to Abel Tasmen national park. The park is massive and as we only had a day (and were returning later in the trip) we headed to the most talked about beach. After a 3 hr drive we arrived in the car park to the realisation that the beach was actually a 1.5hr walk through the forest (i love this about NZ, it´s never as easy as it seems). It was a ...

... The maximum speed limit throughout NZ is 100 kph (60mph) which was a bit of a culture shock for me. I didn't get stopped for speeding (this time) though. In Lake Tekapo we vegged-out in a lakeside holiday bungalow just up the road from a famous tourist trap, the "Church of the Good Shepherd" (would they erect a church to a bad shepherd ?). This tiny church is about the size of a double garage & has a picture window at one end that ...

... was bad but Doug managed to get to a rugby match with Tony and Joseph while Kay, Sophia and I went to see Slum Dog Millionaire! A day in the city culminated in a superb culinary success by Tony when he cooked us a curry - something else we've missed! We were sad to leave them, and New Zealand but had to get to Auckland via Christchurch for our flight to the USA. but this is one place we'll definitely be back to!

... off at Palm Beach. Had an icecream and sat looking out over the beach. Nearly missed the bus an hour later as we were waiting at the wrong stop. Though obviously used to tourist stupidity the driver waited the couple of minutes for us to run around the corner. Made it back to the ferry terminal and ventured off on the hourish walk around the point on the bi-annual Sculpture exhibition. All the works were for sale. One scultpure which was fascinating was pink builders string strung ...