Airport Manor Inn Auckland

6th of November....

The one we really regret we couldn´t stay longer.......but " Aucky " people are just like us...!

We had to say good bye to Ozzie land and a new " small " trip lay ahead. We left Sydney at 12 and arrived in Auckland at 3pm. Same-same again for us, so Blondy got a map and I watched the bags. A smokey and a friendly bus driver with "roots" in Holland. Also somewhat 96 years ago, but he still managed to speak a little Dutch ...

... some reasons. And obviously not a long route but any how it is called traveling.
Well my beautiful experience waz Mildford sound in New Zealand (South Island). The summit waz covered by snow, the wind waz breezing and the experience of fary between peaks. There is one saying, very popular in New Zealand, is that if u dnt travel to Mild ford Sound in here ur trip is worthless. Make ur own time to visit the same place.

... trip shoes to see if I can wear them in just a tad more prior to next Thursday.

Wow. I booked this trip 10 months ago and it seemed to take ages to come around - now it seems to be arriving too quick!

The weekend shall consist of packing and re-packing and learning how to use my new camera :o)

F xx

... kind of makes football look a bit wimpy, especially because the players play without any pads or guards to protect themselves. Through out the game, 3 players got broken noses, and they even showed all the blood and stuff on TV.
Yesterday, the International House (where I'm living) had a fun night, where you got to dress up. It was themed "predators and their prey," so you had to dress up as one, and find a partner to dress up as the ...

Then back to Auckland to catch my flight to Tonga.

Spending not even a week in NZ is definitely not enough but as it was Winter the timing was not so bad.
I was glad to see quite a lot of the North Island and its inhabitants in this short time.
Kiwis are overall super friendly, welcoming, curious about other cultures and ...

... Park

I had always heard that Nelson was a cool place, and you know what, it was! I stayed at one of the best hostels, The Tasman Bay Backpackers (as a matter of fact, all of New Zealands hostels are great, clean, cheap, well run, and super nice!), which had free breakfast and free pudding at night! I even stuck around in the lounge that evening, as they aired the Worlds Fastest Indian, with Anthony Hopkins. It's a great movie, and ...

... asked about 6 times.... ´so i jump now?´.... ´no, really i just jump do i?´... and off she went and no scream but instead a sort of whoop`that got louder as she fell. Totally amazing experience and i would recommend it to anyone. That night Jess and I relived the jumps as we had a few in the irish pub. Queenstown´s adrenalin rush complete we spent the next 2 days visiting glaciers... first Fox Glacier and then Franz Joseph. Huge doesn´t really describe these mounds of ...

... for them to get to for the weekend. It is a beautiful area, full of very secluded beaches, forested mountainous areas along with some very quaint villages. It is also very historic as it was one of the first areas for settlement, with logging, ship building and farming going on there. We spent three days looking around and left understanding why it is so popular. The first day was spent heading up the east side of the peninsular that is the Coromandel. We spent the night in a small town ...

... large tanks with cold water fish species and native New Zealand marine fish. They also have a preserved specimen of a Giant Squid. I have only ever seen one of these before, and that was at the Smithsonian in Washington, D.C. When I was done, I walked out and within 5 minutes the shuttle appeared and I rode back to the Sky Tower. Since I was already there, I decided to go up to the observation deck at the Sky Tower. This is kind of ...

... island and saw 2 stingrays which was aazing, horse trekked on pakiri beach which was fun, swam in the beautiful fresh water lakes of lake kai iwi and then spent a day exploring the enormous kauri forests. We went right to the northern most point at cape Reinga and tramped around the headland, played on the huge sand dunes (real sahara style) and drove our car (4wd) up 90 mile beach which was great fun!! We managed to be in waitangi on Waitangi day ...