It's a hot day up north. I keep on being amazed at the difference in weather just between 2 islands. Or even between Wellington and Auckland. I did some Merino socks/faulty exchange shopping this morning and a big black (slightly smoking) plane went overhead at the North Harbour stadium. Pretty cool. Other events since returning to Neil and Julie's, and Nina and Evan's place/s:- Getting much closer to the end of my current Christopher Brookmyre book, this charac...

The sun is shine on the end of our mini road trip. The hostel is mint, called The Mousetrap and there is indeed a mouse sitting on the top. There are 3 mini kitchens which can lead to funny confrontations and intense card games. (Fairy jack and evil queen!) We sand boarded on some massive dunes yesterday leaving Holly with a bent thumb, but I got her some frozen diced onion and chocolate for that. Another chance to practice my first au skills. You know if I was...

At the end if my kiwi experience trip, we had one last toilet stop at the home of Hobbiton, where I acquired stamps and an apple turnover. Status • Tired but happy from finding my cheap but adequately comfortable hostel... • Missing the girls of course... • Made plans for the north north island with my new American, Holly, who I met through T-shirt reading shenanigans... • Getting more and more excited for the states... • Looking forward to mee...

Leaving towards Taupo today. Nothing of special excitement yesterday except for these really cute and entertaining seals in a waterfall off the main road. Way more exciting than the grown ups who just sit on the rocks. Oh and the driver went into antiphilactic shock on the ferry after eating a chicken satay wrap since he is allergic to peanuts... But they pumped some adrenaline in him and he is fine now. Me and Charlie have been watching revenge in her iPad t...

To be followed up in the next blog but this was somewhere my very lovely ex-boyfriend visited in 2011 much to my jealousy so I was a littl eprepared, touristically it is known for it's seals, dolphins and whales but I had that extra bit of Zing from knowing he had been there before. One of few times I ventures onto twitter as I retreived reminders of the highlights of this town hidden on the east by mountains. I have never enjoyed swiimming as much as I did that ...