So Taupo, the skydiving capital of New Zealand...there was me promising that never in my life that I would ever skydive and here I was, standing at the desk and signing my life away. What an absolutely ridiculous thing to do. Not really though as I started to get a bit excited but also very very nervous. Anyway, it turns out that we are not diving until 1pm that day so we headed into town to get some lunch and we were told to call at 12.40 to check we are all on for jumping. At 12.40 we call, after not being able to eat from the fear, to be told that it has been called off because it is too cloudy. Sure enough it started to rain and we were glad we didn't do it in that! We were a bit gutted but they slotted us in for the next morning at 10am. In all the excitement we walked around a little and headed off to see Huka falls, which was a beautiful waterfall along a little track. It looked like ice flowing into the river it was so clear. Who are we kidding though, all we can think about is the fact that we are going to jumping out of a plane very soon! We take an early night and watch a DVD in Galileo to keep our minds off it.

The following day was clear skies and we called up with high hopes to find that it was being canceled again! This time because of high winds! We were so gutted as we had to go to Wellington that afternoon! I could not believe it. For someone who had always thought of skydiving as a really stupid thing to do that I would never be able to face as I'm too much of a wimp, I was a little more upset than I thought I would be. I suppose I should have been happy, it must have been a sign! Well we can't even do it anywhere else either as it is supposed to be way more expensive in other parts of the country. GUTTED!!

We decided instead to walk around some of Lake Taupo, the main attraction. This is where we began to agree that it was way too windy to do anything and headed back to leave for Wellington. The drive down there was amazing. We drove around Lake Taupo and it was stunning in the warmth and shelter of Galileo. We also drove around Tongariro National Park which gave us some great views of the volcanoes that were made famous in the Lord of the Rings Trilogy (Mt Doom/ Mordor?). We were planning on going to this park and Waitomo caves on the way back up to Auckland. Barry was really pleased that we drove through an army training area and he got to see some soldiers...I on the other hand missed out as I was asleep in the passenger seat, you think he would have woken me up to see some soldiers!!!!!