Well blogfans, we're less than six weeks from home now which seems ridiculous given the huge amount of ground to cover in the meantime! That said...a lot of that 'ground' is actually the Pacific Ocean! We spent a leisurely Saturday morning walking to town where Katie bought a shopping bag with a print of Vava'u and surrounding islands. It's very nice, and importantly large so that we can put some of our vast amounts of belongings into it! I'd been giving kayaki...

Well folks...after only one full day on Tongatapu we were due to fly to the second most populated island in Tonga (approx 18,000) - Vava'u! The domestic terminal in Nuku'alofa was fantastically casual...we needed no proof of I.D. and there was no gate number or anything even close. It was basically a cafe from where you could take flights. Ours would take us first to the island of Ha'apai - drop a few people off/pick a few up and then we would go on to Vava'u (p...

Malo e lelei, Hello from Tonga!! We're now basically in paradise...honestly picture utopia and what do you see? Palm trees - tick, golden beaches - tick, Turquoise water - tick, blue skies - tick, sunshine - tick....etc etc etc! We did have a few days left in New Zealand before coming here, but they were pretty non-eventful. Worth mentioning is that we went up to the viewing platform in the southern hemisphere's tallest building - Auckland Sky Tower. We were 22...

So from the top of the South island to the top of the North...Nelson seems a distant memory as we enjoy the sunshine up in the 'Winter-less North'! We had a slightly bumpy journey back across the Cook Straight, but were soon once again on the North island, and it felt like only days since we left rather than weeks! Unfortunately the weather had changed some what since we were last there, and on arriving in a very rainy Wellington we decided not to stick around. ...

Hi there folks! Well, last time we blogged we'd just arrived in the town of Franz Josef Glacier, handily named as it happens to be right next to Franz Josef Glacier! No doubt you've all been on tenterhooks wondering what on earth we could've been up to there! We'd been anticipating a half day hike on the glacier, which we'd heard was easily enough hard work for the amateur glacier trekker. Cooper had also looked into scenic helicopter flights, which seemed like...