Well, as I said some time ago, I got a tad bored in Taupo and decided to hire a car to do a spot of road tripping around the East Cape of the North Island and check out the places I would'nt see on the Kiwi Experience East As tour. So up I got bright and early to hire out a "backpacker special". Or in real terms, a Nissan Sunny, so dented and scratched anyone with real money wouldn't be seen dead in it. Still, easy handling (like my good ole metro) and bloody cheap - Nearly 450 miles for 25 quid when I filled it up!

With a newly purchased road map, I set off for a small town called Bay View, about 7kms outside of Napier. Well, when I got into town, my awesome sense of direction kicked in and I missed the turning for the hostel. But I thought, thats not a problem, theres a place about 20kms (judging from the map) south that would be worth a visit. Anyway, 90kms later, I stopped at a hill called Taumatawhakatangihangakoauauotamateaturipukakapikimaungahoronukupokaiwhenuakitanahu. Just so I could say I visited the place with the longest name in the world. Probably not worth the 180km round trip, but I had unlimited mileage on the car so never mind eh! Back to Bay View, this time making the right turn, and I found myself in a rather strange smelling hostel, a bit like when you visit an old persons house and they havent redecorated in sixty odd years. Ok, so it smealt of wee. But it was cheap, had free internet access, and it gave me a chance to catch up on a few episodes of Neighbours as there was hardly anyone else staying there!

Next day, I took a drive in to Napier City, a cool but odd place. Pretty much the whole place collapsed in 1931 (I think) due to an earthquake, and when the locals rebuilt everything, they decided it should all be Art Deco... With an English Seaside feel on the front, a bit like Frinton or Clacton. So I took a wander, had a look in the local Possum Museum and decided to head back to the hostel for more Neighbours and internet poker as ther was nothing much else to do!

Next day and next stop, Gisborne. An awesome place if you like surfing. Sadly I can't surf, and so after meandering around the local statues of Captain Cook (and his cabin boy), it was another early night for me. Which again was a bit strange as I had checked into a hostel that used to be a convent. And was full of Brazilians. And flies as it was a bit of a mess to say the least.

And so on I drove round the cape for another few hundred kilometers, and actually realised I was missing tho homely comforts of Taupo, and so headed homewards (!) for another week of prawn fishing, barbies, quiz nights and mini golf....

...For a week, untill my old chum Canadia (Jason) got back from an inpromtu trip to Sydney and we jumped on the good old Kiwi bus to do the East As tour.

First stop, Te Kaha, to sit around in a hot tub looking out over the sea with some random Canadians, Dutch and Danish girls and boys. And a night time of singing rude songs with some local Mauri chaps. Oh, and there were two dead deer in the fridge. Awesome smell wafting into the dorm!

Next day, Rangatukia to carve a necklace from a cow bone and chill out round a campfire for a few hours, with a 5am start the following morning to be amongst the first people in the world to watch the sun rise (28th Nov for the record). Not really worth it with the amount of cloud around, but saw enough before going back to bed!

Final stop, a small town about 20kms north of Gisborne with some really good intentions of learning to surf at 8am the following day. Unfortunately, the hostel owners took us out drinking that night, and so when I woke up still drunk at 9.30, I realised the surfing wasnt going to happen...

Ah well, back to Taupo, same hostel, same room, still never having to show money as getting on well with the workies (invited to birthday celebrations, dinner parties etc)...

And so really all thats left to do is find some work to tide me over till the new year... See how that goes eh?!!!!