Hope things are good back home for everyone. Well, as Hannah has probably already told you in her last postcard, we have now left the warm climate of Oz & we are now in the FREEZING Country of New Zealand. I think the first thing that struck us flying into New Zealand was the scenery. We came flying in & the whole place just looked like a scene from Lord Of The Rings (more about that later.....), there were clear lakes, rolling green hills & then huge snow capped mountains in the back drop. We got off the plane & that is when we were hit with it!!!! We were warned in Oz that it would be cold over here & man they were spot on!!!!! We have since been shopping & brought hats, scarves & gloves. Well, we landed in Auckland & spent a few days looking around town. Already we could sense that the New Zealand people were real warm folk, genuinely nice people. After a few days we then went & picked up 'Santa Cruz' our little camper van!!!! He is ace. We have rented him out for the full 2 months that we will be here & it is really cool to be travelling around be ourselves instead of catching the buses we have been catching. Our first stop was in a little town called Kerikeri, North of Auckland. We stopped here for 2 nights. We went on a decent walk up to a waterfall & visited the oldest stone house in New Zealand, Arrrrhhhh I hear you all say. Yes.... very interesting......... We then stayed in a place called 90 mile beach (which is actually only 88 Km's). It was really nice here, a camp site right on the beach where we found turtle shells & I had a nice relaxing afternoon while Hannah was in her element digging up all of the clams on the WHOLE beach!!!!!! Next we went further north (as far north as you can actually get) to a place called Cape Reigna. Here we visited the light house & also saw were the Tasman Sea & ........ I forget which Ocean..... meets. It is pretty cool as where they meet they actually cause massive waves, sometimes up to 10 meters high!!!!! We then moved on down the peninsular to a real nice place called Hahei. We stayed here right on the beach in a real nice camp site. So nice we stayed here a couple of days extra than we had planned. We did a real good walk along the coast to 'Cathedral Cove' which is where the sea has cause a massive cove in the cliff which you can walk through. We also went to a 'Hot Water Beach', which is exactly what it says. And man, that water was real hot!!!!!! We dug our own little hole & sat in the water........ for basically a second!!!!!!! After a nice few days in Hahei we moved on to Matamata which is home to The Shire........ 'Hobbiton'. For those of you who don't know Hobbiton, it is the home of the Hobbits in Lord Of The Rings. We went on the tour of Hobbiton which was real good. Hannah is not a big fan of Lord Of The Rings, but she really did enjoy it as much as I did. We got to go into some of the Hobbit holes including the home of Bilbo & Frodo, Bag End!!!!!!!! Ok, I'll shut up now. Next up was Rotoura. This largish town sits on a real nice lake & is home to alot of the activities they have in New Zealand like Bungy jumps, white water rafting & other stuff. We haven't done any of that at the moment, but we may do towards the end of our trip, we'll just see how the cash flow is. FOOTBALL: Women look away now.......... Well, it's finally here The World Cup. Yes, they do show it over here but it is on a stupid times!!!!!! 1am, 4 am & 7am!!!! Luckily we found a pub in town called the 'Pheasant Plucker' which was showing the England Vs Paraguay game at 1am. So I dragged Hannah down the pub after a few home made drinks in 'Santa Cruz'. We got there about 10.30pm & the place was pretty full. Anyway, the rest is history. I have to say, the main thing is we got 3 points, but I think we need to pull our socks up & get stuck in. There will be a lot better opposition than Paraguay coming up........... COME ON THE BOYS!!!!!! Unfortunately the next game we play in on at 4am so I think that will be a very big night which I don't think my kidneys will ever be able to forgive me for!!!!!!! So, that brings us to here....... Yes we have moved on & are now in the very centre of the North Island in Lake Taupo & what a lake it is!!!!! The lake is actually the size of Singapore which we visited about 4 months ago now & I can tell you, it is not a small place. This is our 3rd day here & we leave tomorrow. The place is just beautiful. Beyond the lake all you can see is snow capped mountains, which we are heading towards in the next few days & we expect to go sledging, so that should be cool. Anyway, we went for the longest walk in the world the other day. Well, perhaps not the world, but it was well long!!!! We left our little pad on 4 wheels around 11.30am & walked to a dam which we got to at 2pm & watched as the dam opened & let the water through to the rapids, which was cool. Then we walked back along the river, past a real big waterfall, Haka Falls & finally made it back to 'Santa Cruz' at about 5.30pm!!!!! Well, I thought it was long?????........ We have just come back from a 'Prawn Farm' where we had to go as Hannah is now the worlds biggest prawn fan!!!!! We got a tour around the farm & then had a real nice meal in the restaurant. Then, this was the best bit, we went prawn fishing!!!!!!!! What is that all about!!!! Basically it was a bit like crab fishing, when you felt a tug then you pulled them up. We saw one, but we never caught one. Well that brings you all up to date for now. We still have around one more week on the North Island before we cross over to the South Island so we will update the last of the North Island very soon. Also, we have been having big problems with the photos today on the computer so we will try & update those for you very soon to. So long people.......... To be Continued.......... XXX