We got up early the next day for the drive to the far far north. It didn't take as long as we had expected it to, and we ended up getting there at about 1.00pm. The drive was fine, utnil we got to the last 20k's which was all gravel road! The lighthouse was pretty cool, and it is the area where the Pacific Ocean and the Tasman Sea meet so there was a lot of rough waves! We were a bit disappointed to see that someone had vandalised the signpost that tells you how far you are from London, Tokyo, New York etc - the had snapped them all off! I was speaking to a girl who said her friend went there a couple of weeks ago and the signs were lying on the ground there.

After that , we went to see the Te Pake sand dunes - they were huge but we didn't go sandboarding. We stopped off just down the road to get some lunch - the place we were at sold ostrich burgers so we all ordered one. Never order an ostrich burger, they are disgusting!! They are all chewy and gross. I only ate it cos i'd paid for it...!!

We were getting a bit tired when we were heading back down the road and stopped at this backpackers which looked like it was set back in the 1800's! There was nobody there, until about 9.00 some other weary travellers came along, but everyone went to bed as everyone had been driving all day!

We left there the next day and we headed back to Paihia. We were going to stay somewhere else, but the weather was rubbish so there wasn't much we could do, and we went to a couple of other places but it was much more expensive (and they didn't have a fire, which i missed!!). So we headed back and met up with all the people we'd met at the hostel before.

Today we decided to drive straight to Auckland, where we are now, and we are staying with my friend Joni. We'll be here tonight and tomorrow night, then off to the sun sun sun!!