Meeting Monique

The next day James and I awoke to Rob knocking on our hostel door. It is weird and lovely to be so far away from home yet still have a little piece of Darlington with us. We still had to get some more money out to pay for the campervan so met Rob and Corey in Starbucks (yes still living it up) and went on the internet to tell the bedmobil people who they should be looking out for. James suggested 'just look for the only people coming out of The Pullman' with backpacks, we stood out like sore thumbs. We said bye to Rob and Corey, this time it wasn't emotional as we knew we'd see them soon, and went excitedly to collect our camper.

Her name is Monique and she is everything we had hoped for. Very simple, yet sheek, beautiful yet comfy! We hit the road immediately and after a few hours arrived in Mount Manganui where we were hoping to bump into Ruth, a girl we had met in Fiji. Along the way we stopped for a scenic walk on an old railway track and took a quick snapshot of the giant L&P bottle as we drove through Paeroa. We hadn't originally planned to stop in Mount Manganui but we were pleased we did, it is a popular beach resort with natural hot springs, gorgeous beaches and a huge hill to climb. We made sure we did all of these things before we left for Whatakane but unfortunately didn't meet up with Ruth. Whakatane is situated on a river and a pleasant town but aside from dolphin tours, which we couldn't afford there was not much else to do. We found a shop to buy some things we needed in the van and headed towards the East Cape early the next morning.