At last! We can get rid of the van!! Oh it hasn´t been that bad. Just not that great either. In total we clocked up 2 flat batteries (nothing to do with Anthony charging his i-pod of course), 1 episode stuck in the mud, 1 run in with a very nice policeman and a smaller than it should have been speeding fine (oops), a month effectively sleeping on wooden slats and bits of foam and waaaaaaay too much petrol for our liking. Just about managed to get it to 100k...

Time for a spot of architecture perving in the Art Deco City of Napier. Took a stroll about town and did the Japanese tourist thing with our cameras. We then took a drive through wine country to Havelock North to stay with my old childhood friend Amy and her Kiwi husband Josh. It was good to see that Amy hadn´t lost her British roots despite being in New Zealand for 7 years now - she´d decked out the spare room as the Britannia Room - complete with Union Jac...

Another flat battery and a bump start later and we got on our way via the ´Forgotten World Highway´ - a pretty drive through crazy small tunnels and over big mountain ranges. Mid way along the journey, we stopped off in the Republic of Whangamomona - a town where the townsfolk didn´t want to be ruled by the district council and instead decided to form a republic independent from New Zealand. Sadly it didn´t involve a stamp in our passport, only comedy photo...

So we crossed the high seas and made it to the North Island. To start us off, we caught up with Ant´s Uncle Nick in Wellington. Katy was slightly freaked out by how similar one of Nick´s kids is to Anthony. Literally a mini Ant - dimples and all. Next was a drive along the Whanganui River Road - famous for two things - beautiful scenery and scary Mongrel Mob gangs. Luckily the mob turned out to be rather helpful when we got stuck in a ditch to avoid some s...

We´d heard that Golden Bay was a bit off the beaten track so to get away from all the other happy or not so happy campers (depending on their choice of van), we headed up to the furthest point of the South Island. And it was sooo cool. Full of hippies and yocal locals. We explored Farewell Spit (which strangely looks a bit like a Kiwi bird when viewed on the map) and got lost in crazy grey sand dunes. One flat battery later (our first...) and we soon stumble...