Day 113 We arrived on the evening of the 18th July and we thought our hostel was a 10 minute walk, although it turned out to be a marathon. Once at our hostel it took us an hour to boil rice so by the time dinner was done we were starving. After dinner we just watched TV in our room. The following day we had a lot planned although it was raining so we had to change our plans. Our first stop was Christchurch Cathedral, where we met a lovely guide called Quentin ...

Day 111-112 On the 17th July we had our trip to Kaikoura which took a bit longer than we thought. However, the views on the way gave us our first real glimpse of snow capped mountains and black sandy beaches. Once at Kaikoura we went for a walk to the seal colony at Point Keam, we managed to get a couple of metres away from a large male. We also saw what we thought was a baby but we later found out it was a female as they are much smaller. We then took the 'Cl...

Day 110 We were up at 0500 to get ready for our ferry to Picton at 0800. We watched a film onboard called 'Music and Lyrics' before having a small sleep. We woke up just in time for the magnificent views of the Marlborough Sounds into Picton. We saw dolphins jumping out of the water by the bow of the boat and it was a picture perfect moment. We must've taken 50 photo's of the breathtaking views before we even arrived. So we decided that as soon as we'd had lunc...

Day 108-109 Our coach journey to Wellington was not until the afternoon so we headed to Lake Taupo. We were in shock at the size of the lake as it looked as though we were by the ocean. It takes around 3 hours to cross by boat and is the largest lake in the North Island. Our tummies had started to grumble so we decided on the Pizza Hut lunch menu which was a bargain at $10. Lorna thouoght it was a good idea to do the Pizza Hut Challenge and see how many slices ...

Day 107 We arose early in order to get the most out of our day in Taupo. We had a bargain taxi ride to Craters of the Moon which was our beginning point for the day. The Craters of the Moon is exactly how it sounds although with hot springs. The craters were in sizes and had a large array of colours within the soil. These colours were used by Kiwi's to dye garmetns, carving and body decorations and the steam was used to clean thier clothes. We were also intrigu...