On Sunday, we left Queenstown to go to Te Anua.  We had a little extra baggage that we picked up in Queenstown, by the name of Ashley from Folkstone.  Typical, we come all this way and we still end up hanging out with a Kent boy.  On Monday, the 3 of us went to Milford Sound.  This included a stop at Mirror Lakes where everything reflects perfectly in the lakes.  We had to drive through Homer Tunnel which is only one lane wide and 1.5km long, tra...

First thing on Monday morning, we managed to have a look around the shops in Greymouth as they were now open.  It only took 10 minutes and then we were out of there! 5 hours later, we arrived at Franz Josef.  We had a lovely little room complete with ensuite, kitchenette and TV.  We also only had to share with two people.  We felt spoilt.  We quickly had a look around but as this was a small town, it didnt take long either.  It was a very pret...

We managed to get ourselves onto a ferry for Tuesday (10th) at 1pm from Wellington into Picton (South Island). It took 4 hours so we sat and watched a film (cars) and sat up on deck for a while admiring the views (very windy though). When we arrived in Picton, we drove to Nelson where we stayed the night. It was a lovely seaside town and so we had a browse around on Wednesday before it was time to head off again. Next stop, Kaikoura. Just before we got there, w...

After leaving Rotorua on Friday, we went to a thermal wonderland. We had to get there early for the geyser eruption at 10.15am (only happens once a day). We virtually got front row seats and were amazed by it until it started soaking us with cold water. After that, we walked around the park looking at the different coloured pools and bubbling mud. It's weird seeing natural steam coming out of the ground (and it was very smelly). After leaving the park, we hea...

Well we've travelled nearly 1000km in 3 days. We now have our car, Percy the Nissan Pulsar (a little larger than what we were expecting, but at least there's plenty of room for the rucksacks). Its also not as difficult to drive as what we had imagined.Before leaving Auckland, we visited Kelly Taultons Aquarium, which had a 2m stingray called phoebe and lots of other fish and sharks from surronding waters. They also had a penguin enclosure which we went ro...