My auntie picked us up in the rain when we got off the bus at Invercargill. Then we drove out to Centrebush, where they live in a converted church. The house is really nice with lots of land, and 3 sheep (which Marc had fun chasing).The first day we all went out to the Catlins and went down to the beach to walk the dogs along the sand. We also went to see the Petrified Forest at Curios Bay which was interesting as the wood has been preserved in the volcanic rock ...

We had a long bus journey down to Dunedin where we were only staying for 2 nights. We once again stayed at the YHA which was a really nice renovated hospital, about a 10 minute walk out of town. The town centre itself wasn't much, but the reason we had come down here was to go down onto the Otago Peninsula to see the wildlife. So we booked ourselves onto the Elm Wildlife Tour and went down to encounter some of the native wildlife. The first stop was Taiaroa H...

From Christchurch we took the 4 hour bus ride to Lake Tekapo to see some of the spectacular views that New Zealand is famous for! As soon as we arrived we checked into the YHA which was right on the edge of the Lake and so had great views from the Communal lounge. This was one of the nicest hostels we've been in, although it was more than a little chilly in the evenings.The weather on the day we arrived was brilliant - cold but a really clear sky and the sun ...

We arrived at Chirstchurch and the first thing we noticed was the drop in temperature! 12 degrees it was when we walked out of the airport! Colder than England was at that time we were later told. It wouldnt have been as bad a shock had we not just come from 30 degree heat in Noosa. Arriving?early?evening we just had time to squeeze in the walking tour provided by the lonely planet, which also helped us get our bearings. Walking around we realised 2 things. First...

After our long long overnight trip from Airlie Beach we finally got to Noosa Heads. We arrived at our hostel, booked up some surfing lessons and some camel rides and went to find our room. We'd booked into the YHA after being told it was really nice by someone, and having found the YHA in Airlie to be very clean. It was definitely the nicest hostel we stayed at in the whole of Australia. Clean beds, pristine bathrooms, helpful staff and even nice room-mates! ...