The Interislander ferry would take us across from Wellington in the North Island down to Picton in the South Island for the second half of our New Zealand adventure. This was the first time either of us had driven a vehicle onto a proper car ferry, and we both were reminiscing about family holidays to France. Once she was parked up and anchored down we went off to explore the boat. We had been warned that you could get a rough three and a half hour crossing, bu...

Our time in the North Island of New Zealand was coming to an end. We were booked to take the van across on the ferry in a couple of days, but planned to see what Wellington had to offer first. After negotiating the crazy traffic on the way into the city (something we had become unaccustomed to after the empty wide roads on the rest of the island) we opted to park the van outside a 'hostel' and pay a fee to use their facilities. Lets just say we were both pleas...

You could smell Rotorua long before you could see it! The sulphur smell was everywhere, but you know what that means..... Hot pools! Yes, Bee was very happy. First stop was the natural pool out at Kerosene creek, beneath the wide and strong waterfalls after all the rain, surrounded by trees and ferns in the bush. Tim whiled the time way diving into the falls only to shoot back out down stream.Driving a bit out of town we went exploring the Waimangu Volcanic Valle...

We had always wanted to go caving from the moment we'd stepped foot on New Zealand soil. Tim with his new love for rafting and Bee with her love of all things 'nature' based. Waitomo was the place to go as it featured numerous cave systems that could be explored. We opted for 'Waitomo Adventures' as they offered a bit of everything, tubing, caving and the famous 'glow worms'. One of the advantages of visiting NZ in June was that everything was very quiet due ...

After our longest day of driving the van so far, we bypassed Auckland on our way down and across to the Coromandel Peninsula and camped at Hahei Beach. We awoke to a stunningly hot sunny morning and wandered down to the beach, on our way back we spotted a couple just about to tuck into a breakfast of fresh fish caught that morning from their kayak. Less than ten minutes later and there we were, sat out in the sun sharing a fresh red snapper breakfast with them! ...