howdy all!!! well just finished my trip of the bay of islands plus the top bit!! Started the day off leaving auckland quite hungover but not feeling too bad. Arrived at Paihia at lunch time so spent the afternoon on a jet boat thing exploring the islands in the bay including going through the famous hole in the rock and a cave thing - was really cool and very beautiful. The next day I headed out to the rainbow warrior to do some diving. Unfortunately my dive of the rainbow warrior was a bit of a waste as i somehow managed to get something in my throat which i couldnt clear so i couldnt breathe too well so had to come up as was consuming too much air and felt really uncomfortable in the water - so i did see the ship even though the visibility was only like 5m but wasnt the best dive ever!! The second dive was a reef one and was really cool and saw loads of stuff like some giant sting rays! The following day i headed up to cape reinga for the day on a day tour thing. We did some cool stuff like walking to the lighthouse on the northern tip, some great sand boarding - man sand can get everywhere - was still finding after many showers!! Also, had lunch on the beach and swam in the sea so all in all was a good day. That night we got invaded in the bar by some kiwis on a stag night but they were really funny guys - very drunk but very amusing to talk to - even learnt some maori!! So left paihia the next day. Before leaving i headed up to waitangi treaty grounds where they signed the documents for todays laws concerning the rights of maoris and the colonials. So that was really interesting to read about. Instead of coming back to auckland i stayed in Whangerei to do some more diving at poor knights islands - stayed at a really cool hostel which was actually a house so very comfy and homely. The diving at the islands was really good. The 1st dive i went off with a french guy as my buddy but we did get a lil lost so had to surface at one point to find out where we were - doh!!! but we did see 3 sting ray all together - one heading straight towards us so really cool!! Really great dives - the visibility was like 20m+ so saw loads of stuff! Thats all from the north - head back to auckland tomo!!! love nikki xx