Next off to the Coromandel Peninsula, and mussels... yum! (as you have probably guessed it is famous for it's mussels). They are huge and delicious steamed, smoked and probably grilled. Also the sun reappeared so we had a couple of very nice walks including a visit to the beautiful Cathedral Cove- we left wishing that we had more time to relax on the beach. Lake Taupo is beautiful, as everything seems to be in NZ! We have seen a number of things here, see the ph...

After our first day in the Bay of Islands the weather turned and our tent was tested to the full by the driving wind and rain and came out with flying colours I am glad to say! However this did mean that our trip on the a catamaran around the islands and to see dolphins was not going to be on. We did however wait until the following day and take the trip in ok-ish weather. We had an excellent day and saw dolphins which was great as well as jumping off the boat fo...

We landed at 3.30am, killed a bit of time by declaring all the things that we weren't really supposed to bring into the country (although they let us through with all of it), bought a cup of tea and then there was a lot of noise and commotion....David Beckham had just landed too and was there with the rest of LA Galaxy (just out of interest can anyone name another of their players?!). They were welcomed by Maori dancing and singing and a hoard of photographers (w...