The Coromandel region is next on our itinerary and the town of Kuaotunu right at the top. Its a very long drive from Rotorua and another twisty twirvy road. The hostel we're staying at is called Black Jack Lodge and is perfectly located just 1 minute from the beach. Its a really nice beach and our first evening is spent admiring the sunset and taking silly photos in the shadow of the sun!
Sam, luckily, had an early night which gave us the chance to wrap all of her presents and prepare for her birthday. This included wrapping 24 presents (for her 24th b'day), making a happy birthday banner out of leaflets (which Jason had already pretty much completed), blowing up balloons and icing the cake we'd bought!

Jase and Becky got up a little before us so they could decorate the room ready for Sam when she woke up and when she did, she was so surprised. It was brilliant, she didn't have a clue, even when we popped a balloon the night before she didn't hear it!

After brekkie the presents came out and this was also met with great surprise. Somehow we'd done all of this without her realising a thing. The presents were only small gifts that we either needed - like batteries and toothpaste(!) - or little treats that Sam could enjoy such as a creme egg or to and a lolly pop, but they gave her something to open. After Sam had rang home we all went out on the kayaks for a paddle in the sea to enjoy the gorgeous weather. Sam and Becky weren't out as long as Jase and I so they sunbathed on the beach while we defied death by riding the waves onto the beach - in our kayaks! Quite a mental experience and on one occasion i got flipped over and the kayak landed on top of me. In the scramble to rescue myself, my hat came off and i lost a badge and, at long last, my sunglasses vanished! The same sunglasses that had been lost at least 3 times on this trip so far but found there way back to me. They've now well and truly left. It seems the strong current pulled the glasses back into the sea and, surprisingly, they didn't float or get washed back to shore. It's no great loss because they were free but they'd tried so hard to stay with me for this long!!! I survived the ordeal with a few minor kayak or sand (it's a little hazy so i couldn't say which it was!!) burns!

The rest of the day was predominantly spent on the beach and for dinner - Sams choice - homemade burgers on the bbq and they were delicious. We ventured down to the beach one more time for the sunset with some wine to complete St. Patricks Day - i mean.. Sams birthday!!

Next day we had more sun and spent even more time at sea in the kayaks, this time paddling around the cape to find some secluded beaches and navigating the kayaks through the rocks! I even disturbed a sting ray but no one else saw it. Maybe they believe me, maybe not, who knows!! While staying here we also drove out to a nearby town were you can walk around the rocks and through the woods to a secluded beach rated in the top 20 of secluded beaches in the world by the observer newspaper! It really was nice though and there were not many people around at all - about 4 in all and the beach was about 1km long!
Leaving Coromandel we started off towards Hamilton when we stopped for fuel and the car didn't start back up again. The garage jump strted it for us and we drove around to the mechanic who immediately spotted the alternator belt had snapped. They qupted us but couldn't fit it in until last thing today because the part needed to be couriered in. Jason very kindly offered to drive to the shop and pick the part up ourselves which they agreed to. This saved us about 4 hours of waiting around which helped greatly as we needed to be in Hamilton to check in and we'd have been really late if we'd waited until the car was ready at 5pm as Hamilton was a further 3 hours driving. The repairs cost just over £30.
We spent a day walking around Hamiltons beautiful botanic gardens while Jason & Becky went to see the glow worms at nearby Waitomo Caves. We'd already seen the glow worms down in Te Anau on the south island so we were happy to not do it again, as magical as they are!

We had one day to use up before we were due down in New Plymouth for the Jack Johnson concert so we checked out the weather and managed to book Sam in for a skydive in Lake Taupo. We parted ways with Jason & Becky as they had 1 week less than us to finish the north island so they went up to the Bay of Islands while we drove over to Taupo.

Our return to Taupo was for the benefit of Sam's desire to jump out of a plane! I wholeheartedly agreed!! She was very nervous leading up to it understandably but, after we'd checked her in, she didn't even have a chance to take in what was happening as they kitted her out and had her on the plane within 10 minutes! She was the first to jump out too which helped and her tandem partner was very very calming - i.e. singing her songs on the way up to take her mind off it! As you can imagine, it was well worth it for her because when she landed, her face told the whole story. She was beaming and, with the help of adrenaline, was like it for at least the rest of the day! I'd never once imagined doing it but seeing sams response and watching the DVD, i think i'll have to one day!

Straight after the skydive we drove to New Plymouth where we saw Jack Johnson in concert. He was superb of course and the venue was pretty good too. It was outdoor in a park and the stage was separated from the crowd by a little lake with plenty of ducks in! Suffice to say, not long after Jack came on, many people jumped in the lake to get a closer look and the event was nearly cancelled because of "safety reasons". Apparently the venue is afraid of people drowning in 2 feet of water! I'm glad we didn't jump in because when they all came out, they really stunk!

Easter Monday involved us driving all the way up to Auckland where we can sell our car. We still had two weeks before our flight out of NZ but we wanted to not have to worry about the car on our last few days! So, after 3 days in the car market with very little interest, we had a day off selling before hitting the weekend local car markets. The saturday market wasn't too good but we'd managed to talk a couple of backpackers into seeing the full potential of Mickey. They agreed to buy but we had to get the fan fixed.

We took the car to the mechanic who didn't seem to know what he was doing - which didn't help our buyers' confidence - and he then wired up the fan in such a way that the engine didn't turn off when the key was taken out of the ignition! By this point our buyers had been scared off and we lost them. This meant, because of the stupid mechanic, we had to spend another day at a car market. This time we had success. We sold for $1000 so we only lost £280 over 2 months. We were happy with that because we'd seen people sell for a fraction of their asking price as they were flying out on the same day! At least we didn't have that to deal with.

The day after selling, we rented a car and drove up to the last little bit of New Zealand - the Bay of Islands - for 5 days of relaxing and winding down before our trip to the South Pacific.

In the Bay of Islands we had a couple of days doing very very little, drove to see the giant Kauri trees and took a boat trip to the quaint town of Russell. As well as this we saw the treaty grounds of Waitangi. This is where the Europeans signed a treaty with many Maori chiefs to secure the future of Aotearoa (New Zealand). You could visit the actual grounds where this happened and also there they have a massive Maori war canoe on dislplay and a Marae (Maori meeting place).

It was nice to spend time unwinding before heading back to Auckland to pack for Fiji! After another 2 months in a car we had more stuff we didn't need that had to be discarded or eaten! But we packed all up and we're due out on our flight to Fiji in a couple of hours.

New Zealand really is a fantastic country and, if theres anywhere that we've been so far that you have to visit, its here. Everything you could ever want is here from Ski resorts in the winter to sun kissed beaches in the summer, from giant mountains to plains of fields, from penguins to dolphins, and from adrenaline fuelled activities to casual 3-5 day walks!! Fantastic!