We have spent the last few weeks back in Taupaki in Auckland pruning kiwi fruit. It was the perfect end to our trip; we had some beautiful sunny days and some very wet days. San spent her days tying strings up and Jeff laid down canes. We had some incredible dinners at Shirley and Bruce's and Shirley took us to Murawi for a walk on the beach. It was a wild rugged day and the sun stayed shining, we warmed up with a hot chocolate. We sold our van to a guy we w...

We spent a few days in Taupaki after coming back from the Coromandel Peninsula. Then we headed north towards Goat Island which is a marine reserve and is meant to be a great place to go wadding and see loads of interesting fish and marine life in shallow waters. We had a walk around and the water was incredibly clear but all we saw was a couple of snapper. We headed north still going through Mangawhai where we stopped for a couple of beers as the sun went down...

We left Taupaki and headed towards the Coromandel Peninsula where our first stop was Thames. We didn't think much of Thames, just an average industrial town and so we headed into the Kauaeranga National Park and stayed at a DOC campsite in the middle of the forest park, it was pretty windy so we went for a quick walk through the forest and then hibernated for the night. The next day we went on to Coromandel Town which is a bit further up the peninsula. It's a ...

We arrived in Taupaki at about 5 in the evening, it was just getting dark. We arrived to find no one around but then realised they were all in the Pack House. We walked in and were introduced to everyone and we started to make boxes up for the persimmons (a fruit like a cross between a carrot and an apple). We had worked for 2 hours and didn't realise, everyone is so friendly. Afterwards we were shown around our accommodation, it's a really lovely one bedroom...

We left Martinborough and headed to Cape Palliser with Kellie and Foxy. We camped there for the night, climbed rocks, jumped on rocks to get good sunset pictures and explored the seal colony. We watched a baby seal play with its Mum for a while. We found a free camping spot beside a hot food truck, it was a beautiful day so it was really busy and there was just one lady. We had burger and chips and an ice cream later (which San waited half an hour for and it wa...