After our last blog we headed further south towards Auckland, where we were meant to be picking up Neil, but due to his recent injuries he couldn't fly out. After visiting Simon to sort out the issues with our van, we headed south, stopping on the way at the hot water beach. Here we began digging rather enthusiastically, though our interest quickly dwindled when we discovered that most of the hot spots had been taken (you dig a hole which fills with hot water and wallow). We managed a small foot pool, occasionally jumping into the nearby swimming pool sized attempt when the owners weren't looking.

That night we freedom camped again, staying on a miniature farmyard, as we found in the morning, with a friendly dog, multicoloured chickens, goats and an emu. The friendly farm yard owners offered us an open fire which we accepted gratefully.

On our way to Rotorua we stopped at a sign for zorbing, intrigued. A little while later we were hurtling down a hill in an inflatable ball filled with hot water - this we found, was zorbing. The friendly owners were low on business, offering us another free ride. This time we went solo down a bumpy track, much like a marble run. Libby attempted to make it over the small fence and into the carpark, as we had heard had been successfully attempted once, but was unfortunately unsuccessful. The rest of the day was spent driving down into Rotorua, where we camped up. It was in the campsite that we had a small accident in Bess, ripping down a fence and causing some damage to her right flank. The friendly campsite owners recommended a friendly man who gave her the once over and provided us with some cream to get the paint off. It was at the campsite that we again bumped into Jack who kindly donated a range of items to us including CDs of local music and warm clothing. We went kayaking on the lake opposite the campsite, trying to be athletic, and not helped by the very fast rower who insisted on showing us up. My technique was not perfect and I ended up being continually splashed, and finding a lack of upper arm strength was resigned to shimmying my way back to shore. Sophie was considerably more impressive in her technique.

The following day we headed down to Lake Taupo, where we decided to bite the bullet and book a skydive. The lady in the shop discovered that the next few days did not offer diving-friendly weather, and we found ourselves driving to the airport at top speed for a dive just an hour later. Once at the centre we kitted up in our jumpsuits and were belted into our harnesses so tightly we did little more than crawl to the pink aeroplane ready to fly us to our 12,000ft drop off point. On the way up we got more and more scared, not helped by the tandem men finding it entertaining to pretend they knew little more about diving than us (although my German tandem was very attentive - though he did not stroke my hair in the soothing way Sophie's Joel was).

We jumped (/pushed) out of the aeroplane, all having similar thoughts of tumbling to our deaths, but landed unscathed (except Libby who sustained facial injury). We all decided the experience was amazing.

Next stop was Wellington, stopping only on the way for a friendly man to fix another issue we had with Bess. That evening we drove into the city centre, though we found this particularly un-campervan friendly (the only spaces we could fit in were either the unavailable row of three) and Libby at one point found herself doing a three point turn in the entrance of a multistorey carpark we were led to by our satnav, much to the enjoyment of a gang of youths producing their camera phones. We eventually found a suitable carpark, and wandered down to a friendly Irish pub. This appeared normal, despite being surrounded by all the middle aged people currently residing in the city, until a live English band took to the stage, the pub filled to the brim with more older people, and everyone began dancing in almost High School Musical (or Grease to their generation) fashion, to our (and suspected the band's) horror. We watched on, partly entertained by the commotion, and the full range of dance moves supplied.

The following day we tried to sightsee Wellington, but unable to find a space big enough to accomodate Bess we ended up in a cafe instead (not to our dismay). We boarded the interisland ferry, and began a horrendously rocky journey across the channel. At times the waves were plummeting over the top of the ferry, and we found ourselves sat at the calmer stern, amongst the more violently sick of the passengers.

Arriving in Picton a little while later that expected we freedom camped on the roads heading to Nelson (along with just about every other campervan in the southern hemisphere). The following morning we awoke to the local wildlife - a suspected dolphin/seal/whale/shark, that we looked on at in awe, breathing in deeply the honey scented air.

Arriving in Nelson, we found little open (as they take the Queen's birthday very seriously here), so we headed on up to Golden Bay.

Much love

Sophie Elinor and Libby

xxxxxxxxxxxxxx