Well here i am, five days into new zealand. i arrived on monday evening and was fortunate enough to have a friend my contiki trip meet me at auckland airport. I stayed with him for a couple of nights, it was great having my own even just for those two nights. Huib is an aircraft engineer and has a share in a small plane, he had to do somthing for work so took me out for a trip. All i can say is wow, we went for a flight that lasted a good hour, over auckland, the countryside and the coast line. i got a amazing trip which people would normally have to pay for, for free. The views were amazing, and no motion sickness for me! That night we wne tout for dinner up the sky tower, it was an all you can buffet, again that was amazing. huib dropped me off at my hostel on the wednesday evening ad i spent thursday wondering around auckland. i picked up my bus tour on friday, and only a couple of hours into the trip the bus blew a tyre, so we had to sit on the roadside for an hour waiting for the the tyre person to come out. After our sit on the roadside we got on our way again, but we were set back for time, so after that everything was a rush. We visited Waitaimo caves, where we got to walk through and then ride on a boat out through the glow worms. there werre hundredsof tiny little green lights hanging from the ceilings.

On leaving Waitaimo, we arrived at Rotorura, with just enough time to run in and get changed before getting picked up for our Maori evening. We had a nutter of a driver, who could say what Kiara meant in 58 different languages. He liked his horn all the way to the vilage. We got greated by a maori worrier, who did a tribal dance, we got to walk through the village and aw a concert, the song and dance was great - we even got to see the huka performed by about 10 kiwi men. Following our concert we got taken into the dining room where we were served a hangi buffet diner - all the food had been cooked in the ground on volcanic rocks, it was so nice - the meat was so tender, and just fell off the bone. On the way back the driver decided to sing a song in all different laguages, and decided to do here we go round the mulbery bush, but taking the bus around the roundabout about 10 times. A good night was had by all.

i had best go for now as got some photos and sight seeing to do of lake Taupo

Bye

Sharon