First day of my 15 day tour we headed out of Auckland in the direction of 'The Bay Of Islands'. Along the way we stopped at Parry's Kauri Park. Here we got to check out a Kauri Tree, which are really really big!! We then carried on towards a town called Paihia which is in the Bay of Islands. We checked into a really nice motel which was made up of self contained units and i was lucky enough to have a room to myself with a double bed, Heaven!!! The other girls in the same unit were really nice. That evening i caught up with Katie who had also made it to 'The Bay Of Islands' and we just chilled out with a few beers. The next day i went out on a boat around the bay of islands ( there are 144 of them!) spotting for Dolphins to go swimming with them, we were lucky enough to see them but they had babies so we were unable to swim with them :( It was lovely though taking in the scenery which was stunning. That evening the tour guide invited Katie to join us for dinner which was really nice of her then after we all headed down to the water to watch the sunset, it was a little to cloudy but was nice chatting and having a beer! It was then time for goodbye to Katie as although heading in the same direction im always going to be a step ahead!! The next morning it was back on the bus towards Auckland where we stopped for a short while and went up the Sky tower. The views were amazing and made Auckland look alot better than it does on the ground!! After picking up a few more people to join the tour towards the South Island we were on the road again. As new people had joined the group we had to do the whole stand up and say your name ect felt like i was back at school!! Though it did pass some time on the bus as it was quiet a drive to our next destination of Rotorua. With the first few days over and some really cool people on the bus i was really looking forward to the rest of the trip.