Making our way north we reached Auckland, where we were shocked to see so much traffic and even the first proper service stations since arriving in New Zealand. We spent that first day in Auckland distributing adverts to sell Barry; that sad time would soon be upon us! Four hours after leaving Auckland in search for accommodation, we finally settled on parking up illegally in a car park on the sea front, due to some stupid council initiative in the area which meant that all cheap campsites had to be booked up hours in advance - something we hadn't been prepared for, and after a lot of swearing we couldn't care less about breaking the law at midnight! This isn't to say we didn't get up at about 6am to sneak off before any wardens came around checking! The next day was Good Friday, which of course meant a search for hot cross buns, before we headed off to 'Goat Island Marine Reserve' just outside of Auckland. Renowned for the fantastic variety of wildlife to see when snorkelling, we hired some gear, including a very thick wetsuit each for the freezing water, and headed in. Swimming off from the shore to the small 'Goat Island', surrounded by crystal clear waters, we saw an abundance of fish including:

A wide range of aged snappers
Red Moki
Wrasse
Pipers
Butterfish
Giant boarfish
And very exciting - 3 eagle Rays, gliding gracefully past or basking in the sand!

Being in a protected area the fish were pretty tame, and it was a real treat to see the brightly blue dotted snappers up close, and swim amongst large schools of pointy nosed piper fish! After our underwater adventure we headed up to Whangerei to camp for the night, where we began to try and use up supplies which resulted in a strange but surprisingly tasty dinner of rice, eggs, sweetcorn, tuna, cucumber and soy sauce.... We accompanied this with a lovely bottle of sparkling wine that Bess had given us as an Easter treat...we're not sure what the other campers thought of this strange combination of dinner supplies! That evening we hunted around for Easter eggs in the nearby town, but being some strange kind of ghost town the only place we could buy a couple of overpriced Creme eggs from was the petrol station! Following one more morning of buying more hot cross buns, Easter eggs for sophie and savoury pastries as Trevor's Easter treat?! we booked up a dolphin spotting trip for the following day in 'Paihia'. That afternoon we took Barry on a small car ferry over to the historic town of 'Russell', which was full of picturesque houses and streets, situated around a small harbour of local fishing boats and small personal yachts! After enjoying a pint overlooking the pretty harbour, and tucking in to some pretty decent fish and chips for once, we headed back to the mainland and stuffed ourselves full of Easter eggs before nodding off.

Next afternoon we headed off on our 'Dolphin Encounter' trip, and quickly came across a large pod of over 20 bottle nose dolphins. Unfortunately as there were a number of young in the pod we were unable to get in and swim with them, but it was pretty fantastic to see them bobbing along so close to us, and to see the tiny calves jumping out of the water every now and then. Although the the scenery of the 'Bay of Islands' was stunning for the remainder of the trip we failed to spot any more dolphins before heading back to shore. Later that afternoon we headed further north up to 'Tauranga Bay', a pink sand beach where we watched the sun set over the pinnacled sea-scape while we tucked into dinner. Continuing on towards our campsite however, Barry took a turn for the worse! There was suddenly a loud scraping noise as if one of the tyres had punctured. In the dark we pulled over to check but all the tyres were still fully inflated. Assuming it had just been the road surface we continued tentatively on for a few more minutes before experiencing an even louder grinding noise, and a loss of control of the steering wheel, as it felt like Barry was skidding along the road. Just about managing to pull over into a driveway on a quiet country road, we were definitely not continuing any further! On closer inspection of the tyres we discovered some strange brown liquid coming out of the front left wheel bearing and realised it was time to call in the breakdown cover we'd taken out! An hour later a guy from the AA came to rescue us at about 9pm, prior to which we had extensively researched on the Internet what the problem could be, much like we do when we have a slight headache and determine we are on deaths door, and predicted the same for Barry! Realising our van was completely undrivable as the brakes were no longer working, the rescue guy towed us to the nearest garage in a small fishing town called 'Mangonui' where we spent the night sleeping on the forecourt waiting for the mechanic to appear in the morning, with a few strange looks from the locals! Next morning we thankfully were told the news that the damage was 'only' a wheel bearing coming off and wouldn't cost too much to get replaced! After a few hours we were on our way again, thankful Bazza hadn't given up on us in our last couple of weeks!

That afternoon we drove all the way up to Cape Reinga, where the Tasman and Pacific oceans meet. There is not much there apart from craggy cliffs and a lighthouse... It was a long journey for a photo really! We decided to then try our hand at sand dune boarding at the 'Te Paki Giant Sand-Dunes'. Giant they were, and after hiring a couple of boards we clambered up the dunes and built ourselves up to go belly down on the boards, down some pretty steep dunes. This was good fun, but much like sledging, the hike back up the slope was exhausting! Anyway, after a few goes, we saw a farther and son sitting on one board and going down the slope together...cue us deciding to do this also. With probably a bit of additional weight to them, this unfortunately went very wrong, with us getting the position completely off, and having the front of the board dip straight into the sand halfway down the slope, filling our eyes, ears and mouths with tonnes of sand! Reaching the bottom in shock we began spitting out the sand desperately to breathe, and assuming we were completely blind! After the initial shock we were in hysterics at the base of the slope and decided that hadn't been such a clever move! We had sand in our eyes for days after!

Moving on we drove down to the town of 'Kaitaia', where we once again managed to flatten our atrocious car battery, this time in the petrol station of Pak n Save, to which a very large Maori man came to our rescue, and after which we spent hours in the shower trying to rid our bodies of half the sand-dunes at our campsite! Next morning, with a brief look at an underwhelming '90 mile beach', onto which we decided not to take Barry for fear of getting stuck (he'd been through enough recently), we headed south, catching another car ferry to 'Rawene', which we somehow managed to get away with not paying for, and stopping for lunch in the picturesque 'Hokianga Harbour' area for lunch and then onto the 'Kauri Coast'. Here we drove through the forest and looked at 'Tane Mahuta', the largest Kauri tree alive with a height of 51m and a girth of 14m, estimated to be up to 2500 years old! That evening we stayed at a small campsite next to a lovely coastal harbour.

On our way East to the Coromandel Peninsula we stopped off at 'Piha', a black sand beach (we seemed to be ticking off each colour of sand there was), and that evening stayed at a very strange tiny truck stop in the town of Thames, where Barry looked liked the children's TV character 'Brum' in amongst all the giant RV's surrounding him. Next day, after getting one of our tyres replaced that we almost shredded when the bearing came off, we headed north to Coromandel Town and had smoked mussels (Trevor liked) and a chai tea (Sophie liked)! Winding our way around mountainous roads we reached 'New Chums Beach', which is a thirty minute walk across rocky foreshore to a beautiful secluded stretch of near-empty beach backed by forest. Driving south we arrived in Hahei and headed to 'Hotwater Beach', something we'd been looking forward to seeing since we arrived in New Zealand - we'd heard how you could rent a spade, dig a hole for yourself in the sand, and sit in it as the magically hot water bubbles up through the sand and creates your own personal hot tub.....we stood on the packed beach watching in horror as we saw about 50 people crammed into one small hole on the beach trying to touch the warm water...the only part of the beach where the water was actually warm...what a disappointment! Instead we went and watched the sun go down with a beer over the pretty ocean of Hahei, full of small craggy islands out to sea.

Next day Trevor skyped his family back home, and we continued down to Cathedral Cove; a 20 minute walk from the car park took us to another secluded bay focused on a pretty archway carved out of the cliff. Worrying about our remaining time to sell Barry we then decided to head back to Auckland to push for a sale! That evening however, we managed to fit in watching a rugby game...when in New Zealand! We headed down to Eden Park, Auckland's main stadium, and watched the home team, 'The Blues' beat an Australian team 'The Brumbies' by 2 points in the final seconds of the match. The atmosphere in beating the Aussies was great and everyone left the stadium in high spirits! Heading into the centre of Auckland the next day we stopped in a petrol station and used the brush that is only meant to be used to clean your window screen to give Barry a complete wash...cheap skates! We showed a couple of Israeli guys Barry who made us an offer but after saying we wanted more, later backed out of the sale. The next few days were spent having a BBQ, going to various car auction valuations, flattening Barry's battery once more, sticking up more advertisements in hostels around the city, and showing Barry to a horrible man who wanted to rip him apart to use as a work van....no way!! Finally we had some luck when 'Luke', a guy from England came to view Barry and liked him straight away, and subject to a mechanical test the following day was keen to buy him for a fair price, phew!! That evening, Caroline, who sadly hadn't had any luck selling her car in order to be able to buy her beloved Barry, invited us to stay with her for our final two nights in a house she was looking after in Auckland. We were treated to a lovely dinner, far too much wine, and a comfy bed. Next morning we dragged ourselves out of bed slightly hungover to take Barry into the garage for his mechanical test...it was what we imagined it would feel like to take your child to an exam and wait for the results!! After having a coffee with Luke and sharing stories of our adventures in Barry with him, we returned to the garage to a gigantic list of minor things that could be done to Barry. Once we had all sat down and worked out which work was actually a good idea and which would take any character Barry had away, we agreed a price with Luke, and he was to pick Barry up the next day! Relieved of the sale but sad to be leaving Barry, we went through the McDonalds drive-thru in him (this must be done in all cars you own) and returned to Caroline's for more celebratory wine!!

16th April, and after 10 weeks it was finally time to leave New Zealand. Up early, we cleared out Barry, said our goodbyes and sadly waved him off to Luke, although Caroline may have been the most upset out of all of us! The three of us treated ourselves to a cooked breakfast, packed our rucksacks which we hadn't had to use for the whole of New Zealand, and then Caroline very kindly gave us a lift to the airport; she was a great 'crazy' friend to make on our travels! Checking in there were all sorts of issues finding Trevor booked onto the second flight from Santiago to Peru, to which the staff suggested we sort it out once in Spanish speaking Santiago, to which we suggested a firm 'no'. After about 7 staff getting involved and finally sorting out a non existent issue, we spent our remaining NZ currency on grossly overpriced chocolate and excitedly headed off to departures on our way to our final continent; South America!

New Zealand had been the developed country break that we needed; safe food, no haggling, English speaking, no rip offs, albeit bloody expensive. However, after experiencing as much stunning scenery and adrenaline activities as we could, we were ready to move on for more challenges and immersing ourselves in some new cultures...we wondered whether we would be saying this in a couple of weeks time when we were in some cockroach ridden hostel or spending too long in a squat toilet!