Kia Ora, Hello From New Zealand. Well it is finally here the most anticipated and awaited Blog Entry for this Trip so far...the almighty Kiwi land!

New Zealand, North Island- Auckland travelling to Northest of Country

New Zealand had some big boots to fill and alot of hype to live up to from all the fellow travellers who have told me about it. So did my first impression of the Country make an impression I will never forget...it bloody did, I was picked out at random by customs and spent two hours at the Airport answering intimidating questions to a 6ft 3 Maori (N.Z. Aboriginal) trying to plea my innocence. He was cool by the end tho, Mike even told me the best Bars and clubs to head for when I got to Auckland centre, and wished me a great trip, as he made me do the most tedious and hated chore of all Backpackers, re-pack my entire bag contents all over again!!!

Oh well bad start, but I still had this great feeling about the place though. The next day I started my trip on the Kiwi experience Bus heading to the very North of the Country Paihia for just 2 days. I made friends instantly that day, the first was Mandy who was from Canada, sat directly behind me on the Bus. As we got off at our stop to do our activities booked from the Bus, a Girl convinced me to do the Powerboat trip around the Bay of Islands instead of my first choice Dolphin Swimming (It was very cold B.T.W.). Her name was Shelley and from Bristol. It totally paid off because it turned out that the Swimmers came back having not seen a single Dolphin, and by chance we had loads all around our boat playing with us and jumping and showing off, amazing. The Boat ride was brilliant by itself, soo fast and the sea was choppy so we flew in the air so many times. In my dorm was Shelley and 2 other boys from London somewhere. One of the two was pretty ill and I didnt talk to him at all, until that night. We got playing some drinking games at the bar. Little did I know that this was the start of something incredible. 4 just off of being called strangers to me then, were the very beginnings of the best Month of my life in New Zealand, and I had no clue!!! It is so strange to me to think about how we all were then and what I first thought of them, because afterall, who can actually say they remember meeting their best friends and what they felt and remember thinking at the time??? Not many people, except backpackers! That's the incredible thing, its like making friendships in a test tube, same ingredients and same process, just manufactured so that the process is sped up to give you close friends very quickly so that no one feels alone. The manufactured part is that everyone makes a true effort to be open minded and friendly so that people will talk to in the first place. The sped up part is literally the travelling together itself! U will share dorm rooms and very quickly get to know peoples habbits and querks, and having shared activities together (loads of these by the way) means memories for life with that person, this brings u all together much quicker than just a mate u will see at work for a set number of hours a day. Therfore it works then, because after the first 2 days I did not feel like I was travelling alone, I was travelling with four of my good friends!

Back to what I was doing there, some of the activities included Powerboating around the 42 Bay Islands where we saw Dolphins, Sandboarding ((which was awesome)and I was awesome at!) Mandy and I did a 5 hour trek down a forbidden path to see a water fall. We entered the bar quiz together and WON! 50 bucks bar tab was the prize. Coach ride on the sand down 90 mile beach where we saw a wild seal.

And that was just my first two days In New Zealand. After the North Journey to Paihia, we all travelled south again which meant stopping over night in Auckland for the second time. Of course it was much more fun this time round, I had friends to spend the time with. So we drank at an Irish Bar and just began to get to know each other.

The next Blog may not be so precise as it was 4 weeks ago to me now, and from that point the stops all came so quickly, we only spent about 1 night in each place so may not be accurate with all the details. It will come very soon.

Next Mercury Bay- North Island, Southbound.