Land of the Long White Cloud (2)

Friday 20th February

Today finds us in Tauranga (actually at the Papamoa beach) which is around 88km from Rotorua. Yesterday was a long drive around 320 km but the roads albeit very picturesque were a little twisty and this slowed us down somewhat. It was a bit like travelling from Weston to Cornwall but using all of the B roads. Traffic was light though and this helped with the journey. We stopped at a few places along the way and took some “arty” beach photos and took in the fabulous views. It really is like every every beauty spot you have ever seen but on steroids.

The Camper Van is a 4 birth and is fine for 2 people but you would have to be very good friends to accommodate 4  people – especially adults. It has fridge, cooker, microwave etc but the sites are so well appointed that we hardly need to use these at all. The problem is that the sites are not well signposted – in fact not at all, so finding them with my navigation skills it makes it doubly difficult.

So today when the rain stops we are off to Rotorua where we will probably stay 2 nights. The plan is to reach Wellington by Wednesday PM where we take a ferry first thing on Thursday across to South Island (Picton). There starts the tour of the South Island. Its becoming apparent that to see everything that you want to and at a more leisurely pace, you probably need the amount of time we have allowed for the holiday just for each island – but hey ho that’s life and we make the best of it. 

21st February

So I write this part of the blog whilst sitting outside the camper van and enjoying the remainder of the evening. Today has been a relatively short trip down through Rotorua to Lake Taupo. This morning we visited a (partially) buried village that had been the victim of an Volcano eruption as recent as 1876. The site itself was ok but the guided tour was very good indeed. Before that however we took a look at a waterfall and watched some brave souls white water rafting down the river – rather them than me.

We then went on to Roturua and took a look at the thermal springs whilst dodging the odd shower of rain before reaching Taupo. Found the site, and then went for a walk before tea. The beer of choice on this holiday is Monteith’s Golden Lager and very nice it is too. The bottles are a little small at 330ml but I can cope with that. Not quite as many photos as I thought that I would take but they are mounting up nicely.  Weather is hot again and although it is punctuated by the odd shower of rain it’s not a problem.

22nd February

Today we arrived at Napier at around 10.30 am after an 80km drive from Taupo. Napier was destroyed in the early 1930’s by a huge earthquake that basically reclaimed a large portion of land. That was the good bit – the bad bit part was that it also totalled the town and virtually all buildings were lost. The cost of rebuilding was significant but as the great depression had already hit there was a lot of spare labour available and it was decided to construct the town in Art Deco style as it was cheap to construct and very fashionable at the time. Each year on the anniversary of the event the residents organise a fortnight of events with the highlight of them being the weekend vintage car rally and jazz weekend. We arrived on Sunday which was the last day – and what a superb day it was!! Lot’s of locals (and not so local) in period costume and some super cars (NZ has the highest number of vintage cars per capita). The weather was great and there was an air display steam traction engines and music until around 6.00 pm. During the afternoon we went for a guided walking tour of the town – with a peek into some of the buildings that you don’t usually get used to seeing. A few beers helped the proceedings along nicely. After a long day out we walked the 2-3 km back to the Camper van for an early night, ready for the long drive to Wellington the next day.

23rd February

Today we drove 320 km down to Wellington which will be our base for the next 2 days before catching the ferry to Picton on Thursday – and leaving North Island. It was a good trip and the roads were quite fast with the exception of a stretch right at the end of the journey where we traversed a mountain range.

However it does mean that I have no more driving for the next few days and that's good as so far I have driven a little over 1200 km since we arrived at Auckland – some of it on some quite demanding roads. I didn’t really realise just how big NZ was, it seems (and is) quite small compared with Australia. Typically it is a little too far from the UK to make an easy comparison.

I’ll finish the blog here and start a new one with our activities in Wellington and South Island