Hallo again!

From Napier we made our way back up the coast to a city called Gisborne, which is a pretty quiet town. It has historical value to New Zealand, as it was the fisrt landing place of Captain Cook and his ship in 1769. We only spent a day here, as there wasn’t much to do really. We looked at flat screen tvs for about 2 hours, trying to decide whether to put one in the van!! I really want one, but we hardly get a decent radio signal as it is

We drove on from Gisborne on Monday, through a scenic gorge called Waioeke, and had a lovely picnic there in the sun. We eventually arrived in Whakatane, on the southern part of the Bay of Plenty. This was our favourite town so far, and we bumped into a lady from Leeds here, who had just moved out to New Zealand herself. There are really pretty pastel-coloured weatherboard houses here, and a nice walk along the seafront.

We treated ourselves to a campsite here for once so we could wash our smelly clothes! We had been told that a town called Hamilton, nearer to Auckland, was a good place to live, so we set off for there on Tuesday.

It is a bigger city than we have seen further south, but it was too industrial for my liking, with a rubbish shopping area too, and the rain didn’t help! Funnily enough we ran into someone here that we met in the hot pools at Napier the week before. It’s like living in the Truman show, you see the same people over and over, but I spose NZ has a small population.

After Hamilton, we made our way to the West Coast, and a little surfing village called Raglan. We only spent one night here, as we were hoping to go to the glow-worm caves at Waitomo the next day. This was a really great experience. We thought it was a bit expensive but decided to go in anyway. The first caves were really eerie, with waxy-looking stalagtites and stalagmites everywhere, and a really low ceiling. The guide took us through a maze of tunnels and up and down loads of flights of stairs, into one cave called the Cathedral, where they have christmas carol concerts!!

When we got into the second cave, we had to step in to a boat and float along the river into a pitch black hole, where thousands of glow-worms were attached to the ceiling. They looked like little green stars, very cool!

We left Waitomo on Thursday and arrived in New Plymouth the same night. We have found the local swimming pool for a bit of a swim and a hot spa – which is luxury compared to the cold water showers we have by the side of the road!! there is a rather unusual art peice on the coast here called the Wind Wand, it sways around in the breeze all day and night..Further up the coast is the Sugar Loaf Reserve, where we stopped at sunset to watch the flocks of birds come in to roost – there we so many of them! Today we have had a look round the shops and I was so chuffed to find out that New Zealand stock shoes in my size in normal shoe shops, and go up to a size 12 here for ladies! Imelda Marcos is going to have nothing on me from now on!

Sorry to hear about your foot Jane, I bet that really hurt! It makes me shudder at the thought. At least it has got Matt doing some jobs tho eh!

Glad to hear you didnt get into too much trouble at Leeds Garry and Leanne, I dont know if they have music festivals here, they do have concerts all over the place of American and British bands, we watched the Editors in Auckland in a tiny venue, but they definately have sheep shearing contests!! We drove through the sheep shearing capital of the World the other day! The 16 times champ lives there!!

Hi Mick and Cath, glad to see you here too! No we are not missing Englad, but we are missing the people lots.

Anyway Im off to get some tea, Im starving after spening all day shopping, and Mark is busy checking his shares! Hope you are all well, lots of love from
Mark and Gill xox