New Zealand update
Hi guys,
We have less than a week left in New Zealand now-sad times! But we have been having lots of fun here. Last time I updated we were in Abel Tasman and we spent the next day walking along the coastal path of the national park in glorious sunshine and it was absolutely beautiful.
The next day we drove down to Kaikoura and as I said in the last mini post it was absolutely incredible. It definitely rates as one of the best things we’ve done along with the diving in Thailand and the Mount Kinabalu climb. We hope we can go back and visit Tiaka the whale some time in the future 🙂
We left Kaikoura and headed back north to Picton stopping at a few wine cellars on the way for complimentary tasting-some very nice marlborough sauvignon blancs! We got the ferry over to Wellington and again it was a gorgeous day so we got a really good view of the city from the ferry. We then went to visit some of Chris’s parents friends from uni and they were soooo welcoming. They have an absolutely beautiful house in a perfect location and it was perfect for us to just chill out for a few days in a house after all the travelling. We really enjoyed being soo well looked after and hope we weren’t in the way too much. We had a wonder round Wellington and met up with Chris’s friend Becky while we were there. While we were staying with Jan and Dave they gave us an awesome slide show of a few old photos back from their uni days! It was very enjoyable, as was there hot tub! We spent an evening in there looking at the stars.
Feeling refreshed and relaxed we reluctantly left them too it and headed back to our van. We drove up to the Tongairo crossing and again had great weather the next day for what was a spectacular one day hike past mount doom, craters and beautiful emerald lakes. We climbed Mount Tongairo as well but really it was easy after Mount Kinabalu. After our 22.4km hike we continued north to the Waitomo caves. The next day we had a tour round the glowworm caves which were spectacular. The glowworms really looked like stars.
That night we moved on to Lake Taupo hoping to do a skydive. Unfortunately the weather wasn’t on our side so we visited the huka falls and moved on to an awesome natural geothermic hot water spa close to Rotorua. It was nice to relax in the hot pools and chill out. We also went to a natural stream called Kerosene creek which has water 39 degrees!! It was lovely!
The next day the weather improved so it was back down to Lake Taupo for our skydive. And yes it was absolutely terrifying-but absolutely amazing once we’d got out the plane! We have videos so you can see when we get home but the views were stunning and the jump was just soo soo good!
We went north to visit some natural mud pools which were cool and bubbly and then continued to whakatane. This was the first time the weather would stop us. We wanted to visit white island but the wind out at sea was too strong and the trip was cancelled. (o well we’ll have to come back :-)) However not knowing what to do instead we spoke to a guy on our campsite who told us about Moko the local dolphin who was in the bay that morning. We went down to see if he was still there and luckily he was. Two people were swimming with him and when they got out we couldn’t resist and even though the water was freezing we spent the next 15mins swimming with him. He was amazing, 3.5m long and just soo playful.
The next 2 days we drove round the coromandel scenic road but the weather wasn’t perfect. It was still nice though. We continued up to Tutukaka where we hoped to Dive the poor knights. Luckily the weather had calmed and we went out. The diving was incredible! Loads of yellow kelp you could swim through and scorpion fish and stingrays and millions of fish. We really enjoyed our day there. We hired a camera again so hopefully they’ll be some good photos coming up.
We’re currently in the Bay of Islands. We travelled up here with the couple who we dove with yesterday and this morning went on a nice walk with them. Tongiht we are going to the best fish and chip shop in new zealand to see if it compares with home.
Hope everyone at home is well and the weather is getting better over there for when we come back. As you’ll see from the pictures we’re starting to lose our tans. 🙁 Anyways hope you’re all ok and miss you all and not long till we’re back now. Ever sooner till we see you sibby!
Take care, lots of love
Katie and Chris