On Olly's birthday we flew to Aitutaki. It took 40 mins on the little plane. The view flying in was fantastic - we could see the whole of the bright blue lagoon. We stayed in a little hut right on the beach, it was lovely. We thought we's seen paradise but we hadn't until Aitutaki!! It's a huge aqua lagoon surrounded by reef. It's considerred to be one of the best lagoons in the world. It couldn't really be any better! The sand is so white and fine. The following day we had a walk to the 'town' which was [View Full Entry]

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Kia Orana! We left Fiji on Saturday morning and arrived in Rarotonga on Friday night. Rarotonga is a volcanic island and is the largest of the group of 15 islands that make up the Cooks. We spent a week in Raro, staying at Vara's Backpackers on Muri beach lagoon, in a double room instead of a dorm! Luxury! The beach is the nicest on the island and the lagoon is really blue and overlooks two other tiny islands. Our first day was overcast but for the rest of the week we had lovely weather so we spent a quite a [View Full Entry]

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Arriving back in the busy capital came as quite a shock after being stranded on a tropical island for a few days! We had a look around the city but it's not particularly nice and it was way too hot. Later on we met up with one of our friends from the Coral Coast for dinner and went to a japanese restaurant - very nice! Then went for a few drinks in the city. The next morning we left Suva and went to Pacific Harbour where I looked around the art's centre...Olly was in a slightly more daring mood so [View Full Entry]

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We got a bus to the capital, Suva, and then another bus to a little harbour where we travelled to Caqalai (pronounced 'Thung-gulie') which is a teeny tiny coral island in the Lomaviti group. It took 10 mins to walk round the entire island! A couple that we made friends with at the Beach House were there too, and about 6 other guests. It was a real tropical paradise island. We stayed in a nice little hut with no electricity. On our first morning the locals took us accross on the boat to a bigger island (with 20 inhabitants!) and [View Full Entry]

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Bula from Fiji!! After being greeted at the airport by a Fijian band playing traditional music we stayed in Nadi for the first night. The next day we got a bus along the coast to 'The Beachouse', where we stayed seven nights. Its the place where ITV filmed Celebrity Love Island - it was great. The weather was not great for most of our time there but the last two days were nice and sunny. most of the other people there were English because everyone wanted to live the Celebrity Luuuuurve Island dream. LOL. There was loads to do there [View Full Entry]

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When we got back to Auckland we were too lazy to cook so we drove to Mount Eden, had a chinese and got a great night view of the city from the top of the mountain. Over the next few days we saw most of Auckland and ate so much good food! Loads of sushi, chinese, and malaysian. We went to a brilliant comedy night while we were here. We were seated so didn't get a choice in where we sat - we were put RIGHT at the front. We had to go up on stage and were used in [View Full Entry]

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After a day back in Auckland we hired a car and headed off on a road trip. Day 1 Our first stop was the Coromandel Peninsula, about 3 hours from Auckland. After having lunch at Coromandel Town we headed for Mercury Bay. Our hostel was lovely and overlooked the gorgeous bay. We went on a walk along the beach to the harbour before the sunset. Day 2 The next morning we headed down the road to Hahei beach and then went on a walk to the stunning Cathedral Cove where there are some awesome rock formations, the main one being [View Full Entry]

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Back to the North Island! We stayed in Wellie for a night before heading up to National Park...where the weather went from hot and sunny to cold and rainy! National Park is a small place and is much busier during ski season. It's surrounded by misty mountains, active volcanoes, and a lot of cloud. As there's not even a proper shop there we were pretty glad we were only staying for a couple of days! Our reason for being in National Park was so that we could go to the nearby Tongariro Crossing, said to be the best one-day walk [View Full Entry]

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Abel Tasman National Park Australasia » New Zealand » South Island » Abel Tasman By Globetrotters Independent Traders March 26th 2007 Olly Farrow and Charlotte Browne We couldn't g [View Full Entry]

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Not much to report since our Franz Josef adventures. We travelled up to Nelson to look for work but there wasn't much going in Nelson City itself, so we got the bus an hour up the road to Motueka. Its a nice little town right on the coast and its the heart of the apple, pear and kiwi fruit growing region. Orchards rely on backpackers to harvest the fruit so finding a job was easy (no reference required!). We started out picking pears. Working in the fresh air, hearing the birds and catching some sun while earning some cash - [View Full Entry]

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