Lake Taupo and Wellington - North Island Picton, Nelson and Abel Tasman National Park - South Island 1. Hiking on the Trails in New Zealand -Guess what side of the trail the New Zealanders and Aussies walk on. Well the left side since they drive on the left side of the road in their cars. When we got on the trail I told Rhea to stay left when meeting someone on the trail. This got somewhat complicated as so many Europeans were walking on that same side coming towards us since they drive on the opposite side of the road than [View Full Entry]

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Napier 11-4-09 - Wednesday we arrived late afternoon in Napier on the East Coast of New Zealand’s North Island. Without a doubt, Napier is one of the loveliest cities we’ve been to since landing in New Zealand. We had Jeannie’s address and since she lived atop Lighthouse Road …. well we figured to find our way to the highest point in the city, close to the edge of the of the bluff and we should find her house. Sure enough we worked our way to the highest point and we finally found Lighthouse Road where she lives. Her daughter Emma greeted [View Full Entry]

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10-25-09 - Sunday afternoon we departed Auckland heading south and then east to the very popular and beautiful Coromandel Peninsula. The Peninsula is due east of Auckland separated only by the Hauraki Gulf. The peninsula starts southeast of Auckland but juts out into the Pacific well north of Auckland. We’re hoping to see Auckland at night from the peninsula. This area we have been told has some of the finest and whitest sand beaches on the North Island. So we’re off to find out the truth and fiction of this well promoted vacation area. Hey we also got our first phon [View Full Entry]

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Bay of Plenty, Rotorua, East Cape, and Gisborne - See Map for Details 10-29-09 - Thursday afternoon we were on the road towards Rotorua just south of the Bay of Plenty. The Bay of Plenty is a half moon shape portion of the North Island of New Zealand that was named by Captain James Cook. He must have had some vision about this area because several hundred years later it is possibly the largest fruit & vegetable growing area of the country. Avacados, Kiwi Fruit, Oranges and much more is harvested here and shipped to all corners of the Earth. We [View Full Entry]

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Day 5 - 11: Northland, Bay of Islands & Far North Region - New Zealand 10-19-09 - Monday morning found us finally departing Auckland for the region referred to as the Northland. Vehicle traffic became much less the further north we moved away for Auckland - thank goodness as learning to drive on the left side in busy Auckland was stressful and everyone was in a hurry while we were not. North out of Auckland is Highway 1 and smaller roads off Hwy. 1 would carry us to some very remote areas along the NZ east coast. One of our first [View Full Entry]

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Kia Ora (Greetings) from Auckland, New Zealand - We arrived in Auckland - City of Sails, on Thursday (10-15-09) at 12:10pm. The last two times I was here it was sunny and beautiful. We arrived in overcast skis and light rain but it was a great view as we dropped below the clouds to see this city that is surrounded by water, sailboats and volcanos. Auckland is situated among 49 volcanos - all at this time dormant - hope it stays that way for awhile. It took us 1 ½ hours to get out of the airport because of customs, and [View Full Entry]

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Hello Family & Friends - We are only a day out from departing Jackson to Los Angeles then to Auckland, New Zealand. Bags are packed and we believe we're ready for a new adventure. If you know someone who might be interested in viewing our travel blog, send them an e-mail with our site attached and have them "subscribe" to our blog. We'll try to make the site interesting with plenty of photos and perhaps a video from time to time. We've had several people asking us about the gear we'll be taking on this trip. So we made a few [View Full Entry]

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These are the tents we'll be taking with us to New Zealand in October. The North Face Tadpole is a 2-person backpacking tent we'll be using on the numerous backpacking trips in New Zealand. The tent weighs 5 pounds and is a great backpacking tent. This is a 16 year old tent with a brand new fly (thanks North Face!). The Sierra Designs Tiros 2 is a 2-person 4 season tent. We'll use the Tiros the majority of the time in New Zealand while car camping. The tent weighs 10 pounds, sets up fairly easy and is absolutely bomb proof. It [View Full Entry]

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Hello to everyone who is viewing our travel site. This travel journal is about the planning and preparation for and the 14-week journey to New Zealand in the South Pacific during October 2009 to January 2010. We were flying into Samoa for 10 days to see these two islands (Upolu & Savaii, but the recent tsunami that hit Samoa, American Samoa and Tonga forced us to make changes to our travels. Rhea and I have retired temporarily from our full time jobs in Mississippi and are exploring this beautiful area of the world. This is her first trip to New Zealand [View Full Entry]

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