Returning To My Roots

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Geo: -36.8474, 174.766

Back to the motherland! This time we were going to visit the North Island. Anna hadn't been to the North Island and I hadn't been back in many years, so we found the perfect excuse to visit on route to a wedding in Melbourne.
One of the benefits was having various family members living all over the North Island so we were in for a treat.
We flew in to Auckland where we stayed at my uncles and aunties. After a much needed sleep, we tacked the next day by visiting the city. We went up the sky tower which gives amazing 360 degree views. We were lucky enough to use my aunties retro car and from the city went and visited Piha Beach which is a nice little beach tucked away to the west of Auckland.
We also took the car for a day trip around the Coromandel Peninsula. Both of us really enjoyed the area. We had a fantastic lunch in Coromandel Town and finished the day off by visiting Cathederal Cove and the Hot Water beach which unfortunately was very busy but quite a nice place.
The following day we headed in to town to pick up our campervan, our home for the next 10 days. We left to start our trip down south. Our first stop was Waitomo Caves where one of my cousins worked. We were very lucky to be able to do the Black Labyrinth tour at a price of $128 each for only a slab of beer.
The tour was great, we spent a few hours in a cave, following the trail of glow-worms and crawling through small holes. It was fantastic and a thank you goes out to my cousin.
Our next stop was going to be Rotorua and Taupo.

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