Road Tripping

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So I drove south with a heavy heart after saying goodbye to the fantastic people I met at Koru Creek. I arrived back at Tranquil Heights in time for lunch and enjoyed a night of sheer luxury and great company. The next morning I went into Warkworth to meet Wendy’s cousin, Sarah a great girl who had been a Shepard in the south island and had so many stories to tell. I ended up staying the night with her in Matakana where she took me on a tour of all the hidden pleasures of the local area. The next morning I headed off to the Coromandel along the coastal roads. In New Zealand it’s hard to concentrate on the road when there is so much beauty around. After staying the night in a lovely hostel I drove around the peninsular taking in the breath taking scenery of vast green hills and water so blue it looked as though an artist had just finished painting it. On the way back my bubble burst, well the front tyre of the car at least. Just as I began to fix it a local guy stopped to help, he was the train driver for the local scenic route and offered me a place on the morning train. Thanking him I left and returned to the hostel to rest my weary bones. The next morning before leaving I went on the toy train through the hills to the most fantastic view over the peninsular.
I said my goodbyes and carried on further south to the bizarre town of Tirau which has a gift shop fashioned out of a corrugated iron sheep. The information centre next door was a sheep dog being watched over by his Shepard, thoroughly entertaining. However, as I got there at 4:30 pm everything was closing so I took a few snaps and carried on to Rotorua. Now I know the books say this is a wonderful place and perhaps I needed to look a bit deeper for it's natural beauty but I still regard this place as the arsehole of New Zealand. The whole town has a heavy sulphur smell which unfortunately smells like rotten eggs, has no soul but thousands of grockels and has more gambling dens than Las Vegas, no wonder it’s dubbed RotoVegas. However, I did meet an English guy and an Iranian girl who somehow managed to convince me that climbing the Tongariro crossing was a great idea.
We planned to do it in 3 days time so rather than attempt to higher my fitness levels I got in the car and drove to Napier instead. Here I met up with Raffaella, the Italian wwoofer I met at Tranquil Heights. We ended up camping on the beach after having a BBQ and huge bonfire. I went to sleep with the sound of the waves crashing and the smell of fresh sea air. The next morning I went into Napier which is a quaint town. It was destroyed by an earthquake in the 30’s and was completely rebuilt in the style of Art Deco, giving it a quirky edge.
The next day I drove to Turangi to attempt the 18 kilometre walk over the mountain pass, I hope I’ve not bitten off more than I can chew with my lazy, unfit body.

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