Advertisement
Published: December 19th 2006
Just realised that I haven't updated this for a while, so here's what we've been upto:
After our skydiving experience we headed up to Whakatane (via another geothermal valley) where we stayed with some more of my relatives for a few days. We had a great time there, got treated to BBQ's, beer and a lovely bed (made a nice change from sleeping in the van!). while we were there we made a trip back to Rotorua (where I made the most of the shops and bought some nice summery clothes) and spend a day driving up the coast which had beautiful scenery. we also got our van looked over and taught how to do some basic checks on it by my mum's cousin, which have proved to be very useful. We also experienced our 1st earthquake (measuring 5.1 on the richter scale) which was quite exciting, although I was asleep at the time so got woken up by it, Jack on the other hand felt the house move slightly.
From there we drove through the gorge to Gisborne. The day we arrived it was lovely and hot, so we managed to have a quick swim in the sea.
The weekend however turned wet and windy, so we didn't do much more than wander about the town. (This caused me to decide to dye my hair blonde (done by Jack) which ended in disaster (yellowness) and meant I couldn't leave the van until Monday morning when it could be saved by a hairdreser). We then went and stayed with some more of my relatives who very kindly showed took us out for meals and showed us beaches near them and the surfers surfing in the sea. We also met both their sons and visited one of their farms. The farm was huge!! It's really away from everything, but by far one of the most interesting things I've seen this holiday. We got a tour of the farm, the sheep sheds (although unfortunately it wasn't sheep-shearing time of year) and went around the farm on the quadbike to watch the cows being herded around fields.
we originally planned to look for work in Gisborne, but after a few days we decided to move on and tried to look for some in Napier. Most of the jobs there turned out to be more pruning, so again we decided to leave!
Napier is a lovely town though, it was flattened during an earthquake in the 1931 and all the buildings were rebuilt in artdeco style, so all very picturesque. We also visited the aquarium there and watched another christmas parade!
We're now in Havelock North which is just 30mins south of Napier and staying with some more relatives, and are planning on spending christmas here with the family (think there's about 25 people going!). It means we're getting a bed at the moment, and then free camping on family orchards after! and weather permitting we may be picking cherries for a few days this week for my grannies cousins son, or his friend, which should be good.
We're next planning on moving down south, possibly to Wellington for new years, then onto South Island from there.
Hope you all have a good christmas!
xx
Advertisement
Tot: 0.127s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 13; qc: 60; dbt: 0.0859s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
anonymous
non-member comment
Kate that is the best photo i have ever seen"!!!! I lvoe it.....wel besides the skydiving ones! Your hair is soooooo funny but i reckon its cool anyways y u change it back!!!??????? Plus the yellowness makes ur tan really obviously....nearly orange my wee darling! HEHEHE love you MWAH love Rhi xxx