Our introduction to the North Island

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Well - after a wonderful one night stay in Christchurch at the Randolph Motel (highly recommend it!) - we arrived at Christchurch airport around 8.30am ready for our flight to Aukland at 9.40am. Check in was a breeze - all automated so it prints your luggage labels and boarding passes... however they are still experiencing teething problems with the conveyors - and it was a bit slow to get rid of the bags....

Flight took around an hour - and was a little bumpy after take-off and before landing due to strong side-winds of approx 120-140km/hr.... still not as bad as our initial landing in Christchurch!

Mum was a little disappointed that she failed to set off the security alarms - so yet again has not been frisked by a "nice young NZ man"... however I can already hear the cogs whirring for what she can do to sabotage the alarms for our outward trip when we leave NZ... which is a bit of a worry for me....

We collected the car (which has seen better days although is getting is around just fine - and has air-con which is much needed as the weather is 28-30 (if not more) and bright sunshine.

We took the decision to head to the west coast - and had been told that Raglan was internationally recognised for its surf. Thinking it would be a good place to relax and enjoy the scenery for a couple of days - we headed straight their from the airport (after negotiating the various poorly signed roads escaping from the car-hire office)... Approx 3 hours later we arrived in a very small town - and attempted to find some accomodation. We managed to find a motel type unit at a local dairy (shop). Both the accomodation and the location were somewhat disappointing... very basic, an uneasy feeling and not as welcoming as the South Island... so after taking some pics this morning (to follow later) we hit the road again.....

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Comments

[Sarahq]

The Weather
Please no more comments about the need for air con!!!