17th February 2011 We awoke to the noise of the bloody cockerel again this morning - we may have been converted to early rising but this was taking the biscuit. So we went to the toilet and went back to bed until a sensible hour. When we awoke again it was approaching 9am which is very late for us but the lack of aircon means that we don't sleep very well, and as such awake feeling like its bedtime. Only our own sheer force of will gets us out of bed at all. I had some leftovers and we then tried to make a plan for the day. We had both decided that we wanted to get out of this hostel as it is the pits, but with super expensive and unreliable wifi, we would ... read more

16 February 2011 Our time in New Zealand had come to and end, we were Paualess and had once again set our alarm to an hour suitable to ensure that we would not have a rush on to get to the aiport. Unusually, we both slept for the night. It is quite usual when we know that we have to be at an airport in the morning that one or both of us can neither get to sleep or stay asleep. I say this with one slight qulalification. I did sleep but, courtesy of Inception I had rather lurid dreams which involved one of Gregg's colleagues storming out of her job among other things. For the sake of his sanity upon returning to work, I seriously hope that there was no premonitionary quality to that ... read more

12 February 2011 The sunrise was stunning and I wanted to stay but we hadn't booked another night in Raglan. I think we were both more than a little sad to be moving on but, if we were to head North, we needed to move this morning. We had been lucky enough at Solspace to have access to a fridge so the cool box (or 'chilly bin' as they call them here) had been redundant for a few days. This necessitated a quick stop at the supermarket in town for a bag of ice before we got on our way. We had been advised that that is the best way to keep the contents of the cool box cool and it does work pretty efficiently. However, and that is a big however, you also have ... read more

8 February 2011 We would have liked to linger a little longer in Taupo however we have a plan and that involved once again moving on. Today we were headed in the direction of the Bay of Plenty (named by Captain Cook who, apparently, noticed how abundant the local area was) where we planned to stay at one of two DOC campsites that we had pinpointed. First stop however was Rotorua. Because we both have a childish sense of humour, we were quite some distance from the town when we both started asking if the other could smell rotten eggs. Rotten eggs? Well, Rotorua is home to the most active geothermal area in New Zealand. Think hot springs, geysers, mud pools and sulphur - giving the air that unmistakable tang of rotten eggs. It is ... read more

4 February 2011 This morning was pencilled in as one for a lie in since we had Nelson in our sights for tonight's stop and we knew that it was just under 100km away (a helpful sign just across of the road from the campsite told us that) - there was therefore no hurry to get moving in the morning. The trouble was that our bodies seem to rather like early rises and we were therefore awake at the usual time of 6.30am. Since we weren't in a rush, we executed a leisurely morning tea routine, probably played a couple of hands of Monopoly Deal and then set out on our way. I dimly recalled that, as I was drifting off to sleep last night, Gregg said something about how wonderful it would be if ... read more