Auckland, New Zealand

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Today we drove the pacific coast highway from Wakatone and stopped to play in the sand and surf. The waves were powerful and we underestimated them a few times. I tried to get close for pictures and ended up getting hit by the wave and it REALLY wanted me to come for a swim. It was so hard to stand upright! We both got so soaked we had to change our clothes.

We shopped in Tauranga and drove through Kiwi Country, the Kiwi capital of the world. We stopped at a roadside stand and bought a bag of kiwi for a dollar (60 cents American)! At Karangahake gorge we got out and walked across 2 suspension bridges. I climbed the remains of a gold-mining plant. At one point my mom said, “oh you can’t climb that” and for those of you who know me really well…you know I especially had to then. We stopped for ice cream for the first time on this trip, today. New Zealanders like their ice cream servings LARGE!! I saw a girl with a cone that had two ice cream cones attached to each other (looked like a W) and each side had 4 scoops of ice cream in it!!! We each got one scoop and we were completely fine with that.

When we got to Auckland, we had a hell of a time finding Devenport. We drove wayyyyy out of the way, asked for directions, of course the gas station attendant didn’t speak much English, etc. But we finally found it and then we walked in to town to get something for dinner. The B&B advertised a 5-minute walk to town, well I don’t know who can walk THAT fast, because we were basically speed walking in the dark and it took us almost 20 minutes to get there!! When we got back we each opened a bottle of wine and we drank and watched Bones on TV.

Ashley

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Photos

gold-mining plant
where's Waldo?