End of Kiwi Experience...

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Monday morning we were picked up at 9:20am, and we had the best bus driver Steve again. We drove along the coast for a while, and took lots of photos as it was really pretty. We saw a colony of seals on the way to Picton, and we stopped there to take a couple of photos.

When we got to Picton, we checked our bags in and went upstairs and watched Steve playing a hunting video game while we were waiting to be able to board the ship. We had to wait about 30 minutes for boarding to begin, but we were sat in the sun, so it was nice! When we did get on board, we headed straight for the cafe, and got lunch. We read our books, and I did some crosswords while we were travelling across the Cook Strait. It took around 3 hours to get across, and by the time we got to our hostel in Wellington it was 5pm.

We went to the supermarket, and got some milk, shampoo and mince. We went back to the hostel, and after having showers, we cooked ourselves rice bolognese! It was really yummy. We then gave into temptation and bought chocolate bars and ate them for pudding while making a crazy video with my camera!

Tuesday morning started off when we were picked up at 8am and we headed out to a place called Bulls. It is an interesting little town.... Each of the shops and things in the town has a saying to go with it. Eg. Police station - Const-a-bulls, real estate agent - Live-a-bull. We had quite a bit of a drive to get to Taupo, so not much happened in the afternoon.

When we got to Taupo, we went to the airport, and tried to do some skydiving, but unfortunately it was too windy to jump, but we were booked in for 7am the next morning. We then visited Huka Falls again, and spent about 20 minutes there and had a little wander along the walking track. We were then dropped at our hostel - Urban Retreat.

We went out for dinner as it was our last night of travelling on this whole trip. :-( We had a HUGE meal! We had garlic bread for starters, Mel had spaghetti bolognese and I had spaghetti carbonara for mains, and Mel had a berry cheescake and I had Brandy snaps for dessert. It was delicious. We had to go for a walk down to the lake afterwards as we were SO full!

This morning we got up at 6:20am, and at 6:40am I phoned the skydiving people to check whether they were going to jump. The lady said that they were going to try and jump people, so the minibus arrived at 6:50, and we were driven out to the airport. We were waiting for the first three people to jump, but unfortunately the wind picked up, and they stopped anyone jumping. So, we were taken back to the hostel, and just had time to have a hot chocolate and cup of tea before we caught the Kiwi Bus to Auckland.

We stopped at Rotorua to pick up and drop off a couple of people, and we caught up with our friend Kevin again which was nice! We also stopped at a pie shop in Rotorua and I had the most delicious steak and onion pie!

On the way through to Auckland we stopped at Matamata (home of Lord of the Rings) again, and Mel and I got a Subway for lunch. After Matamata we drove straight through to Auckland, arriving at about 4pm. Ranee and Ellen came to pick us up, and when we got back to Ranee and Billy's house, we packed our backpacks ready to leave, and then had a lovely pasta bake for dinner.

Now we have been looking through all of our photos from the last 3 months, and it is really nice to see all of the things that we have done, and all of the places that we have seen. Mel has just been lovely and made me a cup of tea, so I am going to drink that, and then I think I will go to bed.... It is a lovely comfortable bed, so I should get a really good nights sleep.

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