New Zealand Week 1 19/10 - 27/10

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It's official - we're on the other side of the world!! 12 hour time difference and the furthest we've ever been away from home.



After our pretty seamless flight from Indonesia and our obligatory McDonald's from our favourite airport, Kuala Lumpur, we arrived in Auckland. We immediately noticed the air was soooooo much fresher than any of the places we've been too. It was a lovely spring sunny evening. It should also be noted at this point in the blog - our lungs are having a double holiday as we have stopped smoking!



We eventually got to the hostel 'Silverfern'. DO NOT EVER STAY HERE. It was horrible. More like a squat/AA meeting area. The dorms stank of all sorts and most horrifying for us was that it was the most expensive place to date we've stayed at. Auckland itself was a refreshing sight. Cars that adhered to the road rules, pavements were intact, nobody shouting at us for our money. However despite all of our home comforts we felt thoroughly out of our depth. The prices were astronomical compared to what we were used to, we had to actually follow the proper rules about things - not to mention it was chilly (even with all of our winter clothes on). Also playing on our minds was the dire need of getting a campervan ASAP to start living in and as a mode of transport.



After our first night at the hell hole of our hostel, we headed to 'Auckland Campervans'. It was a train ride and a bit of a walk away and when we arrived we were greeted by a German lad 'Willy' who was working there whilst travelling himself and the owner 'Lucky'. He optimised the stereotype of a car salesman. We searched around the different vans and we already decided that we needed a self contained van so we have more options of staying in different places and also for free.

We found a van for $5900. A petrol 1992 self contained Toyota Estima with 250,000km under its belt. Let's just say it has some character! After a test drive and stealing (acquiring) various camping gear from other vans whilst Lucky and Willy weren't looking we were proud owners of a Campervan! We picked it up after it had a final once over and it's WOF (MOT) was done the following day. That meant one more shitty night at the hostel. We went out for celebratory beers that night. We really fancied a dark ale as we haven't had anything like this since leaving Sheffield. We skipped to the best ale bar in town, ordered the darkest thing we could - then they asked for ID! Ah - problem. This never happened in Asia. We had to walk the 20 minutes back to the hell hole, picked up our driving licences and then powered it back to the pub. Unfortunately UK driving licences do not qualify as a form of ID in New Zealand, only passports - DAMN. Luckily the lad serving us was English and took pity on us as we'd already been an gone, even though it was kind of his fault as he didn't specify this the first time, so we managed to get served. Safe to say 3 ales down each we were feeling pretty merry about the whole thing.



The next morning we scarpered out of the hell hole and into our van - who will now be referred to as the Mothership in remembrance of our mushroom trip on Gili where we felt we were stranded on our mothership in space. We immediately headed for the cheapest supermarket 'Pak N Save' and stocked up. Our meal plans consist of Rice, pasta, baked beans, pasta sauce, bread, peanut butter, porridge..... carbs carbs and more carbs - we need to build up an insulation layer! We also tried to refuel here unsuccessfully. It turns out our bank cards can only be used at ATMs and not anywhere else like a card only fuel pump (of which there are many and low and behold the cheapest). So we trundled off to our first site and first night in the van.



It was a beautiful scenic farm with pigs, chickens and turkeys. We parked up, spoke to some other English campers who helped us out with phoning the council to pay $8 each to stay. One the lads was a bit of a cooky character, he didn't believe in wearing shoes and after coming home from Australia last year he couldn't sleep indoors because of the sound vibrations so pulled his mattress into his garden and slept there......fair enough. Our first nights sleep was great. Loads of space and really warm and waking up in the middle of the mountains on a farm wasn't bad either.



The next few days we spent trying to find our feet. Spent some time at visitor centres finding out what we could and couldn't do when camping, where to visit, cheap camping shops, clothes shops etc.... Char was very pleased when she found a jumper for 50 cent (25p) in a charity shop which she preceded to wear every day since. We should also mention that it hadn't stopped raining since arriving which definitely took some getting used to. After transitioning into Kiwi life we headed north to The Bay of Islands. It was really beautiful but don't think we saw it in its best light as the weather was awful and couldn't really appreciate it. Still we did go on one 5k walk in Waitiangi through the forest to a cafe and back. On this walk we could really see how beautiful and abundant the wildlife is here. So many birds, insects and really cute field mice. We stayed in one campsite in the forest and were very excited as there were showers. Which was bloody freezing and gave Char a brain freeze just by washing her hair.



We went on one great walk in the Coromandel peninsula. "Don't take the water" Char said, "it'll only be a quick one". So we set off in our jeans, jumpers and trainers. It turned out to be one of the most challenging short walks of our lives, but one of, if not THE best walks of our lives. It started off up a massive incline through the jungle and didn't really stop. We went through dense jungle (rivals any Asian jungle we've been in). Wildlife everywhere you looked and once we reached the summit the view of the bay below was spectacular. Then the real work started getting down. We followed a small stream, where Char found some fresh water Crayfish, and then followed it all the way down until it was a cascading river where the water was fresh for drinking. We hopped over the rapids regularly, with or without rope, we came across old gold mine shafts that seemingly appeared out of nowhere but neither of us were brave enough to go in - we've seen too many horror movies and know how that would turn out. Due to the 2 and a half hours spent in there we were beginning to fall in love with this country. AND on another plus note we were still fit enough to do it quicker than the stated time (Asia hadn't ruined our bodies).



After a few days here we headed for Coromandel in the northeast. The peninsula was more of what we were expecting from NZ. The mountains and forests were vast and amazing. The weather was picking up and there was so much space just begging to be explored. Unfortunately, this is where the problems started. We'd noticed for a few days that the Mothership was not feeling as powerful as it had been. We'd had to jump start it a few times but wondered whether that was our fault with leaving things plugged in with the engine off. We were driving on a beautiful coastal road, full of hills and steep bends when Char saw all of the lights on the dash coming on every time she touched the brake......hmmm strange.... There was nowhere to pull over and we'd got a bit of a backlog of traffic behind us so had no choice but to carry on chugging along up the mountains. Then the wind screen wipers started struggling and then all of a sudden Char lost power steering. She stamped on the brakes pulling over with Jack trying and failing to put the hazards on - the Mothership had died.



We had no choice but to leave the van on the side of the road and hitch a ride into Coromandel about 5k away. We went into several garages and spoke to various people who were very unhelpful and 'too busy'. Our last hope was with a local auto electrician a bit of a walk out of town. We trotted off and found "Don" who is the complete saviour of this story. Praise the lord for Don! He must have been in his early 70s, had a farm literally as far as the eye could see. Boats, quads, tractors, planes, sheep, a mansion on top of a hill - he had life sussed. He admitted he was 'pretty happy here'. He drove up to our dead van. Replaced the battery, drove back to his workshop and soon realised the alternator was buggered. After some conversation and thinking we decided to have Don charge our battery over night and he was nice enough to let us stay at his farm (which was beautiful) for free in the van. Got up nice and early the next day, replaced our now fully charged battery and Don only wanted $50! Fortunately the dealer we got the van from gave us a 1 month warranty so we decided to drive the 2 and a bit hours back to Auckland so he could replace the alternator for free. All in all we came out pretty unscathed and could have been a lot worse!



Let's hope it was just one weeks teething problems!

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