Arriving in New Zealand

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Saturday 1st Feb
Left Pomonol and headed for Arrarat which was a small pleasant looking town and made our way onto Ballarrat which is a city with wide streets not a lot of traffic, some lovely buildings and a tourist information centre that was difficult to find. We only had a few hours to spare so could not do the whole ‘Eureka gold rush’ experience. Instead after lunch we headed out to look at a couple of the original gold rush towns, Creswick and Clunes. We stopped in Clunes first and had a wander round, sleepy, a bit like the wild west towns in films then went into the museum which for the size of the town was excellent]. It had lots of info of the gold rush times and artifacts used and lots of old photos one of a Joe Foley [killed in the 1st WW that was the spit of Steve, uncanny! We then went to Creswick and into the information centre as we had seen on one of the tourist maps a Taits cottage. It turned out it was a B & B but was called Taits cottage because of John Tait, originally a ship builder from the Clyde. He became a well known business man, beer, grocers and finally gold.
Sunday 2nd Feb NZ Auckland
Had lunch up the sky tower the highest building in the southern hemisphere and the highest place you can bungee jump from - no we did’nt. It was a revolving level so we got a really good look at the city and surrounding areas and islands and there were an amazing amount of inactive volcano’s. Looked round the quay side area and then headed back to the airport for our flight up to the Bay of Islands.
We got there a bit early so settled down to read and have a cuppa. Our names were called over the tannoy, Steve went to investigate . Our friend Paula who lives in Wellington, was just entering the airport on her way back home and heard our names called out! So we had a lovely unexpected chat with her before she had to catch her flight to Wellington. Got on a small plane for the half hour trip to B of I. And arrived to see Ann and Pete waiting for us as we stepped off the plane, lovely to see them. Great evening catching up over a lovely meal and great NZ wine.
Monday 3rd Feb
Awoke to a dull day but it quickly transformed into a glorious one. Ann took us to the east coast Went up the east coast to Have a quick look at Mangonui , Cooper & Cable beach, all stunningly beautiful. Went to have a look at Ann & Petes new bach really lovely with fantastic views. Had lunch at KeriKeri Vineyard overlooking kerikeri beach. Ann then took us to Matai for a swim and a body surf! The sea was the most fantastic turquoise colour.
After tea we went for a walk to a local Pa overlooking the local inlet. Beautiful skies and sunsets and stars.

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