New Zealand

---

1.12.11

Arrived early morning into Aukland at 4 o'clock and jumped straight on the kiwi experience bus. We travelled up to the Bay of Islands driving through scenic countryside with hundreds of cows. The driver guide was your typical kiwi with all the bad jokes. Sweet as bro, get amongst it and cool narnas finished every sentence. We checked into our first hostel in Paihia my first taste of shared dorms. What a first time experience it was, we were stuck with 4 Germans who must have lived there as all their stuff was thrown all over. It was a bit intimidating and wasn't awkward at all! It was a bit of a shock to be in bunk beds but im sure ill get used to it as its all part of backpacking. We went for a walk along the beach with some people from the bus and ate our first pie of the trip, it was de-lish. It was so good to be able to communicate, read the menu's, ask questions and have some normal food! It took Sophie a while to stop saying gracias to English speaking New Zealanders! oh and hola to everyone!

2.12.11

Morning boat trip around the bay of islands to try spot some dolphins. The weather wasn't too bad, on and off sunshine. We only had 4 hours in total and it had already been 2 hours and still no sign. Sophie kept thinking birds were dolphins and kept giving false alarms. She gave up after the third time. We got a call through that some have been spotted so we headed straight for them. It was a huge pod about 30 in total! The guide said that they have never seen so many together before and that were new dolphins to the bay. There were playing, jumping and swimming around the boat. They are bottle nose dolphins and bigger than you think. We lay down at the bow (the front) of the boat with the dolphins coming up for air inches from our faces! We then had the chance to swim with them. Only a couple of boats have licence to swim with them and the guides had to check there were no calfs with them as it would have been dangerous to get in the water. We got our snorkel and flippers on and jumped off the back of the boat in the middle of all the dolphins. It was amazing we were surrounded by them and they where coming really close and having a nosey. They where arms length away swimming underneath us playing with each other and you could hear them communicating with each other. I tried to keep up with them swimming alongside them but they were going to quick. It was definately worth the 50 quid! Sophie made me some lunch back at the hostel then we waited for the bus back to Aukland. M x

---