Our original plan was to travel a bit further towards Wellington today but the site we’d targeted was coastal and advertised itself with photographs of smiling children. Weekend, child friendly … no, maybe not. It’s about 300kms to Wellington so…

[Blast, that title’s given me the most dreadful John Bloody Denver earworm.] Continuing our journey south towards Wellington and a ferry to South Island, today we were heading for the so-called Desert Road. The Desert Road is section of State…

A better morning. After yesterday’s cheapskate thermal experience around Rotorua itself, this morning we – well, Francine, planned to visit Waiotapu (or Wai-o-tapu) “Thermal Wonderland”. Hello tourism! The main attraction at Waiotapu is the Lady Knox Geyser which “goes off”…

We awoke to rain; sporadically heavy rain. Up ‘til now our weather has been beautiful. Well, it is green here and it is spring. There’s a huge open cast gold mine in the area that Francine fancied a look at…

We’d survived our first ever night in a camper van. Getting up in the  morning felt considerably better than had going to bed last night. It’s wonderful what a night’s rest can do. Things may be better than we at…

We awoke after half a night’s sleep, having arrived at 01:30. It also took me ages to get to sleep. The room and bed were perfectly comfortable but I just seemed to wake up. The coffee at breakfast couldn’t have…

Our flight to New Zealand would be at 19:00 this evening. The rental car, complete with Strine Satnav, was due back at around 15:00. Given the 30-minute drive to the airport (theoretically), filling up with fuel then searching for the…