After an incredible year in Australia, the time had come for us to be kicked out of the country and start our long trip home. Putting off the inevitable England return for as long as possible, we’ve planned a two month trip of New Zealand and Fiji.
We finished work on the Friday, said our goodbyes to friends and packed up our lives once again ready to board a flight Sunday morning to Auckland. It was an emotional end! After many recommendations from friends we booked a hop on hop off pass with Kiwi Experience that will take us to see the highlights of both the north and south islands over our five week stay. The bus is a standard hop on hop off bus, with a slight tour bus edge. They book all your accommodation and activities for you so you’re spending a lot of time with the same people, but you are free to do as you please and to whatever timescale. We have five weeks and it’s going to be a slight rush to fit everything in!
After just twelve hours in Auckland, we boarded the big green bus to our first destination, Hot Water Beach where we would spend just one night. Boy it was raining and miserable! After an hour long walk getting completely drenched, we arrived at cathedral cove beach. We were meant to be doing one of the best kayak trips in New Zealand here, but it was cancelled due to the horrendous weather (phew!) the beach was lovely though and very scenic, just a shame it was too foggy to see all the islands that can normally be seen from the coast.
After that it was back to our very nice hostel to warm up, eat dinner and plan the next few days with our driver Lisa. Hot water beach is famous for one reason, at low tide you can go to the beach and dig holes in the sand where the geothermal waters bubble up through the sand creating a natural hot tub. Low tide was half 8 so we all headed to the beach in the dark, cold and rain with spades to dig holes. It’s amazing how it works, the water is boiling hot. Too hot to really enjoy the experience in a relaxing way! After twenty minutes or so we gave in to the cold and headed back to the hostel for some beers in the warmth.
Robyn - Flying The Nest 
Amazing scenery, although it looks a bit bleak with the bad weather.You have only just arrived and done so much already!xx
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Looks a bit grey, let’s hope it improves.
Nice bath time!
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