On the Sunday after getting back from New Zealand, we decided to go into the city to take a look at the art festival This is Not Art, also known as TiNA, as well as go to the beach and meet up with a few friends.
Gustav at The Lock-Up
Our first stop was The Lock-Up, which used to be a jail but has in recent years been turned into a gallery. In many of the rooms and cells, there were art installations part of TiNA. There was also information about how the prison had been used before. It was striking to look into the isolation cell covered with thick layers of isolation on the walls and on the door with leather as the utmost material.
A single screen showing a video as part of This is Not ArtArt installation from This is Not Art
A few of the art installations were quite flashy and used bright neon colours in excess. Many of them were also made up in part or as a whole of video, like one piece that showed scenes of men shaving or being shaved from different movies.
Nutella milkshake at Three Bears Kitchen
After our visit to The Lock-Up, we went to Three Bears Kitchen where we ate lunch and Gustav also had a Nutella milkshake. We continued from there to Nobby’s Beach where we met up with our German friends Sil Ja, Nadine, and Svenja. We took a spot at the beach beyond Nobby’s Head and put our towels there. The German girls only wanted to sunbathe, but we wanted to go into the water, which we did. It was nice. The water wasn’t very warm, but since the air was so hot, it didn’t really matter.
Gustav at Nobby’s Beach
We stayed at Nobby’s for almost two hours. The five of us then went to Six Degrees, a restaurant located at the Queen Wharf and the Queen Wharf Tower. We ordered coffees and smoothies. The waiter unfortunately messed up Linnea’s and Sil Ja’s order, but at least the smoothies were good.
After finishing our beverages, we headed to the bus and went back home.
We started our Tuesday by skyping with Gustav’s parents, which was Monday evening for them in Sweden. After the Skype call, we went up to the dining room where Latimer served us breakfast.
We had two choices of getting croissants or toasts and flavoured yogurt or natural yogurt. We went with croissants and had an array of marmalades to choose from. At breakfast, we shared the table with one of the other house guests that were staying with Latimer. He was a German guy called Flo who was traveling around the world one country at a time. He had been on long stays in both India and Australia previously and was going to the U.S. after New Zealand. To finance his travels, he was doing freelance web development and programming.
Together, Flo, Latimer, and we discussed a bit of everything. Politics, cultures, and travels. It was very nice, and we had breakfast for probably more than an hour.
After breakfast, we headed out towards the city centre. We were walking and had dressed according to the weather forecast, which turned out to be completely wrong. Instead of cold weather, winds, and rain, we got a day filled with sunshine. It was nice but would have been more pleasant if we had dressed for it.
Linnea and Auckland War Memorial Museum from one sideAuckland War Memorial Museum from the other side
Our first stop was the Auckland Domain, which is a big park close to the centre. We got a picture with the Auckland War Memorial Museum but decided on not going in. Instead, we had some fika and went for a walk in the park along a path called “Lover’s Walk.”
Flowers in the Auckland DomainA family of Mallards in the Auckland DomainA brook in the Auckland Domain along the Lover’s Walk
We continued towards the city centre. On our way, we walked past another campus of the University of Auckland and at this campus a lot of people were dressed in colourful capes with suits or dresses under. As we got to a park on the other side of the campus, it was packed with more people dressed like this. So, it seemed like there had been a graduation ceremony earlier and these were the graduates and their friends and families. We still don’t know what the different colours of the capes represented.
From the park, we went to the wharf, where we found a collection of shops similar to the Re:start mall in Christchurch. Although similar, there were fewer in Auckland but an interesting concept to have shops in containers. Among the shops, we found a sushi place with good deals. Seated at a nearby table, we rested our legs and ate our late lunch.
Our sushi lunchView from the wharfsSeagulls on the wharfs
We walked along the wharf past the harbour and got to Silo Park, which seemed to be another area they were replanning. This area playgrounds and basketballs courts amidst the old industrial silos and warehouses.
Silo Park
Next to this area was Auckland Fish Market located, Linnea thought that it would be interesting to check it out. After stepping in, she walked the ten meters straight through because the smell was too much.
From there we headed to the nearest bus stop as it was starting to get late. At the bus stop, we concluded that they didn’t seem to have the signaling system as in NSW (where you need to signal or wave to the bus driver for them to stop). But lo and behold, when our bus came it just ran past us because just that bus route required you to signal the driver. In their defense, in the last second before the bus ran past us we could read “please signal driver” on the bus itself (which seems like a stupid place to put that text). We weren’t the only ones annoyed by the bus drivers inability to stop, which was evident by the swear words uttered by one of the other persons at the bus stop.
Twenty minutes later, the next bus arrived, and this time we waved and flared with our arms like our ride home depended on it. The bus stopped, we paid and got seated. The bus had a display that showed the upcoming stops, a map, the weather, the latest news, and a few ads – unlike the displays on the buses in NSW that only shows the video feed from the cameras onboard the bus, which is quite useless.
The bus tour went well, and we got off at the right stop with just a hundred meters to walk to our accommodation. For dinner, we fried the last of our camping sausages and ate them with bread. We spent the evening packing our bags, talking to Latimer and just relaxing.
Our last day in New Zealand started much like the first one with a tasty breakfast and nice company. As our flight was leaving at 5 pm, we had some time to spend before going to the airport. Latimer was so kind to let us leave our bags there until we had to go because otherwise, the check out time was at 11 am.
We went out towards a nearby park called Cornwall Park and One Tree Hill, which is a small mountain located in the park that’s quite famous because of it giving the name to the TV series. On our way to the park, it started raining. We had brought umbrellas, but our shoes were the real problem as they were starting to get wet all the way into our socks.
Cows in Cornwall Park
In the park, there were both sheep and cows. Linnea wanted to pet a lamb, but none of them seemed to be too trusting of humans and started to run away as soon as she got near.
For the most part, there was a path for pedestrians along the road in the park, but when we got to the main road leading up One Tree Hill, there was no path for pedestrians. After walking a bit up the hill on the road, we decided to turn back because of our wet shoes, the lack of a path, and the weather (which also meant that the view from the summit would probably be limited).
An obelisk on top of One Tree Hill
Our next stop was a Chinese restaurant called Golden Jade. We ordered noodle dishes with veggies and chicken for Linnea, and pork for Gustav. It was alright, but it was pretty much bathing in a soup of broth.
Linnea’s lunch at Golden Jade
When we had eaten, we headed back to the house to get our bags and ordered an Uber to the airport. We got a really nice driver that took us on a smooth ride there even though there was some chaos on the highway. We ate some fika (before going through the security check), and checked in with Virgin Australia that was flying us back to Sydney.
Once again we had to fill out a card with information about why we were leaving the country, which was very similar to the form we had to fill out when leaving Australia to New Zealand. When it was filled out, we went through the security control without any problems.
Linnea and the duty-free shops at Auckland Airport
In the duty-free shop, we looked for something to spend our last New Zealand dollars on. We settled on New Zealand’s favorite brand of chocolate and 2 litres of liqueur (Bailey’s Irish Cream and Swedish Absolut Vodka, of course). After shopping, we headed to our gate, which was packed with people. But thankfully, we found two available seats where we could relax before having our rows called for boarding.
Our aeroplane from Auckland
For the first time, we were not seated directly next to each other but had the aisle between us. Gustav sat in the middle of a family of New Zealanders. They were a bit noisy and had the weird attitude of feeding their youngest child only candy and soda, even though they had pre-ordered food for all of them. But at least they offered us the child’s ordered dessert when he didn’t want it because he had already eaten two chocolate bars.
The flight was otherwise quite uneventful. We listened to audiobooks or podcasts. Gustav solved a sudoku puzzle in the in-flight magazine. Towards the end of the flight, we had to fill out yet another form. This time it was the same form we filled out going into Australia, so it was easy to fill out.
We landed in Sydney at 5:45 pm, so even though we flew at 5 pm and had flown for almost four hours it was almost the same time as when we left. (Yes, we know how time zones work, it’s just fascinating.)
We got through immigrations and customs easily, but we had brought back a few things that we were required to declare. We had boots that we had worn while hiking, seashells from the beach, and the book with the wooden cover that Linnea had bought. Since we knew about the strict rules, we had washed off our boots and the seashells before leaving New Zealand. The customs officer was very kind, and after hearing that we had cleaned our boots, he only asked to examine the seashells. After his inspection, we were free to leave and bring everything.
We went to the train to Central. When arriving at Central, the next train to Newcastle was the first for the evening to be affected by track maintenance. So, it would only go to Wyong and from where we would have to take a replacement bus.
We were quite tired already since our brains thought it was 9-10 pm. To top things off, the train didn’t arrive at the platform on Central. So everybody was called to go to another platform and get on the train there instead. Everybody was rushing, and it was hard to get ahead with our two big bags. But we managed to get on the train and get seats to sit. After a 15-minute wait, the announcer once again called out. This time he was announcing that the other train had arrived and that everybody should go to it instead.
At this point, we started to get quite annoyed with the circus which is public transport in NSW. Since everybody on the train only cared for their own skin, we were left last because of our bags. When we got to the other train it was completely packed, which wasn’t shocking since it was almost half as long as the other train and at this point, it had been collecting passengers for much longer than it usually does.
So because of this, we were only left with the space in the vestibule of one carriage. To top things off, in the cramped space, we were probably seven people, one of which probably was suffering from substance abuse since he was antagonizing all the other passengers. After a few stations, we hurried to the next vestibule in order to escape his antics.
From there on, it was calm and on the bus from Wyong, Gustav was nodding in and out of sleep. When we got to Hamilton, the last train to Waratah had already gone. Fortunately, the last bus towards Mayfield was just a few minutes away, so we hurried to the bus stop and managed to catch the bus.
We got home at 11 pm and were very tired since it was 2 am in our heads, so it was an easy thing to go to sleep.
We started our day by packing up our belongings from the storage compartments in the campervan into our bags and disassembled the bed, which we hadn’t done for the whole trip.
We left Keeley Reserve at 10:45 am with our only two goals to be at the Airbnb in Auckland at shortly after 1 pm and at latest be at the Apollo return location at 2:30 pm.
We drove for one hour, at which point we stopped to eat. Our lunch was only about 30 minutes, but it was long enough for our schedule to start going off plan. Our next stop was one hour later at a dump station to clear out the toilet waste cassette and to empty the grey water. We left the dump station at 1:30 pm and drove towards the Airbnb to drop off our belongings.
We arrived there at 1:50 pm and were greeted by our host Latimer and his cheerful dog Digger. After walking a few turns between the van and the house we had finally managed to get everything inside. When we drove off to Apollo, it was already 2:10 pm.
We had to be at Apollo at 2:30 pm. To top things off the traffic was dense and in turn driving there became a bit stressful. Because of the short time span, we skipped topping up on diesel as we thought it was more important to arrive there on time. Fortunately, when we arrived at Apollo, they commented that there was a diesel station right next to their lot. So, we filled up and returned our dear travel companion to Apollo without any remarks on its condition.
In total, we had driven 1478 kilometres and used up diesel worth NZ$165. Since we had the campervan for a relocation, we had a fuel allowance for NZ$250. So, we could have driven a bit more, but most importantly we got money back for the amount we spent on diesel.
We ordered an Uber, left Apollo and went back to our accommodation in Auckland. Our Uber driver was a guy about our age studying chemical engineering, although he seemed to be more interested in programming and computer science outside of school. We got back to the house at 3:20 pm; it was a very charming and big house located between the city centre and the airport.
We got settled in and talked a bit more to Latimer; he suggested that we could go to Mount Eden if we wanted to go for a hike and he also suggested a few different places we could go to for dinner. We also took some time to pet and play with Digger, who made us feel very welcome. He was really energetic, but he was limping a bit because of a previous injury, Latimer told us.
So, we set out for Mount Eden. On our way there, we took a shortcut across one of the campuses of The University of Auckland. The architecture was of a style different from the universities both in Linköping and Newcastle.
Mount Eden deserved its name, and it took some time to climb it, but the path (or rather road) leading up it was in good condition. On our way up, we found a swing mounted on a tree. Linnea couldn’t help it but had to try it out.
When we arrived at the summit and saw the crater, we realised that it was not just an ordinary mountain, but a dormant volcano. This turned out to be the case of most mountains in Auckland, but as long as they are dormant it does not matter that much.
The view from Mount Eden was really amazing. We could both see the accommodation, as well as the city centre. There were quite a few people at the summit, some of them seemed to use Mount Eden as their running track, which is a feat to admire.
From Mount Eden, we headed down towards a nearby road packed with restaurants. On our way there we checked out a few of the ones that Latimer had suggested, and we decided on going to Circus Circus, which was a circus-themed restaurant.
We ordered a Chicken Caesar Burger each and a bottle of cider to share. The meal was really good, and we were really content with our choice of restaurant.
We headed back to the house and spent the evening relaxing without the fear of the room getting cold (like in the campervan).
We got up at 8 am and had bagels with egg for breakfast. After breakfast and packing up, we drove off to the Redwoods, a redwood forest in Rotorua where we went on a short hike. Both the trees and ferns felt huge compared to what we’re used to.
As time was ticking on, we went back to the car, where we ordered two pizzas from a nearby Domino’s. We drove to the pizzeria and picked up our pizzas which we ate in the car. Linnea ordered a Beef and Caramelised Onion Pizza, and Gustav ordered a Hawaii pizza. In hindsight, Linnea would have gotten rid of the caramelised onion as the sweet tasted weird on the pizza.
When we had eaten, we drove off to our afternoon activity, a guided tour through Hobbiton, the movie set where they filmed parts of the Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit trilogy. We arrived a quarter before our “check-in” time at the Shire’s Rest and got our tickets and brochures. From the time we had eaten our pizza until we got to Hobbiton, it had started raining.
The tour started at 1:30 pm with a bus ride onto the farm where the set was built. During the ride, our tour guide told some stories about the farm and how it came to be the film location of the two Tolkien/Jackson movie trilogies.
We got off the bus when we arrived at the set. The set for filming the Shire where the Hobbits live was built into the hills on the farm. The set was deconstructed after the original LotR trilogy and then rebuilt for the Hobbit. The second time they built it with the Hobbiton tour in mind, so they used materials that could last for a longer time.
The walking tour took us around the whole set. The different hobbit holes are at different scales depending on the perspective they were filmed from. It’s fascinating how small the hobbits are actually supposed to be, and a human would probably have to crawl to get into a real-size hobbit hole.
Anyway, the tour guide was a really nice woman from New Zealand. She helped us take some pictures, so we got some pictures of the two of us without having to take a selfie. The props and attention to detail on the set was amazing, and the tour was still nice even though it rained throughout the whole tour. The main irritation of the rain was that people kept unknowingly poking you with their umbrellas, which was both annoying and made you wet.
The tour finished off in The Green Dragon, which is a pub in the film and movies that have been reconstructed for the tourists. At the pub, we got cider and huddled up around the open fire. While sitting at the fire, we got some unexpected company from some Asian tourists that first posed in front of the fire for pictures. Then one of them, a man in probably his fifties or sixties, sat down without any warning on the armrest of the chair Linnea was sitting in and put his arm on her shoulder and then had his friend take a picture of them.
That unexpected event then prompted a discussion with four other persons we just met who turned out also to be studying in Sydney. They were all international students as well, from Norway, Germany, the US, and the UK. We talked to them for quite some time both at the pub and at the Shire’s Rest, after going back with the bus. We exchanged contact information, so hopefully we’ll meet up in Sydney.
We headed off in our van to our sleeping place of the night, a freedom camp site called Keeley Reserve. We got there, only after driven past it twice. First, because we didn’t think the exit would come that soon (don’t trust google maps completely). The second time, because all the oncoming traffic made it dangerous to cross and exit on the opposite side.
We parked, made dinner of the food we had left and then we watched Now You See Me 2. When it was finished, it was dark out, and because of that and the rain, we stayed in the van for the rest of the evening.
We woke up in our seaside accommodation at 8 am and fixed ourselves some breakfast. Shortly after the nearby camper vans had left, we were getting ready to leave, but first, we were going to use the dump station. This was our first emptying of the grey water tank and the toilet waste cassette. It was quite simple. The grey water was emptied using a tube that we connected to the car. The toilet waste cassette had a good design that allows for easy emptying and cleaning.
We rolled out from the campsite and drove along the coast in Wellington to an area close to Oriental Beach, from where we walked up to Mount Victoria. It was many stairs and hilly tracks which lead up to Mount Victoria, and “Mount” felt like a well-deserved prefix to Victoria indeed. The view from the top was nice, but due to clouds, we could not see very far. But we think we could see our car from up there.
When we got down, we managed to get back to our car right before the parking maid got around to our parking lot. This was good as we arrived five minutes late for our parking ticket. We drove out from Wellington and started making our way north on Highway one. Before we got too far, we drove into a shopping area to go to a Noel Leeming store, which sells electronics. But Burger King became prioritised, so we went in for lunch first. We got some suggestions from the woman behind the counter when we asked for student deals, even though they weren’t student deals the deals she suggested were within a good price range, and we were sold.
Stomachs full we headed into the Noel Leeming store and bought a phone charger for the 12V carjack, as our phones had been running low on power while driving. We plugged it in, and it was working as we drove back onto highway one. On the roads there was a lot of traffic, there was congestion multiple times, and we started discussing how to re-plan the NZ highway system. Although experiencing queues at some point is probably to be expected on a road trip.
We took another pause to refuel on our way, but otherwise, we drove straight to our next camp site, Whakapapa Holiday Park. As we were getting close to the camp site, rain started hitting our windscreen. The campsite itself was a bit muddy due to the rain but seemed alright otherwise. It’s located in the middle of Tongariro National Park, which has several volcanoes and seismic activity. But the weather forecast didn’t look good, so the plan on hiking tomorrow morning had to be cancelled, and we decided on heading straight to our next destination.
Gustav discovered that the cramped toilet in the van is actually rotatable, which means that you can use it without training to become a contortionist. That’s good news although we wouldn’t have minded realising that earlier than day 5.
We started our day with a hot shower to clean ourselves after the hike and prepare us for a travel day ahead of us. We were driving to the ferry in Picton to go to the north island.
After breakfast, we filled our fresh water tank and then rolled out from the camping site at 9 am. We topped up on diesel and started making our way back over the curvy mountain pass.
Apart from a nature call, we drove straight to the ferry terminal. We drove past many wineries, which seemed understandable as Marlborough is one of the largest wine regions in New Zealand.
We arrived at Picton and the ferry terminal at 12:15 pm with one hour to spare before final check-in. During this time we made ourselves some soup for lunch, which we ate in the car. Time passed, and we had eaten our lunch and drunk some coffee, before boarding a man from the ferry company came and asked us concerning an alga that is present only on the south island. He asked where we were from and then went on to say how beautiful Stockholm is and complained only that the E4 highway in Sweden is a bit boring.
At 1:50 pm or so, they started boarding the cars onto the ferry. We parked our van on the lower car deck and proceeded up to deck seven where we watched the ship leave the shore. Then we bought a coffee (a caramel latte, yum!) and a panini sandwich and sat down to watch our journey through some large windows in the front of the ship.
As the ship left the archipelago, the sea became a bit more rough, although it was still quite calm. Linnea felt a bit ill and needed to sit and watch the horizon in order not to get seasick. We both made it through without any incidents, but the ship was late on arrival in Wellington.
When we drove off the ship, we made our way towards a Countdown (the New Zealand branch of Woolworths) for some groceries. As we got to the parking garage for the store, we realised that our van was too big for the garage height and we had to find somewhere else to park. We ended up driving a couple of blocks down and turning back, not so much because we couldn’t find a parking spot, more because of the hectic traffic and needing to slow down in order to park in the spot.
We finally parked 700 meters from the store, walked there, and bought our supplies. From the store, we drove to our campsite for the night – Evans Bay Marina. It’s located next to the water and the docks for smaller boats. We fixed supper, wrote some blog post, and went to bed.
Today was a very special day. It was Gustav’s birthday!
In celebration of this, we stayed for the whole day in Abel Tasman and didn’t do any driving. By the way, that’s the only day we’ve planned to stay at the same campsite during this trip. We started the day by talking to Gustav’s parents on Skype. It’s a bit fascinating that the time difference is so substantial (10 hours at the moment) that Gustav’s parents are still having the day before at the time of the Skype.
Afterward, Linnea started making a pancake gateau, with Nutella, ice cream and candy decorations on top. As the Swedish saying goes; “Man tager vad man haver!” (”You take what you have!”)
This delicious monstrosity was eaten outside the campervan, out in the sun at our portable table that we rented with the van. We sat there for quite some time, admiring the landscape, and also Gustav opened his present.
When we were done with the cake, we thought about renting a kayak for the day and called the company operating close by. Unfortunately, they had only one drop off time during the low season, and it had been early in the morning. It would have been nice if they had written that in the brochure…
A little disappointed with the kayaking company, we quickly came up with a plan B. Which was hiking in the national park!
Linnea had read about the stunning beaches alongside the coast of the national park, so it was quite fitting that our campsite was located right next to the starting point of Abel Tasman Coastal Walk. We looked up on the map how far it would be to walk to Te Pukatura Bay in the middle of the park, and it was roughly 12 km one way. We didn’t feel discouraged by that, nor were particularly concerned by the fact that none of the signs at the starting point had that bay on it.
We started walking the same track as when we ran the evening before. This time, it was high tide, and most of Sandy Bay was under water. We continued on the track past Porters Beach and up along the coast.
We kept a steady fast pace, since we wanted to reach the stunning beaches in the middle of the national park, and also a tiny bit due to the fact that we were tracking our pace with Runkeeper. We felt like beating our record for the furthest and fastest hike!
After passing a few bays, we felt like it was time for lunch and walked down to a gorgeous small beach at Akersten Bay with two benches available. At first, we had some company by other hikers, but then they all went, and we were alone at the beach. We finished our lunch and drew a mark in the sand before continuing.
We pretty much went straight up the cliff to a lookout where we could see both the beach, another bay on the other side, and a boat that was anchored gleaming in the water. We had a coffee break there, sitting on a rock and feeling tired but wonderful.
Moving on we kept our fast pace, feeling energised we passed 10 km walked. The rainforest continued on and on, the track going up and down the cliffs and always curving back and fourth. Notably, there were no railings on this track, not even when you were walking high up, and there was a straight plunge down to the water. But fortunately the path wasn’t that narrow, so we didn’t think about is most of the time.
Passing a corner we saw some strange shapes moving towards us on the path. Coming closer we saw that it was two birds that looked a bit like the Kiwi Bird, but bigger from our estimate. They didn’t move off the path, not even when we walked passed them. They just kept walking the path like they were a couple just like us out on a stroll. Birds in New Zealand are weird. (The birds turned out to be Weka or Maori hen).
We finally made it to the middle of the park! The view from the top of the hills was amazing. For the final stretch of our hike, we decided not to go to Te Pukatura Bay. Instead, we went to Watering Cove.
We were alone on the beach there too. Probably because of it being the low season, so a big tip we want to give is to visit NZ during the low season!
At Watering Cove, we were thinking about taking a swim. So we changed into our swimmers and started walking into the water. We had got to our ankles before we stopped. It was very cold, and the sun was no longer shining into the cove not making things better.
Being happy with just bathing our feet, we got dressed and started our journey back to the campsite.
As time was rushing on and our walk had taken quite a lot of time going one way, we walked back in a brisk tempo with few stops. It was good that we decided to head back when we did, because when we had a few kilometres left it was really starting to get dark, and we only had a flashlight. But we made it back in time before it was completely dark.
Back in the campervan, we at a three-course dinner consisting of carrot sticks and dip as the appetiser, spaghetti and sausage in tomato sauce as our main course, and last but not least, fruit salad (a.k.a. fruit cocktail) with ice cream for dessert.
After dinner, we went out for a short bit to look at the sky. There wasn’t a cloud in the sky making it very easy to see the stars. It was an awe-inspiring experience.
Paying for the vans bedding proved to be worth it during the first night already. We did not have any heater on as we were running low on the battery for the living area and were not hooked up to an external power source, so during the night we woke up a couple of times because it was freezing in the van.
We made it through the night and woke up at 6:45 am and had slept 9.5 hours. We used the facilities at the camping site and fixed ourselves a sandwich each before driving off. We only drove for a short while before stopping for full-on breakfast. Coffee, yogurt, and sandwiches were our breakfast made up of. We ate it at a rest stop at the table located there. We shared the table with a French woman about our age from Lyon who had been living in New Zealand since October last year. She was making breakfast for herself and her boyfriend, who was still sleeping in their truck.
We talked to her while we ate our breakfast but had finished eating before her boyfriend woke up. After breakfast, we drove off continuing our way north. Our first stop was at Maruia Springs where we bought a cappuccino and a scone and walked down to the stream to admire the nature. We risked the dryness of our shoes and walked out on some rocks to a section in the middle of the stream. It paid off; we got some nice pictures, and only the soles became somewhat wet (on Gustav’s shoes).
Our next stop was at Maruia Falls. The view there was really beautiful as well, but the currents in the water seemed quite treacherous. In the stream below the fall, there was a whirlpool where a great number of trees were going round and round. So that would not have been a good place to bathe. But the park bench was a good place for lunch. Soup in a cup and a sandwich, which kind of feels like a camping classic. Our lunch was unfortunately disturbed by a few biting flies that seemed to think that we looked tasty.
In Murchison, we bought more supplies at a Four Corners store before driving the last bit to get to our next camping site, The Barn Backpackers in Marahau. As the day progressed, the roads seemed to get narrower and curvier. In New Zealand, they often put up recommended top speeds in sharp curves. The lowest speed we had encountered during the first portion of our driving was 35 kph, so as the first 25 kph sign appeared we both exclaimed “25?!” So, yes, the roads were really curvy.
At The Barn, we registered and paid at the reception and were glad to hear that hot showers were free. We parked our campervan in power site 11 and hooked up the power, after which we started charging our phones and extra batteries. When the electronics were connected, we put on our running clothes and went for a jog along the coast in Abel Tasman National Park to Porters Beach.
The forest was really thick, but when we got out to the beach we were met by a wide expanse of sand. As it seemed to be low tide, the water was really far out, and there were seashells everywhere. Linnea picked a few shells, still unsure if we’re allowed to bring them back even to Australia. There were seashells the size of your hand there, unlike anything you would be able to find in Sweden!
After our jog, we made dinner consisting of noodles and tomato sauce. It was good! Then we took a hot shower and watched a movie. Hopefully, this night will be warmer, now that we’re able to have the heating fan running.
Today was the first day of our road trip adventure through New Zealand. Andy had offered to drive us to the rental place, which was really nice of him. We got there at 9:15 am and started by filling out some paperwork. We were helped by a German woman, Helena, who was working there.
Of course, we ended up with some of the extra additions, like heater, bedding, insurance, etc. Hopefully, it will be worth it, well not the insurance. When we drove out from Christchurch, we had to drive through some road work, but we made it through.
It felt really weird to drive a bigger car and to drive on the left. The landscape was really scenic as we drove north. When we got to Hanmer Springs, we found a good parking spot and a grocery store. We loaded up on food and got back to the camper van.
We decided to go to a petting farm, only to find that it was not open on Mondays. But we found other animals to pet as the horses along the walkway proved to be friendly.
We grabbed fish and chips for our late lunch, and then we headed to our first camping site. It was located a bit outside of Hanmer Spring and was free. Being free it only has a couple of public toilets, which is better than nothing.
Arriving at the camping spot, we were alone at first. We unpacked our bags and put our stuff in the cupboards in the van where everything seems to fit. Then we cooked dinner, which was sausage with beans and peas. We managed to cook it on the stove in the van and wash the dishes, but after that, the battery started to run low. So then candles proved to be a good thing to bring. Thanks, mom!
We made our bed in the back of the van and sat down to write these posts. So far everything has been going well, and that’s the way we hope it will continue.
