Friday 22 February 2008 Day 185 Hotel Rex, San Francisco

We catch a cable car up the hill, squashing ourselves in as it’s pretty busy and they make all the tourists stand/sit inside rather than on the platform outside. Get off at Fishermans Wharf and get some good views of the Golden Gate Bridge. We walk down the front to the very touristy Pier 39, before catching a taxi back to Union Square, chatting to the very nice driver on the way. Have lunch in the food court again and then head to SFMOMA (San Francisco Museum of Modern Art). They have a couple of good exhibitions plus a couple of paintings by Diego Rivera that Ieuan wanted to see.

We checked in on line for our flight and then got a taxi to Valencia Street in the Mission district, so that Ieuan could go to Aquarius Records. Come back to Union Square and head back to the hotel to pack up. It takes a while as we now have lots of stuff. Eat in the hotel again as we know the food ios nice here.

Thursday 21 February 2008 Day 184 Hotel Rex, San Francisco

Went out for coffee and to look in one of the big shopping centres Ieuan found a cd/dvd shop on the way, so spent a couple of hours in there. We met up in Borders later and went to the food court in the shopping centre for lunch. Had some nice Thai spicy chicken. By this point Ieuan is feeling pretty rough, he hasn’t been feeling great all day, so he heads back to the room. Lou carries on shopping.

Later as Ieuan still isn’t feeling great we go down to the hotel restaurant for dinner.

Wednesday 20 February 2008 Day 183 Hotel Rex, San Francisco

Get up and by nearly lunchtime are ready to go out. We stop at Borders cafe for a drink and then peruse the books and cds. Afterwards we catch a taxi to Haight (home of Hippies) so that Ieuan can go to Amoeba Music. He spends a couple of hours in there whilst Lou wanders up Haight and looks at the shops. We meet up again and got to a cafe for lunch.

We get a taxi back to Union Square just around the corner from the hotel, and go back to our room to drop stuff off. Heading out again we go to the Apple store and Virgin and Lou explores further shops while Ieuan remains in Virgin.

At about 8pm we head out to the New Delhi Indian restaurant, the place looked nice, but the food wasn’t so good. Back at the hotel we watched some more episodes of Long Way Round and then went to sleep.

Tuesday 19 February 2008 Day 182 Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre, Canada

We pack up and catch a taxi to the airport for our 14:20 flight to San Francisco. Arrive at the airport at about 12 to check in and find the flight has been delayed until 4pm. We wander around the shops and Lou buys some dvds and then we get lunch, before sitting down to wait.

We board at about 4, but then spend another hour or so parked up in a remote area of the airport waiting to take off, eventually leaving at about 5:15. The 2 hour flight drags on and the back of the seat entertainment system breaks, so we can’t watch that! On the way down it’s quite bumpy for a while, but we don’t get any info from the flight crew.

We land and pick up our bags and get in a taxi in the pouring rain. Hotel Rex looks nice, the staff are very helpful and it is very nicely done out, with nice attention to detail and a box of 2 chocolates on arrival. We eat at the hotel restaurant Cafe Andre, which is very nice. We go to bed and watch an episode of Long Way Round.

Monday 18 February 2008 Day 181 Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre, Canada

There’s quite a lot of low level mist when we wake up in the morning, but it soon starts to clear. Lou gets Ieuan breakfast from the Starbucks in the basement and we try to do the typing to bring the blog up to date.

Later we go to the post office and get some boxes to send some stuff home, get back and pack them up. Not only does this mean that we have less to carry, but apparently we can’t take Cuban items into the states, they’ll be confiscated if found.

We take the boxes down to the PO and send them off, being annoyed that there are only 2 options here, cheap an very slow, or fast and expensive, we’ve been used to a third option, so we choose the cheaper option, meaning the boxes will be back anywhere up to a month after we get back. Do some last minute shopping and head back to the room.

In the evening we have a very nice meal at an Italian restaurant, Don Francescos, where the young waiter was extremely attentive and very keen to impress upon us the merits of some of British Columbia’s local wines, telling us lots about Mission Hills and the ‘snakey’ lake in the area. Ieuan feeling a bit better now.

Sunday 17 February 2008 Day 180 Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre, Canada

We go back into town and do some more shopping, before having lunch (another pick and mix salad option that was nowhere near as good as yesterday’s) at a deli in the food store near the hotel.

In the afternoon we head down to the harbour and walk around the sea wall, watching some float planes taking off. It’s really sunny and there is snow on the mountains north of the city, (this makes for some great views looking towards the mountains from a few blocks from the waterfront, with the mountains appearing between the tower block) however it’s also really cold when you are in the shadow and Ieuan isn’t feeling very well, so we head off to the Vancouver Art Gallery, where we don’t quite get to look at the exhibitions as we spend an hour or so browsing in the gallery shop.

Later on as Ieuan is feeling worse we decide to order room service for dinner, so we get a pizza and eat it in bed, watching the final 4 episodes of Race to Dakar.

Saturday 16 February 2008 Day 179 Sheraton Vancouver Wall Centre, Canada

We get up and have a great view over downtown Vancouver, with snow capped mountains in the background. The sun is out and it’s cold but crisp.

We head out to look around the area and go to the shops, stopping for lunch at a great salad and fruit bar called Salad Loop. There are some good shops and we spend a while perusing the bookshops and record shops. Having spent time wondering where everyone was, after all it’s a Saturday and we expected the place to be busy at least, we arrive at Robson Street which is lined with chain stores and all the people. We spend some time here. By about 5pm it’s pretty cold and we head back to the hotel to warm up.

That night, we try an Indian restaurant on the main strip, which is ok, certainly not great.

Friday 15 February 2008 Day 178 Hotel Nacional De Cuba, Havana, Cuba

Get up, have breakfast and pack up our stuff. We leave our room at about 10am and pass the maid in the corridor on the way out, noting that she runs straight to our room to see what tip we have left for her! Hopefully the 10 pesos (a fiver) will be adequate. We later learn that language professors earn about 24 pesos – about 13 pounds a month, so can only imagine what a chambermaid must earn and they therefore rely heavily on tips.

We catch a taxi to the airport, and wait in the line for our flight, wondering when they will open the check in desk. We get chatting to a couple in the queue who have been there for 6 weeks learning Spanish. When they arrived, their luggage went missing for 3 days and when it was found, the locks had been broken off and some stuff stolen. Not unusual for Cuba. Many people wrap their luggage using the huge cling film machines before they check it in, to prevent people getting in to it.

Eventually, some staff amble over and start to stock up the relevant machines with paper and boarding cards ready to open the desk and check us in. We check in then go through security and wander around the few shops.

On the plane, we watch films and listen to music, arriving in Toronto to change planes after 3½ hours at about 5pm. We spend a very chaotic hour there claiming our bags, rechecking them in, and obtaining a boarding pass for the next part of our flight, to Vancouver. We are lucky to have plenty of time to do this as the whole thing seems very disorganised and we watch some people in the queue miss their flights whilst they are waiting to be checked back on.

We get some food and buy some magazines, before waiting to board. We realise we are not sitting together but manage to get them switched over before we board, and end up sitting together and by a window, which is good.

The flight is ok, although by now we are pretty tired. Arrive in Vancouver at about 10pm local time, and catch a taxi to our hotel. The hotel is really nice and has a good view out over the city from our room on the 22nd floor. We check in and go to bed.

Thursday 14 February 2008 Day 177 Hotel Nacional De Cuba, Havana, Cuba

Valentines Day. Lou presents Ieuan with his car and present. As they don’t seem to do cards in Cuba, Lou will have to wait for hers!!

Lou has hardly slept due to feeling sick all night and at 7am wakes up and is immediately sick. Try and go back to sleep, before getting up for breakfast at about 9.

After breakfast, we just stay in the room as Lou feels really rough and just wants to lie down.

At lunchtime, we go down to the cafe and then sit outside again, reading and using the computer, to get some fresh air.

We are in the room packing later when we see a note being pushed under the door. It is from our chambermaid, saying that she hopes we had a nice stay and looks forward to us coming back – obviously angling for further tips (we had already been leaving a tip on the pillow each morning for her).

In the evening, as our Valentines meal, we went back to the hotel nearby and at the delicious pasta again, although seemed to get much smaller portions this time!

Back at the hotel, we watched a documentary about the drug methamphetamine and it’s prevalence in the USA, very one dimensional, but still quite scary.

Wednesday 13 February 2008 Day 176 Hotel Nacional De Cuba, Havana, Cuba

After breakfast, we chill out in the room reading and using the computer to try and get the blog up to date. It’s hammering with rain outside and looks very overcast with low cloud all over the city. We go and have some lunch in the Cinema Cafe again and then go and sit in the courtyard.

It is busy due to the rain stopping people going out to explore, and we sip tea, beer and mojitos in the warm, listening to the live music, before retiring to our room.

That night we go back to the hotel grill for tea and have chicken, rice and black beans again, which appears extraordinarily quickly! Afterwards, we go to the Cabaret show at the hotel – Cabaret Parisien, and are shown to a table right at the very front at the edge of the stage! We share the table with 2 Argentinean ladies, a Spanish lady and 3 Ecuadorians. There are some great acts in the 2 hours show including a good Tango, and a fantastic ballet type balancing act performed by 2 men which must have taken amazing strength.

After the show, Lou started feeling really ill, and we went to bed.

Tuesday 12 February 2008 Day 175 Hotel Nacional De Cuba – Havana, Cuba

We are woken up by the maid knocking on the door for room service at 9.30am. We go down for breakfast and find an absolutely huge spread of food, both hot and cold, although the coffee is crap!

Afterwards, we look round the hotel grounds and museum and then go back to the room for a bit. Watch 2 more episodes of Race to Dakar and then have lunch in the “Cinema Cafe” in the basement.

At 2pm, we wait in reception to be picked up for a tour of the city. By about 2.25pm we are getting worried, but the guide soon arrives and we set off in a manky old bus to see the sights. The tour is pretty good and we see some of the other suburbs of Havana, Revolution Square, Old Havana and Central Havana, and go on a walking tour through the older part. We see some beautiful buildings and architecture and stop at some famous landmarks, like the old house in Havana, and the bar where Ernest Hemmingway drank, and the hotel where he lived. We also stop at a cigar making factory and shop and make a few small purchases.

Back at the hotel, we use the computer for a bit, and then walk up to another hotel for dinner. We have a delicious meal of pasta al arabiata, accompanied by live music. Ieuan asks the musicians to play El Manisero, which they do grandly!

Monday 11 February 2008 Day 174 NH Krystal Hotel, Cancun, Mexico

Packed our final bits and Lou did a run to Starbucks for drinks, getting caught in a brief torrential downpour before we checked out. Got a taxi to the airport and bought our Cuban tourist visas at the Mexicana desk (which seemed quite chaotic) and then queued to check in. Fought off lots of pusher-inners, realising that we had to stand right behind the people checking in if we wanted to get in next, rather than waiting behind the marked line! Got our boarding cards and went off through security.

The flight was full but the small plane was quite spacious with lots of leg room, which was good, plus they still dole out peanuts for free snacks! Had a bit of turbulence on the way down, but otherwise it was a smooth flight. We collected our bags and went through customs, then got a taxi to the hotel.

There were loads of old American cars and trucks on the road, many belching out thick black smoke. Our taxi driver helped some people in the car next to us find their way somewhere, at one point actually pulling over to show them where they needed to turn off, which we thought was very helpful!

Our hotel is huge and very grand! It overlooks the “Malecon” (seafront) and we can see some of the bigger waves breaking over the sea wall on to the pavement. Our room is nice and we somehow manage to get connected to a wireless internet connection, despite our room apparently not having internet access!

We go for a walk to explore and see a famous ice cream parlour called the Copellia nearby. In the evenings, the locals and tourists will form long queues (2 different queues) for the renowned ice cream!

For dinner, we go to the outdoor charcoal grill at the hotel with live music. The food is nice – chicken with black beans and rice.

We watch an episode of Charley Boorman’s Race to Dakar on the computer.

Sunday 10 February 2008 Day 173 NH Krystal Hotel, Cancun, Mexico

Slept in before getting up to visit Starbucks and use the internet. Did a spot of souvenir shopping emptying the shelves at a wooden puzzle store, and then went for lunch at the 100% Natural Cafe in the Hotel Zone. Lunch was average and then we walked home, stopping at the flea market on the way. It seemed to be a load of old tat with a lot of pressure to come inside and buy things!

Back at the hotel, we sat in the sun by the pool until the wind picked up so much it started to move the plastic furniture around! We went and sat in the hotel cafe and used the laptop, and had some drinks, before going back up to the room to do some packing.

Lou noticed that 2 new books she had bought in USA had disappeared, which we reported at reception, and 2 hotel security men were dispatched to our room to look for them. Despite not knowing any details about them, and not actually looking anyway, they deduced they were not in the room and went off to check with our chambermaid! We heard nothing more on that front, unsurprisingly!!

We went to the Mexican restaurant with the live Mariachis for dinner, then stopped at Haagen Daaz for some desert.

Saturday 9 February 2008 Day 172 NH Krystal Hotel, Cancun, Mexico

Up at 6am for our 7am trip to Chichen Itza. The coach arrives at 7.15am and by 8.15am, we are deposited, with about 30 others, and the hotel opposite ours to exchange our tickets for vouchers, or some other such nonsense which seems to take a further half an hour and is clearly designed to make us buy tat from the huge souvenir store there!

It then took us till about 11am to get to our first rest stop, where we were released into an “arts and craft village” with the guide suggesting we might all like to buy a necklace with our name translated into Mayan on! Many did, but we resisted, buying a few other bits and bobs instead.

We finally arrived at Chichen Itza about 12.15pm and were taken round on a guided tour for a first hour. The tour was really informative and our guide was excellent. He shared lots of information we wouldn’t have known about the ruins, such as standing in one place aligned with a certain part of the ruins and clapping, sounds like a bird. Moving slightly to be aligned with a different part and clapping, sounds like a rattlesnake.

We had some free time to look round, and mainly spent it looking at the stall set up around the ruins, selling locally made souvenirs and gifts. Most were apparently “almost free” or “one dollar” which seemed to be the local catchphrases!

On the way back, we stopped at a nearby Cenote – an large water hole usually 30metres or so below ground, where you can swim. It was really pretty but the water was apparently very cold!

At about 4.30pm, we eventually went back to the arts and crafts village for our lunch! It was a buffet and was quite reasonable, although by this time we were fairly tired! There was some dancing and music put on for us too.

We got home about 7.30pm, used the internet, and went to bed, knackered.

Friday 8 February 2008 Day 171 NH Krystal Hotel, Cancun, Mexico

Have a lie in then go for breakfast at the extortionately priced buffet at the hotel. We put some laundry in, but the girl from housekeeping who collects it decides that she will be doing it on the sly and so gives us a discount of $10 and promises to get it back earlier than the hotel would have done! We don’t seem to have a choice in it!

We catch a taxi downtown to have a look round and head to the souvenir market, which is quite touristy with lots of touts. We buy some fruit in the supermarket, then have a nice lunch at the 100% Natural Cafe nearby.

We go in search of a reportedly better souvenir market but find there isn’t much there, so we catch a taxi and head back to the hotel.

We go down to the pool for a bit and Lou tests out the sea, which is really warm.
In the evening, we go and use email, and then go back to the hotel for some dinner. Lou gets a very bare (but nice) cesar salad, but the waiter is very friendly, and then we head back to our room.

Need to be up early tomorrow for our trip to Chichen Itza.

Thursday 7 February 2008 Day 170 Best Western, Bayview, San Diego

Ieuan’s birthday today! He has already had cards and presents in New Zealand and the States! Further presents will be presented later!

Up at the crack of dawn for our 7am flight to Mexico, Cancun (via Phoenix). We manage to change our seats to some extra leg room ones in the row behind 1st class, but we also get randomly selected to have our bags searched at security! The emptied our hand luggage and swiped our cameras and phones with a cloth which they tested, and put our shoes through the scanners.

Our connecting flight from Phoenix to Mexico is quite bumpy, but we arrive on time, collect our bags, and head off in a taxi to the “hotel zone” to find the NH hotel we are staying in.
Its a nice hotel – our room is part of a new section which is so new, it still smells of concrete! The hotel is right on the beach and our balcony looks out over the sea which is only about 20m away.
We unpack, then go and look round the hotel. There is a nice infinity pool overlooking the sea, and 3 restaurants. We walk down the road to a shopping mall nearby and use internet for a bit. Then we look for somewhere to eat. We end up at the Mexican restaurant which is part of the hotel, and are greeted by “Alberto” who is very friendly and lively! We eat our dinner next to a fountain, listening to the live Mariachis and drinking a bottle of Mexican tempranillo.

The Mariachis come and play a tune for us at our table and by this time the restaurant is packed.

We come back to the room and look out over the sea from our balcony before going to bed.

Wednesday 6 February 2008 Day 169 Best Western, Bayview, San Diego

Lou wanted to go to Seaworld today, but by the time we got up and sorted out some stuff to send home, it was gone midday. We spend an hour at the post office, packing and sending, and then went to get a jacket potato for lunch.

Later, we went and browsed in a 2nd hand bookshop and also in the Museum of Contemporary Art. The museum was very disappointing and poncey, with barely any art on show.

We came home to pack up as we leave tomorrow. Had room service and Dominoes pizza delivery for tea.

Tuesday 5 February 2008 Day 168 Best Western Bayview, San Diego

Lou had an 8am telephone interview today for a job back home, so that was something to look forward to!! Later, we headed down to the main shopping area and the historic Gaslamp Quarter to look around. There are loads of restaurants and bars, and a huge shopping mall built to look like a Spanish town.

We do some shopping and mooch around, and have some lunch in the mall food court.
Then we head for the big Borders bookshop, noticing on the way that the streets are being blocked off and prepared for the annual Mardi Gras tonight! We also spot a nice looking Indian restaurant which we decide to come back to for dinner later.

In the evening, the streets are full of people, and those with tickets are let into the central area where the Mardi Gras is being celebrated. As we don’t have tickets, but need to get to the restaurant inside, we have to spend a few minutes convincing staff that we have a reservation there and need to get through. They eventually let us through and we fight our way past the drunks and revellers, until we reach the place we want.

The Indian is very nice and the food is pretty good. The portions are huge and Ieuan finds himself with about 15 popadums to eat and Lou with about 6 chicken breasts in her main dish! The Afghan waiter is overly attentive, but when we ask for a couple of dishes to be modified slightly, we are advised that it was probably not possible as the “Chef knows best”....!

Monday 4 February 2008 Day 167 Best Western, Hollywood Hills, LA

We leave LA today so get a taxi to the Renaissance Hotel to pick up a hire car. Hoping to get a Mustang, we end up with a convertible Toyota in white – lovely! We get out of LA easily enough, driving through the up market suburb of Los Felix and then get on to the freeway where we stay for most of the drive to San Diego.

In San Diego, we find our hotel and drop off our bags, then take the hire car back to the Marriot, walking back around the harbour.

We went on the decommissioned aircraft carrier The USS Midway for a look round, which has many old planes and helicopters on the upper deck, then stopped to look at the tall ship, the Star of India. Formerly called the Euterpe, the ship carried Ieuan’s Great Great Granddad from the UK to New Zealand in 1879. We spot a copy of the weekly ships newspaper on the wall and see that it was edited by Ieuan’s Great Great Granddad himself!

Back at the hotel, we look for a place to eat, avoiding the attached hotel “grill” as it looks particularly grim! We go across the road and eat at a small Italian called Petrinis. Lou’s food was pretty crap and Ieuan’s pizza was just about edible – we shan’t be going back in a hurry!

Back at the room we went to bed.

Sunday 3 February 2008 Day 166 Best Western, Hollywood Hills, LA

Lou doesn’t wake up until about 10.30am and we eventually get up and go out for about 1pm. We spend a couple of hours shopping, managing to buy about 15 DVD’s and some books between us! Get lunch at Mexican place Baja Fresh then go and dump our stuff back at the hotel.

Walk back down to the main street to go to the cinema to see Atonement, which Lou likes but Ieuan doesn’t.

It’s cold when we come out, and we have Mexican for tea before heading back to the hotel. We start to pack up ready to leave the next morning.

Saturday 2 February 2008 Day 165 Best Western, Hollywood Hills, LA

We get a decent night’s sleep, not too difficult having lived yesterday twice without much sleep on the plane. Get up and walk down to Hollywood Boulevard, walking down the walk of fame to the famous Chinese Theatre and the Kodak Theatre where the Academy Awards are held. The area was packed with tourists, people in fancy dress, street artists, and people trying to sell cds of homemade hip hop. Ieuan managed to replace his rather tatty pair of shades at the Oakley store in the mall, we browsed the shops and got lunch.

Afterwards we walked down towards the farmers market (some 4 miles away) with Ieuan stopping at a dvd shop on the way, which turned out to only do rentals. Scrapping the idea of going to the farmers market we walked back towards Sunset, with Lou going into the Museum of Psychiatry for a guided tour (it was all a bit too scientologist for her liking) while Ieuan went back to Amoeba to browse the racks of dvds.

We headed home and once again ate at the diner next door as it was too cold to go far and we couldn’t be bothered to get a taxi. Watched 2 episodes of Long Way Down, while next door try their hardest to drown everybody out with their tv, with periodic bouts of barking from their dog.

Friday 1 February 2008 Day 164 Crowne Plaza, Auckland

We do our packing and some last minute shopping, before taking our boxes to the post office. Get a taxi to the airport at 3pm so we can avoid the rush hour traffic, but still manage to get a bit held up. Spend the next few hours shopping (although there isn’t a great selection) and reading until our flight.

Board late and set off about 8pm. The helpful woman on check in had moved our seats so we had a row of 3 seats to ourselves which was nice. We watched some films and tv, ate our horrible aeroplane dinner and later tried to get some sleep. The flight seemed to last ages, but eventually after a fairly bumpy flight we arrived in LA at about 11am Friday morning. Took quite a while to get through passport control, collect our bags and get through customs, before we got a taxi to our Best Western hotel in the Hollywood Hills ‘hood.

Hotel is ok and overlooks the pool, it’s very cold though. We unpack and go for a look around ending up on Sunset Boulevard, looking in the big Borders shop there. We have lunch at the Mexican fast food place ‘Baja Fresh’ and walk up the road. Ieuan spends a while looking in Amoeba records while Lou searches out a shop selling fresh fruit. We head back and eat dinner at the diner attached to the hotel, Coffee Shop 101, which is pretty good.

Go back to our room and close the curtains on the Hollywood sign which we can see from our room.

Thursday 31 January 2008 Day 163 Crowne Plaza, Auckland

We get and have our club breakfast, then Lou goes to get her haircut. We meet up, get a takeaway salad for lunch and head for the ferry to Davenport about 15 minutes away. It’s a very pretty place with lots of 2nd hand book shops and cafes, we soon ended up with some great finds.
It’s a very hot day and after a couple of days we head back on the ferry.

Back in the city we stop at the post office for further boxes to send yet more stuff home and then make our way back to the hotel, and do some packing to send home (we are aiming to have rucksacks weighing in at 15kg rather than the 24 or more that they have been to this point).

We have our final New Zealand dinner back at Khao Thai.

Wednesday 30 January 2008 Day 162 Crowne Plaza, Auckland

We use the computer in the morning typing up some of the blog and check emails etc. Ieuan goes to get his hair cut and we make full use of our room to chill out. At lunchtime we visit the nearby food court and then do a spot of shopping.

In the evening we head for the Loft wine bar which Ieuan had found a review of in the paper, and spend a nice hour relaxing in there, watching the world go by from the 1st floor window. We eat at Dolce Vita, an Italian round the corner, which was very average, we shan’t be going back.

Tuesday 29 January 2008 Day 161 Manukau Top 10

We get up and spend a couple of hours finishing packing our stuff, sorting out what we need to dump and cleaning and emptying the van of our various waste products. Surprisingly the gas bottle has lasted the whole 55 days. The couple next to us are doing the same and we both dump unwanted food and camping stuff in the camp kitchen. Leaving the site we stop at a sheepskin bootshop for Lou, and the post office to post 2 large parcels home, finally filling the van up with diesel as required by the contract.

We get to the Maui depot about midday, drop the van off and get a taxi into town. On arriving back at the Crowne Plaza we soon find out that we’ve booked a club room on the 28th floor which has a huge bathroom and lounge area, it’s fantastic but not ideal now we are well over our budget! We get many benefits though, including free breakfast, coffee all day, drinks and canapés for 2 hours in the evening.

At 7:30 we meet Matt and Chantal and go out to Khao Thai where we have a delicious meal and a nice bottle of Trinity Hills Syrah (great choice by Matt, shame we didn’t go to the vineyard), while Ieuan bores them with accounts of our travels.

Monday 28 January 2008 Day 160 Bowentown

We pack up the van do the washing up, use the internet, then leave at about 11. We drive the windy roads back to Waihi, joining the main road and on towards Paeroa (home of The Battles of the Streets bike races every February and L & P drink) where we stock up at the supermarket for the final time. As we get nearer to Auckland we hit loads of traffic, all returning from a long weekend away.

A few hours later we reach Manukau (2008 murder capital of NZ, there have been 2 murders over the weekend), a suburb to the south of Auckland and check in to the campsite, which isn’t great, still it’s our last campsite for this trip. As it’s a bank holiday, not much is open, but we need to get some boxes from the post office so we can pack up stuff to send home, so we drive to the nearest open shop with a post office section, which is about 10kms away. We get 2 huge boxes, come back and pack them up ready to send, then sort out the van, throwing away stuff that we don’t need and we don’t think anyone else will want. By way of a celebration of our last night in the van we have jacket potatoes again!

Sunday 27 January 2008 Day 159 Bowentown

Spent a really hot day just chilling at the site, downloading stuff from the internet, whilst Lou took the opportunity to sunbathe next to the van during the afternoon. At about 5pm we went for a walk down to the beach, just next door to the site, which was nice, particularly as most people had gone home/back to camp by this point. We found lots of really pretty shells washed up on the beach.

Back at the van we cooked tea and chatted to our next door neighbour Barry who was from Whangara, the setting for Whale Rider, apparently half of his relatives were in the film. Washed up in the swelteringly hot camp kitchen and used the 50c metered showers.

Saturday 26 January 2008 Day 158 Coromandel Top 10

Woke up to find the aforementioned late night arrivals camping about 10cm from our rear bumper. We decided to move on to another site near Waihi beach that did have space and so set off in that direction, taking the long route to complete our circuit of the peninsular, plus we wanted to visit Cathedral Cove on the east side. Due to the steep hills and windy roads it took a couple of hours to get there, and we found 100s of cars parked right back along the road.

Walked the hour or so route to the cove in 30 minutes, along an up and down coastal path and a staircase at the end. The tiny beach was packed but none the less beautiful for it. The waves were constantly crashing in around the rocks, we watched numerous people getting unexpectedly wet as they stood too close, or when they tried to go through the natural rock arch to the beach on the other side without waiting for a break between the bigger waves.

Arriving later at Bowentown campsite we find it absolutely rammed, and set up camp, Lou cooking tea.

Friday 25 January 2008 Day 157 Rotorua Top 10

Made a quick visit to town in the morning to use the internet and stock up on provisions, then headed away towards Waihi Beach. En route we phoned to book a site only to find that the Top 10 site there had no room, so we drove on passed Waihi and headed to the Coromandel Peninsular, where a campsite was available. It was quite a windy road next to the sea on the west side of the peninsular, so we didn’t arrive until about 5pm.

The campsite wasn’t great, and we were given a site in the midst of a raucous group of friends with their families, when most of the rest of the site remained free! We asked to move and set up camp, realising soon enough that we hadn’t moved far enough as the kids from the big group ran amok around the van.

Lou went for a look at the bay just behind the camp while Ieuan cooked tea. At about 10:30 some campers arrive, setting up immediately behind then van, and talk noisily into the night.

Thursday 24 January 2008 Day 156 Rotorua Top 10

Drove to the windscreen repair centre at the crack of dawn to get a new windscreen for the van. The kind man behind the counter gave us a lift into town, where we used the internet and shopped, before getting a taxi back to pick the van up. We drove out to Tirau nearby, to se the ‘famous’ corrugated iron sheep and sheepdog. It took about 40 minutes to get there and was fairly underwhelming really. Had an unexciting lunch in a cafe before heading back to Rotorua.

Back at the van park, we walked back into town for a few bits and bobs and to go to the post office, then walked home. The campsite had become quite busy and we started to smell the horrible sulphurous smell associated with Rotorua. We had an exciting tea of jacket potatoes

Wednesday 23 January 2008 Day 155 Taupo Top 10

Left Taupo Top 10 and stopped at the supermarket and internet place on the way out of town. Had a quick look from the hilltop lookout before driving on towards Rotorua. Stopped halfway there at the Wai-O-Tapu “Thermal Wonderland” and we were fleeced of our $50 entrance fee before wandering around the smelly, stinking craters and pools. Some were more impressive than others and had some vivid colours produced by the metals in the earth below. We passed bubbling mud pools, yellow, blue and green lakes and pools, geysers and waterfalls. The weather is really hot again and combined with the hot smelly steam from the thermal activity it feels like we are on a tropical rotten egg farm.

We leave there and push on to Rotorua stopping for some lunch at a roadside rest stop littered with rubbish and old broken deck chairs, very picturesque! Arrive at Rotorua and find our campsite, and chill out in the nice weather for a bit. Cook chicken curry for tea.

Tuesday 22 January 2008 Day 154 Taupo Top 10

We get up late and find it raining, great! It soon stops and the sun comes out so we head up to the nearby Huka falls. However, on arriving, we realise that the dam nearby, which opens its gates every 2 hours, will be opening its gates shortly, so we head up there first. We watch the dam gates open and the empty river bed fills up in minutes turning into a raging white water torrent, swelling in size and covering rocks and land that were previously dry. Half an hour later, the dam gates are shut again and the flow begins to visibly recede, and the pools at the foot of the dam gates empty out.

We stop at the volcanic discovery centre and peruse the shop, then go to the “craters of the moon” thermal park, which has lots of open craters belching out hot steam and evil smells.
We go back via Huka falls and actually manage to see the falls this time, despite the fact that it starts hammering down with rain as soon as we arrive. We go and look at the falls anyway, along with lots of inappropriately dressed tourists, and they are pretty impressive as huge amount of water from the 100m wide 5m deep river is channelled through an area just 4m wide and 15m deep.

We go into Taupo town centre for a look round then head back to the campsite. We spot some people we met in Christchurch, who were racing sidecars at the motorbike racing circuit there, and Ieuan goes to say hello.

Monday 21 January 2008 Day 153 Napier Top 10

We leave the nasty Napier site and drive in to town for a look at the famous Art Deco buildings (the city was mostly destroyed by and earthquake in the 1930s, so everything was rebuilt in the style of the time). Some are quite impressive, but we found it amusing that the women in the Art Deco shop/info centre were dressed up in 1930s outfits, probably for the benefit of American tourists.

From there we head out to some of the Hawke’s Bay wineries, starting off near Cape Kidnappers, we stop firstly at Clearview, then move on to Craggy Range (a beautiful setting and absolutely superb wines), finally stopping at Te Mata (Ieuan almost finds himself tasting cheese instead of wine as we accidentally go to the cheese centre with the same name). The morning’s haul of 4 bottles should last us for the rest of our time here.

In the afternoon we leave the Napier area and head to Taupo, about 135kms away via winding forest roads, where we see and pass lots of logging trucks. Arrive in Taupo and set up camp next to the camp kitchen, where we find lazy campers are driving from other parts of the site to the kitchen and then parking on our neighbour’s site. Cook tea and use internet.

Sunday 20 January 2008 Day 152 Hutt Park Top 10, Wellington

We leave the camp site at midday after using up a few more hours of our 24hr internet access, heading off on the long drive (345km) to Napier, which seems to take forever. We stop for lunch at a rest stop, eventually arriving in Napier in late afternoon, having passed the southern hemisphere’s largest wind farm on the way, with some 100 turbines.

We pull up to the camp site and check in, only to find the site is the size of a small town and crammed full of children and hoons. We manoeuvre into our site, handily positioned in the middle of a grass section, with vans and caravans each side, and sit in the van being miserable whilst it rained. Wi-Fi was ridiculously expensive so we had no internet to distract us.

Made our tea, ate it indoors, washed up in the camp kitchen and go to bed early, planning on an early escape.

Saturday 19 January 2008 Day 151 Hutt Park Top 10, Wellington

We catch the bus into Wellington and have a look around the shops, eat lunch in a food court and then do a bit more shopping. Lou tries to take a Vaude rucksack which she bought from a shop here back for an exchange as it has a strap coming off it, only to be told to go and get it fixed at a shoe repairer, as they couldn’t fix it before we leave the country and wouldn’t send it back to the UK for us. Instead they gave us $25 towards the cost of sending it to Vaude when we get back.

Caught the bus home and chilled out at the site, did the laundry and Lou worked on updating her CV so she can start looking for a job.

Friday 18 January 2008 Day 150 Nelson City Holiday Park

Left Nelson and drove the 2 hours to Picton, passing a raging forest fire on the way, which had several helicopters dropping water on it in attempt to stop it spreading. On the ferry we stood outside for a while, looking at the cattle and sheep being transported in open top articulated trucks. It was a beautiful clear day going through The Sounds, but soon got pretty windy, so we went inside and watched some car racing on the big tv in the bar. When that finished we moved to the cafe and spent the time getting up to date with our postcard writing, which took some time!

Arriving in Wellington, we headed straight to the campsite and settled in for the night, buying a 24hr internet ticket for US$10.

Thursday 17 January 2008 Day 149 Kaikoura Top 10

Left Kaikoura campsite and went into town to post a mega heavy parcel home (20kg), which cost us a small fortune, but we had no choice, we can’t take it with us on the plane. Lou insisted that we go back to the seal colony, where we saw a handful of seals lounging nearby on the rocks and frolicking in the sea.

Leaving there we set off for Nelson along the coastal road, where we pass more seals, in places several hundred are lazing on rocks and playing in the sea. The sea is a really beautiful blue, and it is a very hot day again. En route we get held up by some tree felling on the slopes above the road, but make it to Nelson at around 3pm.

We register at the campsite, then walk into town for a mooch, Lou buys several pairs of handmade lamb skin gloves, while Ieuan’s purchases amount to 200g of nice coffee. Stop at supermarket on the way home.

Change our ferry crossing to the North Island to tomorrow instead of 20th.

Wednesday 16 January 2008 Day 148 Kaikoura Top 10

Get up late and lounge around reading and using the computer. It’s a really hot day and after lunch, we head out on a 3 hour walk around the peninsular and past a seal colony, which is disappointing inhabited by only one lone seal, which we can barely see as he is so far away out on the rocks!

It takes us about an hour to reach the seal colony, and being lazy, we decide to head back the way we came rather than take the 2 hours walk up and over the cliffs.

We stop at the supermarket on the way home to buy jacket potatoes for tea.

Tuesday 15 January 2008 Day 147 Kaikoura Top 10

The alarm goes off at 4.30am and we drag ourselves out of bed in the dark, and trundle round to the dolphin place. Lou manages to don her wetsuit with ease this time, which is good news and we watch a video briefing of what we might see and how to swim with the dolphins, should we be lucky enough to find some. We catch a coach to the boat, which is nice and new, and Ieuan (the only non swimmer) promptly head upstairs and befriend the friendly skipper, Pete.

After about half an hour in the boat, we reach some dolphins and the swimmers are released into the water! There are hundreds of dolphins – about 700/800 we are told, and they seem to be everywhere in the water. They are all around you, darting past and coming up for a closer look. Some of them stop and circle around you playfully, and if you make loud crazy squeaking noises they are even more attracted to you! The water doesn’t feel that cold, and we have about half an hour in the water before we are called back, and the boat goes down to the beginning of the huge pod, and we get in the water again. We swim 3 times, each time with lots of dolphins around, plus loads of baby dolphins with their mothers.

After a while, we get back on board and change out of our wetsuits so that we can take some pictures of the dolphins all round us, doing somersaults, back flips and some riding in the bow wave from the front of the boat.

Back on dry land, we head back to the campsite and chill out for the rest of the day, just popping in to town to collect Lou’s underwater camera pictures, which were pretty crap!