NZ - Day 1 - Auckland to New Plymouth

Friday, 24 January 2020

Today we woke to steady and completely un-forecast rain. We decided it would be good to skip our first activity, the Adventure Forest - except we couldn't as we booked and paid for it the night before!  As it turned out, the rain had eased by the time we arrived so it was fine.

At this point it's worth noting that our schedule today was:

• 10-12pm - Adventure Forest
• 12-4.30pm Drive to New Plymouth
• 5-7pm - Register, attend model event.

We were the first customers to the Adventure Forest when it opened at 10, so we were quickly shown the ropes (heh heh) and set off to negotiate the 8 high ropes courses. As usual it was good fun - I like the challenges of swinging around logs and walking along wires - all while attached safely with a harness high off the ground!

Time flew by and before we knew it it was after 12:30 and we hadn't left yet. We realised we weren't going to get to do the final course (which was fine by me as I was getting a bit weary!) so once Jon and Julie descended we headed back to the car, then to a supermarket to get lunch and dinner supplies.  

We ate lunch in a random gazebo by a random lake in a suburb outside of Hamilton. By then it was almost 30 degrees - so we were glad of the shade.

 By the time we finished lunch it was around 2pm, and we really hadn't made much of a dent in our 350km journey southwards, so we set off with a new resolve to eat up some miles, only to stop about half an hour later when it dawned on us that if we didn't buy Jon some new clothes now, he'd be running in what he was wearing the next day. So after confirming with our insurance that he had a $250 allowance, we diverted to Rebel Sports where he bought some shorts, socks, undies, 2 shirts and some sunscreen.  K-Mart would probably have been a better option but we couldn't find one and we were still entertaining thoughts of maybe getting some running shoes - but they didn't really fit the budget.

By the time we left (it took aaages!)  it was really getting on in the day! Determined to REALLY make some progress we immediately stopped at Mitre Ten to buy a cheap Chulli Bin (eski) as we had already noticed our stuff was getting a bit warm in the van! Armed with the bin, some ice, and some bottles of L & P, we were finally ready to go.

And go we did.  When we finally left suburbia the coastline and country side looked really cool and authentically NZ-ish with steep hillsides and unrecognisable vegetation.  We drove a fair chunk of the way but an hour away from New Plymouth I spied some cool looking rock features called the Three Sisters which we simply had to stop and explore. 

They turned out to be a 15 minute walk away, and we could only do it at low tide, which due to our extremely delayed schedule it actually was!  - yay us! 

 By the time we'd finished checking them out, it was really really late. I contacted our AirBNB host for the zillionth time with a new ETA (there goes my good review) and we eventually arrived in New Plymouth at 8.45pm!  Needless to say we had well and truly missed registration and the model event.  We can sort it all out tomorrow though.

Our AirBNB place is nice and comfortable for us all - we've got three nights here which will be nice. We've got a lovely view of Mt Tarenaki which I'm sure we'll get closer to in our time here.