Goodbye to New Zealand!

Today is our last day in Wellington. We leave for Auckland at 1 pm and then board our flight to LA at 7 pm. This has been a wonderful vacation. Our trip to the South Island was incredible. We hiked part of the Coastal Trail in Abel Tasman National Park and saw beautiful golden beaches, crossed a swing bridge to a waterfall , then hiked and kayaked at the Lochmara Lodge, located in the Queen Charlotte sound. The view of the sound from the top of the hill on the Queen Charlotte Trail was spectacular. We will miss Maribeth and Scott very much and look forward to seeing their pictures as they travel south in the next month. We can agree with the statement in the travel guide that this country truly is magical!!! Thanks MB and Scott for a wonderful stay!! --Sue and Jim


View of Abel Tasman from the coast track
















View of the Queen Charlotte Sound after a tough walk
















Swing bridge





















Walking on the coast track in Abel Tasman

The Parents Arrive

From Sue:
Jim and I arrived on Tuesday morning in Wellington. After meeting Scott at the airport, we walked into town and met Maribeth for lunch...so good to see them both. The city is beautiful and the national museum, Te Papa, is incredible...we are learning so much about New Zealand.

















On Wednesday, we walked to the top of Mount Victoria and saw locations used in the filming of "Lord of the Rings." The views are breathtaking and the wine here is excellent!!! We are heading to the south island early Friday morning for more adventures!

Close to home

Well, lately we haven't taken any big trips, and we've been a little bit delinquent in keeping up our blog. So we thought we'd let you in on what we've been doing while sticking close to the Wellington area.

Bob Marley's birthday happens to coincide with the Waitangi Treaty celebrations on Feb 6th. In the morning we took in a bit of the Waitangi Celebrations and in the afternoon we went to check out the One Love music festival. The guys on stage are called the Blackseeds, a popular reggae band in NZ and internationally as well.
















Jason and Beth , enjoying the fantastic tunes.















Here is a picture from a hike we took at a place called Makara. It's about 25 minutes drive from Wellington. The walk made for a good day of exploring, and had some interesting historical items such as gun mounts from the world war two era.















This is one of a few world war 2 gun mounts on top of the tallest hill in the area. Just in case the Japanese decided to invade. Lots of sheep too (surprise, surprise!)

And.....More Beaches

I suppose for most of us, a dream day would be lounging around on a beautiful beach eating mangoes and having the occasional swim in pristine blue waters. This was definitely a dreamy day at the pristine Otama Beach. We didn't intend to stay as long as we did (nearly all day), but when you're in such a nice place with few people around we thought it would be wise to take advantage of our surroundings.
















Here is a broader picture of the beach late in the day

Stony Bay

This is Stony Bay, definitely one of the highlights of our trip. The photos we have don't really do the place justice. It is a great place to spend a few days, if not because of the beauty, then because of the remoteness, which keeps the crowds to a minimum. We spent three days here and enjoyed hanging out, going for hikes and swimming/snorkeling in the warm water. We also spent a lot of time lying around under the giant pohutukawa trees in our campsite.

Here is the view from our tent. The
sound of waves lapping on the rocks
have a soothing effect and help you
get to sleep at night.




















Here is a picture along the Coromandel Walkway, which connects other bays and campgrounds along the tip of the peninsula.

The Coromandel is a popular destination this time of year and Cathedral Cove is probably the most crowded spot in the area. Fortunately we were there early in the morning so we avoided most of the crowds.

It was a really pleasant 45 minute walk down to the cove and there weren't many people on the beach when we got there. In a short while, though, more and more people were coming down the trail and tour boats were crowding the water. We knew it was time to leave when the banana boat showed up.





























There are actually three bays along the trail so we stopped to check out the others on the way back. The first is Gemstone Bay, where Scott went snorkeling. It has a snorkel trail of buoys with photos and information about the species that live in the marine reserve.

First stop... Rotorua

We've just returned from our tour of the Coromandel, at the north end of the North Island. It was a wonderful ten day vacation of warm weather, white sand beaches and turquoise water. But first, we stopped in Rotorua, a hot spot for geothermal activity, on the drive up.







The whole town smells of sulfur and every hotel and campground has it's own geothermal pool(s). We decided to skip the expensive goethermal areas and spas and checked out Kuirua Park instead, a city park with some bubbling mud and steaming pools.




















I'm not sure if it was quite as cool as Geyserland would have been but you can't beat the price (free!) They had a couple of built pools where you could soak your feet in the hot spring water and bridges across some of the steaming ponds (see Scott's photo.) Check the next post for photos of beautiful beaches!