Fire and Ice on the Tongariro Alpine Crossing
The Tongariro Alpine Crossing is rated as the world’s finest day hike and is described by the Lonely Planet as “Reputedly the best one day walk in New Zealand, the Tongariro Alpine Crossing spectacular volcanic geography, from an active crater to the steaming vents and beautiful coloured lakes. The crossing is one of New Zealand’s life-changing experiences” The Tongariro National Park featured as Mordor in the Lord of the Rings trilogy. Mordor is the great volcanic plateau filled with geological wonders known as Gorgoroth. Much of Frodo and Sam’s journey...
Read MorePolar outbreak in New Zealand
Just read the weather forecast for the coming days: “Polar outbreak on Monday and Tuesday – A burst of cold air originating from the Antarctic ice sheet is expected to affect New Zealand on Monday and Tuesday. Unseasonably cold temperatures, strong winds and snow to low levels are expected over the South Island where this event is likely to have a high impact. The coldest air is expected to make its way north to the North Island on Tuesday bringing strong winds and unusually low temperatures” So it seems that the Indian summer that we had for a long time now in New Zealand...
Read MoreCamping days are over
We are back in Auckland but this time without our camper van. A few days ago we returned our camper van and picked-up a rental car. We all felt a little sad, as we had been travelling in our van for five weeks and it had become a little bit our home. You get used to living in a van and it is surely a great way to discover New Zealand. But it is now time to move on and we have different plans for the last three weeks of our stay in New Zealand, so no more camping. So what did we do in the last week with the camper? We wanted to visit a new part of New Zealand and we were searching for nice...
Read MoreRumbling Volcanoes in the North
Finally we have found a campsite that offers decent internet. We have now 2hrs or 1 gig of free internet, so plenty of room to upload new pictures and write an update. The main reason is that we are currently in Auckland in one of the city campings and modern facilities are more common here than elsewhere in NZ. We are in Auckland because sadly we needed to say goodbye to the grandparents who travelled back home today. But the trip ain’t over for us yet, we have one more month to go here. We have been travelling through the North Island for the past week. It is totally different from...
Read MoreThe final days on the South Island
A quick update from our trip. We have left the South Island and are currently on the North Island. In our last days on the South Island we wanted a little bit of a summer beach holiday. We were debating if we would visit the Tasman Park or the Golden Bay. The Tasman park apparently is very beautiful, but not as easy to explore with young kids. You would need to take water taxi’s and do some serious walking. So we opted to explore the Golden Bay. An area that is popular with locals who spent their summer holidays here and in December and January the beaches and camps are packed. But we...
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