Our journey down to Lake Mahinapua was a fairly short one and involved no little walks or stop offs on the way. We did however have to pick up some fancy dress bits in Greymouth before we left, ready for the nights entertainment at Lake Mahinapua or the 'Poo Pub' as it is known, because the way Mahinapua is said ('Mahina-poo-a') and not for any other reason. The standard weather had graced us again and it was early evening by the time we had arrived at our s...

After doing a couple of walks on the way to Greymouth, one to a seal colony and one at the pancake rocks and blow holes (Punakaiki). These are where the sea has eroded holes in the shore line rocks and with rougher sea's, water is forced out through the middle of them, like the blow hole on a whale, not that we saw this happen. We also drove along New Zealand's answer to the great ocean road in Australia. A beautiful stretch of road which, understandably runs...

So after leaving the not so impressive stop off of Kaitiriri we were hoping for somewhere better in Westport. Lets not beat around the bush with this, it wasn't. If anything the town itself, although bigger was not as pretty as the coastal Kaitiriri. The hostel we stayed at though was better than the last, with a nice homely feel to it. We had also managed to bag ourself a double room for pretty much the same price as a dorm bed which was a bonus. After chec...

With morale lower than a skateboarders trousers, we arrived in Kaiteriteri in the late afternoon, with the idea of booking into a private room to catch up on some sleep, this plan lasted all of about 2 minutes, when upon check in, we were told the privates were all fully booked, bummer. Instead we were allocated a eight bed dorm, which should have slept six, max, with absolutley no where to store our bags. It was like when you move house and just have stuff e...

Clear heads and an early morning greeted us the day we left Wellington. We had found a couple of free breakfast vouchers in our room so before leaving we helped ourselves to the free continental breakfast before heading for the bus, it was then onto the ferry. On board the ferry and a couple of hours later we travelled across the Cook Straight and reached the South Island. The weather was alot nicer than what we had left in Wellington and our bus started to ...