No matter how many times people tell you that New Zealand is impressive, beautiful and completely different to Australia, nothing quite prepares you for just how stunning this country is.

Only 4 million people and land two and a half times bigger that the UK, basically all of NZ belongs to nature, and it gives a pretty impressive show!!

Our trip began in Auckland, near enough on my birthday. After a mostly unsuccesssful trip up to the bay of islands thanks to awful spring weather, (when I say unsuccessful, I still mean waterfalls, beachs and beautiful scenary) we ended up at Auckland theatre to see Mary Poppings! It goes without saying, it was awsome.

We then headed East, to the Corromandel Peninsula. The peninsula was home to the most spectactular beach we have seen in three and a half months and the whole of Australia's east coast - New Chums Beach. Peaceful and untouched, we could have stayed there forever!

The peninsula was also home to the coolest thing I have ever seen...natural hot springs bubbling out of the sand at low tide! So hot that, in places, it boiled! Jez, with the help of a local, dug a huge hole for us to bathe in the hot water! First bath since July!!

Waitomo Caves were next and a spot of Black water rafting to see the glow worms. It is so hard to describe how brilliant very single thing that we have done has been, and this is another one to add to the list. Like nothing we have done before, we floated our way through the caves on a rubber ring looking at the millions of glowworms suspended from the cave ceiling. Unreal! I think Jez was quite surprised I managed to squeeze into some of those little gaps without crying! You just don't think of it when you're down there!!

Next stop, Rotarua! For everyone who has been there, there is no need to describe the smell, you can probably still taste it! For those who haven't been, I can't describe the smell! Here, we decided to take a tour around a Maori 'thermal' village, where they use the natural geezers and bubbling water and mud pools to bathe, cook and clean still today. This is a pretty cool part of the eartt. At that point, we were stood on one of the thinnest pieces of the earths crust. You could feel the heat coming through the bottoms of your shoes!! Scary, when then tell you a hole can pretty much open up at anytime. We were really amazed!

With more bad weather, and no sign of it clearing up, we decided we would hire mountain bikes for a day in Taupo. Its more fun in the rain anyway. Our legs cycled us to Huka Falls - a really long rapids followed by a mighty waterfall! Very cool...and 'Craters in the Moon' - more steamy, boling, smelly but awesome holes in the ground. Some of which were massive!!

After waiting around for 2 days in Taupo to see if we could walk the Tongariro Alpine Crossing, we weren't able to do due to galeforce winds, low cloud and snow in the mountains. This was a real dissapointment because it is meant to be one of NZ's highlights. We'll just have to come back...!

Straight to Wellington from here, and a ferry trip across the Cook Strait, through Queen Charlotte Sounds to the South Island.

We're hoping for better weather and some more beautiful scenary as well as some fun stuff to do! Keep an eye out...

Love you all xxx