Day 141- We had a bit of a lie-in and then got up to an amazing breakfast of bacon and egg on toast. After all 5 of us got in and out the bathroom we were ready to leave the house. We drove in to Wellington and manged to find a free parking spot (Wellington have a stupid rule where even if you are paying you can only park for 2 hours). We started waking along the riverside, there was a crafts market on and a kids show so the place was packed. We wandered ar...

Day 140- We managed a good nights sleep and rose early to make sure we would make it to Wellington in time to drop the car of at 3.30pm. One thing we really wanted to do which time wouldn't permit was a canoe trip down the Wanganui River. It is a huge river which stretches for miles down the centre of the North Island with the mouth at Wanganui town. However it takes around 3-5 days and we didn't have time but we heard about the Wanganui River Road which is a roa...

Day 139- Fresh as daisies we were on the shuttle for 7am and arrived at the car park at 20 past where the driver told us to take care and not to pass the Emerald Lakes. It was very cloudy and quite cold so we got a stride on and arrived at Soda Springs earlier than expected. There wasn't much to them so carried on and marched up the Devil's Staircase which wasn't a patch on the steps up Emei Shan in China. At the top we abruptly came to flat land. We had arrive...

Day 138- Our camera was on the blink so we took it to a camera shop to see if they could see what was wrong with it and left it with them for an hour. We went for a walk and checked out the hostel before heading back to the camera shop. When we picked it up he told us it was the camera charging USB socket that was faulty and couldn't be fixed. He was kind enough to charge the battery for us though so we had a few days to decide whether to buy a new one or to bu...

Day 137- We were unsure whether to pay for one of the Maori cultural shows on offer at the thermal villages, they are quite expensive and don't seem very authentic- more a tourist trap. So we didn't bother with the night cultural show which includes dinner and dances for crazy money and we just drove to the thermal village ourself. Once there we discovered anybody could walk in and look around and that a guided tour was only $18. So we signed up and met our gui...