We got up at 6am (too early) to do the Tongariro Crossing, an 18.5km challenging mountain climb. The first 45 mins consisted of comfortable flat paths with sporadic rocky out crops, but after that some muppet put a mountain in the way! The first stage of the ascent is an hour long climb known as "the devil's staircase", which pretty much was a rocky ladder. Once you reach the top though, the view is fantastic and you can see the magnificent sulpher lakes and the lava fields, which was actually where the end of the third Lord of the Rings was filmed.

After this spectacular but very tiring walk we drove south to Paraparaumu to meet my parents who coincidently have been travelling around Australasia as well. After a nice reunion and some decent food at their rented beach house, we all chilled out and watched the sunset.

Day 16 was fairly uneventful, we all went to stock up on clothes etc and then stayed in the beach house all day playing pool, catching up and drinking. Naturally dad was drunk under the table so ended up making a tit of himself! It was hilarious!

The following day we got up at 5am and said a tired goodbye because we had to catch the 7.30am inter-island ferry. The 4 hour ferry journey was pretty uneventful as there was not enough seats, though we did end up talking to a random group of old Dutch people about the war! We also saw dolphins swimming near the ferry which was pretty impressive. And that was the end of North Island. As a whole, North Island was a big let down, there wasn't a lot to do and the scenery is very dry and almost baron. Auckland was very enjoyable and it was one of the more enjoyable cities in Noth Island. It was at this stage that i really was hoping that South Island was a lot better.