New Zealand - June 1 - 3

Well here we are in New Zealand, where men are men and sheep are nervous!  

We left Tassie at 6:30 in the morning, a very mild morning, too early for the sun to be out, but it was very mild.  Very sad too...

We had to fly to Sydney by Virgin Air as there is no direct flight to New Zealand from Hobart, it was cancelled a few years ago, what a shame.  Anyway, Dalton books everything online, as you do nowadays.  Well, it seems only a Travel Agent can book International flights so you can take advantage of the overseas policy for extra weight.  We had to pay an additional $210.00...making it a total of $510.00 (adding the last trip as well) that we have now paid for overweight baggage., and then they won't check your bags all the way so we had to collect them in Sydney, take a cab to the tune of $20.00 from the Domestic Terminal to the International Terminal and go through the entire process again.   This is what happens when you have to fly domestic by the cheaper airlines.   Virgin is way better than Jet Star, as they let sports equipment fly free so I can't lay the blame on the golf clubs this time.

The weather was really nice in Auckland when we arrived considering the horrible weather they had in the morning.  They had so much rain that some areas were flooded.  We didn't want to go into the City so we drove around, looking for a Caravan Park as their cabins are cheaper, however, by the time we got out of the airport, got to the place to pick up the car we were renting, it was so dark we had a terrible time finding anything.  

We drove to a little Town called Drury and stayed in a motel there,  the Drury Motor Inn, it was very comfortable because we both drifted off immediately when we went to bed, slept through the night without ear plugs.  

The North Island is very beautiful, it is fairly small so there is no hurry as we do have three weeks here.  We just travelled a couple of hours and stopped at a little place called Raglan.  The Caravan Park is nice and it is a 5 minute walk to downtown.  Dalton is going to golf tomorrow.  He has not golfed since we were at Hervey Bay.  I think he is feeling withdrawals.

The beaches here have black sand instead of white like Australia.  The accents are much softer, they sound more like us.  Actually, New Zealanders are considered the Canadians of the Southern Hemisphere. 

People are still in shorts and there are lots of bare feet walking around.  Today I could have had on shorts and, dare I say it...thongs.., however, shoes and socks are much better for walking and climbing hills.  Have I mentioned that New Zealand is very hilly!!!  The hills look to be terraced, we think it is from the animals grazing but they seem to be so even and go all around the hill.

The scenery is absolutely beautiful, in every direction

This is the view from the top of Bridal Veil Falls looking down at the lower walkway

another view of the falls

I think you can see how it got its name, Bridal Veil Falls!

We stood and stared at the falls for about 1/2 hour.  It seemed to have us both mesmerized.

This is one of the surf beaches just out of Raglan, where we are staying.  It is really beautiful, can you notice the black sandy beach...  The building is the Surf Club, they are very big in this neck of the woods.

Same beach from the other side of the club house, pretty spectacular

I am going to post his now before I get kicked off.  New Zealand doesn't have any free WiFi sites so you have to purchase time, downloading pictures takes up lots of time and when you run out it just boots you out not giving you a chance to purchase more time.  I don't want to lose what I have posted already so will go for dinner and when I come back will purchase more time and continue.