For those of you who haven’t see it yet, here is Ben’s skydive in Wanaka, New Zealand:

[vimeo 6998076]

We’re now back in Auckland after a very cold (-2 degrees) stopover in
Waitomo Caves.

We spent today in the Auckland museum, main art gallery and exploring
the various galleries throughout the city hosting the photography
festival. Nothing hugely inspiring art-wise but we rather like
Auckland – it has a nice feel to it.

Also got some important shopping done: we now have a guidebook to
roadtripping the US and a map to start plotting our line. That should
keep us busy on the beach in paradise.

We fly to Rarotonga tomorrow afternoon (6th June) and arrive this
evening (5th June). Wierd!! We get a bonus 6th June. What shall we do
with it?! Btw, Internet access is an unknown in Rarotonga so don’t
panic (Mums) if you don’t hear from us for 2 weeks.

Last night in the camper tonight 🙁 We shall miss it. It’s been great
fun. Recommend Escape campers to anyone who’s coming to New
Zealand…as long as you’re not much bigger than us two, it could get
cramped.

Since the glaciers we have just been making our way North, stopping in
Greymouth, Westport, Nelson & Picton. Nothing hugely exciting but we
had a lovely walk along the coast in the Abel Tasman National Park and
a cold but clear trip through the Marlborough Sounds back to the North
island this morning. We even saw a big pod of dolphins jumping and
frolicking in the sun, a fantastic sight. The pic was taken during a
walk along the coast from Picton looking out into the Marlborough
Sounds yesterday.

We did think that as we moved North the weather would get warmer. We
have been incredibly lucky with gorgeous clear sunny days for the last
week or so but it has got colder – it was -1.8 degrees the night
before last which is our record so far but generally is just below
zero at night. We’re snuggly under our 2 duvets and heater though.

Now in Whanganui in North Island making our way back to Auckland for
our flight to Rarotonga on Saturday. Can’t wait for warmth!!!

After leaving Wanaka, which we both loved, we drove further North
along the coast to Fox Glacier and Franz Joseph Glacier. We stopped
and had a look at Fox first but it turned out to be less impressive
than Franz Joseph which we went back to this morning and did the
longer walk to get up close. It was truely awesome but we’re glad we
decided not to do the day-long walk through it which looked knackering
to say the least.

After our walk to the glacier this morning we drove North to Greymouth
where we are staying tonight. It’s a little warmer here thank
goodness. We survived our lowest overnight temperature of 0.9 degrees
in Wanaka so we should be fine under our 2 winter duvets here.

By the way, if it looks like we are always wearing the same clothes in
the photos it’s because we are. Don’t worry though, we are washing
them when we can pluck up the courage to go without during the wash
and dry cycle!!