The week began with one of our most packed days yet! After a pleasant night in Waipu we awoke to yet another glorious morning, and what better way to start it than a swim in the sea, so we put on our glad rags and raced over the dunes and into the sea, luckily we had the beach to ourselves. To warm us up again I fuelled Emma with eggs and toast and a morning cup of coffee, whilst we discussed the first stop of the day, Waipu caves.The caves have relatively easy access, and a free map can be obtained from the infomation centre in Waipu. The cave is famous for viewing one of the longest stalagmites in NZ and a 200m glow worm filled passage, and boy was there some glow worms, as we turned off our lights and looked up we could see a galaxy of little lights, it was pretty amazing, and something Em hadn’t seen before. We had a good wonder through the cave, wading through the streams and boulder hopping, and as we stopped for a brief spell, low and behold a massive Cave Wetta (a flightless cricket) was lurking on the wall. We took some footage of him, and tried to catch the glow worms but its really something to be seen with your own eyes. Eventually we left the cave, had a rinse down in the stream and set off again. Heading along miles of quite country roads, which are literally dirt/gravel tracks, which i know the Mossley ‘rally’ boys would be in their elements.Whangarei pronounced (fahn-ga-ray) is one of the last big towns before being in the north, but in the mists of it, is the wonderful ‘Whangarei Falls’ so we stopped off and took a look. We also carried on along the river walkway which brought us to yet another waterfall and the MASSIVE Kauri trees. People use to bleed the trees for gum which had many uses such as setting false teeth! some of these tree in parts of NZ are about 2000 years old.We left Whangarei and headed further up north to find a place to settle for the evening, luckily enough we found the rather pleasant Waro Limestone Scenic Reserve which consisted of a forest of weathered limestone rock formations. As we escaped the pesky flies and settled in for the evening enjoying couscous and veg for tea, a local out litter picking knocked on our door to say hi and shared his stories of his travels around the UK, dinner was going cold and the flies were delighted to have easy access in, but it didn’t matter as he was very pleasant. He eventually said farewell, and we discussed the possibility of stopping off again here on our way back, we’ll have to see.14th SeptemberLike any morning we had a wee dip, this time it was in the reserves quarried lake, It was a bit chilly but refreshing. After we took a stroll into the depths of the limestone forest, and attempted to loop back around the lake, but were starred down by a herd of rather edgy cows, so we looked and turned away, they won the stand off. Next stop Bay of Islands.Its true what they say, Bay of Islands is a beautiful part of the country, but its also true that its best explored on sea by one of the highly popular cruises and at $80 a pop we decided to explore on foot and save a boat trip for another venture. The town of Paihia is where it all happens in terms of trips out to sea, but its also home to the Waitangi Treaty Ground, which is the founding document of modern New Zealand. We explored the grounds whilst making our way to Haruru (Big Noise) Falls and the mangrove forest walk, apparently maori legend tells of a water monster that lives in the lagoon below, we didn’t see it though.We ended the day with another freedom camp, and whist being frugal on the accommodation for the night we splashed out on dinner and bought a hot chicken with stuffing, fresh soft buns and a bottle of coke from the shop and had that for tea, and it was absolutely delicious. As we took an evening explore after tea we realised we were near the site of the oldest wooden house in NZ ‘Kemp House’ to be honest it looked pretty similar to all the other wooden houses here, but give NZ a few more hundred years of history to catch up with and it may just be something else.15th SeptemberToday was about exploring the rest of the Bay of Island region, we really wanted to get up high and take a look, so we headed to a place called St Paul’s Rock but not before stopping off at yet another waterfall, this one was called Rainbow falls. You can actually walk behind this one but after the heavy rain the night before, the stream was impassable, especially with a camera etc.We popped into Matauri Bay to see the rather interesting stone arch memorial symbolizing a rainbow, which remembers the Rainbow Warrior, the Greenpeace flag ship which was sabotaged by the French secret service, before it set sail to protest against the French nuclear testing out in the pacific. I couldn’t help but scramble up it.We followed the coastal road round to Whangaroa, and scrambled up the volcanic dome of St Paul to get a view of the almost land locked harbour. It was an amazing view, we even met the local Rambling club or should I say Tramping club out for the day.We decided we wanted to stay at a campsite tonight so we took the long drive up to the base of the 90mile beach and found a great campsite in Pukenui, which offers a free bottle of wine on your arrival. They even have a pet sheep, which for some reason is on a lead. We’re here now and we’ve just had a lovely warm shower and tided up the camper and are currently sat in the evening sun enjoying the wine, Emma is already getting rather jolly. Think we will behaving a fish paella for tea and even some popcorn for supper. We are now only 1 hour from the tip of NZ so think we shall head up there tomorrow.We hope you are all well, missing you allLee & Emma