New Zealand: North Island- Auckland to Wellington

There and back again, North Island Vol. 1.

It’s been a hot minute since our last adventure blog. Something about a virus and plans out of windows, and extra Aus visas and having to get normal people jobs to make money to live off. But here we are! Out of the ashes.

I’d wanted to come to New Zealand for a very long time. I remember watching Billy Connolly’s World Tour of New Zealand and being so interested in his journey (plus he was hilarious), and crossed with a love of the Lord of the Rings film trilogy, being able to come was always a question of when. It was meant to happen in 2020 but see above.

Aotearoa- the land of the long white cloud. Or perhaps the long black cloud? As was our regular greeting, particularly in the North Island. Weather across Australasia had been somewhat odd in the lead up to summer, seeing ‘Snowvember’ in the southern states of Australia, even though it really should have been feeling much more warm and Spring-like, so I suppose we should have been a little more clued up for our arrival to NZ.

We began our journey with a few days in Auckland to adjust to our new country. Having spent the last almost 3 and half years in Oz, things here initially seemed to feel the same same, but different. A same language, driving the same side of the road, some of the same shops, but with a different set of currency (their coins only go as small as 10c!), a different time zone so even further ahead than the UK, and a different way of saying the same words.

Auckland, like Sydney for Oz, isn’t actually New Zealand’s capital city, but with an easy flight route from Brisbane, was a more convenient location to fly to. Our first evening in Auckland was spent having a very fancy-pants belated birthday meal for Kjel at the top of Auckland’s sky tower, in the very appropriately named Orbit 360. The panoramic views across the city and harbours were stunning, made easily enjoyable at our table as instead of having to walk around the tower to view it, the restaurant floor rotated around for us!

The next few days were spent visiting the classic touristy spots: a quick trip to the top of Mount Eden to get a slightly different perspective of the city and a day at the Auckland War Memorial Museum to get a little bit of a deeper insight into Kiwi history. We started to get a feel for the nature of where we were: probably the hilly-est place I’ve ever been. We took the opportunity to take the strain off walking around the city by trialling the latest global fad- electric scooters. We’d seen them wildly abandoned in the oddest of locations so decided to take the opportunity to see what the fuss was about. On the whole, not the worst thing I’ve ever done. Trying to navigate the “rules of the road” was a little tricky, as was trying to avoid going over the handle bars whilst scooting over loose bricks on the paths but on the whole they made for a much more enjoyable ride than using buses or trains.

We kept our city break brief and after a few days, we were ready to pick off where we had left our ‘travel life’. Our plan was to travel around the majority of the North Island during our first week in the van, spend two and a half week exploring the South Island, before making our way back to Auckland at the end of our 4 weeks, making last minute stops at anywhere we weren’t able to fit in during the first week. Unlike our Australian road trip that was fairly relaxed, we were a little more pressed for time with important checkpoints along the way that we couldn’t miss (ferry crossings and booked excursions). This meant that we really had to squeeze in the majority of our ‘must-sees’ and abandon some of the more obscure visits. This, obviously, was a shame but boy did I underestimate the time needed to get to many of our planned end of day locations once we tried to stop at the 1000 points of interest that I’d planned for the trip!

Northland

When we arrived at the camper van pick-up location, it took a little longer to get going than we’d anticipated. Once we were “happy” with our van (after requesting a set of new tyres that would actually last us for the full 4 week duration, instead of probably 150kms down the road), our first destination was the most northerly point of New Zealand that we could visit, Cape Reinga (pronounced Ree-ang-ah).

The trip was supposed to take a tasty 6 and a half hours so we should have arrived to our camp spot with plenty of time to spare before sunset. However, thanks to over an hours delay for fresh tread, we were already behind. Add the completely forgotten about supermarket trip for the staples of a successful vanning experience and our departure time slipped from 9am to after 12. But it’s all good. We’d still get there for 7pm- until the niggle surrounding why our fridge wasn’t cold when we collected the van (“I’m sure it’ll cool once you get on the road…”) turned into the realisation that there was something actually wrong when the water pump also didn’t work. A quick call to the help centre gave us an address for a camper van repair shop on Whangarai (pronounced Fang-a-ray). Thankfully the mechanic found the time to see us, and fixed more than one issue for us (I didn’t dare ask what the second problem was!), but the pit-stop set us back another hour.

Our saving grace was that unlike Australia, spring brought with it longer hours of sunlight, something we’d missed greatly since leaving the UK. It meant that instead of 2 or 3 hours of driving in the dark, we really were only driving in it for an hour to get to our campground. And at least being in NZ, we didn’t have to worry about the risk of wallabies and roos jumping out at you in the dead of night. Awesome. Instead, we were greeted with a wandering stray calf in the middle of the road and a number of possums instead!

Our first camp spot lead us down a long and winding unsealed, dirt road (our very favourite kind…) in the dark to Taputapotu Bay. The morning sunlight revealed a damp and wild coastline, but thankfully, as we left to make the final stretch to Cape Reinga, the weather picked up.

The North Island as a whole is covered in lush green, rolling hills as far as your eyes can see. While beautiful to behold, it meant that our road trip was jam-packed full of sharp bends, bouncy tarmac and steep ascents (followed closely with the corresponding steep descents). It was pretty unforgiving- I was at least grateful not to have to sit in the backseat this time, unlike our road trip in Tasmania! The hills also gave us the most stunning view points, where in front, we could see where the golden sandy dunes met the Tasman Sea, and behind, the road that carved its way through the greenery.

When we reached the cape, we witnessed the meeting point of the Tasman Sea with the South Pacific Ocean, with the waves moving in different directions as they collided with one another, like a wavy, watery dance. For Māori, it represents the creation of life, with the male and female seas meeting. We made our way to the lighthouse, because who doesn’t love a lighthouse? But also as the furthest point that we could walk to, it marked the place that Māori spirits begin their final journey to their ancestral homeland of Hawaiki, and that’s pretty cool!

As quickly as we reached the tip of Northland, we were headed all the way back down. Along the returning route, we stopped off at the giant Te Paki sand dunes. I don’t think we were quite ready for being covered in sand so soon into our adventure, nevertheless, we trekked our way up to the highest (and evidently the windiest) point we could reach. The views at the top were awesome looking out to the turquoise waters below.

Our next stop was in a similar, sandy vein, with a visit to 90 Mile Beach. For anyone who remembers the Top Gear race in NZ way back when, Jeremy used this beach to beat James in their race to the north of New Zealand, as you can drive the full length of the beach. Also, it really isn’t 90 miles long, apparently it was an estimation by early European settlers using their horses to give a rough measure of it’s length!

In a bid to avoid driving on the same roads twice, we managed to find routes that took us up on the east side of the island, and returned down on the west side. This gave us the chance to view the stunning coastal areas of Omapere and then through the giant trees of the Waipoua forest. The drive was mammoth though; it was almost 11pm when we rocked up to our revised camp stop- which any other day of our previous lives, was pretty normal (yay for hospitality!) but in travelling-life, it was super late and there’s little worse than trying to sneak your way through camped vehicles at night.

Central North Island:

The Coromandel

A late bedtime was matched with a delightful early start as tide times played a key role on our journey to the Coromandel Forest Park. We needed a low tide to expose Hot Water Beach, and low tide for us was just after 9am, and we were still 2 hours away.

We arrived to what really was not exactly the most exciting beach I’ve ever seen but a little walk across to the dense congregation of beach-goers revealed the geo-thermally heated sands that we had come for. A literally hot beach. Picking the perfect spot to dig our own little spa was not as easy as we hoped for. The patch of water heating the sand closest to the sea that we’d first arrived at was super, super hot; ‘physically can’t stand in the same spot else I would probably get first degree burns’ hot. Closer to the back of the beach, and we’d have been digging for the whole day to reach the heated water underneath. Once the tide started to turn, the mix of cooler sea water and the super hot water eventually mixed to create the perfect spa temperature. Sadly, our fun didn’t last long once the waves broke through the sandy spa defences but it was certainly a novel experience!

Our next stop was to visit the beautiful Cathedral cove. The cove was once a filming location for the second of the Narnia films, turning it into a popular spot for tourists. At the start of the track, the views from Hahei out to Te Tio and Motueka islands were stunning. We were fortunately gifted a gloriously sunny day. With the blue skies, turquoise waters and lush green islands, I could have easier mistaken our views for Thailand. The walk down to the cove was easy and at the bottom, we were greeted to the grandeur of the stone archway, framing the tropical waters from either end.

Rotorua

While maybe 80% of the North Island felt very Shire/Middle Earth-y, it did still feel Plant Earth-y. There were a few places along our route that very briefly took us off-Earth. Our visit to Wai-O-Tapu Thermal Wonderland was like arriving on a very alien planet. The luminous-yellow pits, being worn away by constant plumes of acidic steam; pools of bubbling mud; and pea-green lakes, all wrapped up in the delicious smell of eggy-sulphur. A stark reminder that Mother Nature has a very dark side.

Matamata (Hobbiton)

When planning this trip, I’d tried to include as many of the filming locations for the LOTR as I could- there were however many which we would definitely not be able to visit due to the inaccessible nature of them. The Shire, however, was a simple drive into the small rural town of Matamata. Stepping into Hobbiton was a magical experience. The recreation /immortalisation of the Shire set for the Hobbit films some years after LOTR was filmed was beautiful: the very real vegetable patches and flower-filled gardens, the many Hobbit holes, the stone bridge leading to the Green Dragon pub. It was clear how two years was spent replicating the set that could last for all to enjoy (and not just fans, probably 80% of our tour group hadn’t seen the movies!).

Tongariro

The Tongariro Alpine Crossing was a bit of a bucket list spot for me. Having spent a morning in the peaceful greenery of the Shire, I was definitely keen to take up the chance to see Mount Doom. The crossing, however, isn’t quite as quaint of an experience as that of the Hobbiton set. It’s actually a pretty intense, almost marathon-length trek to 1800+metres above sea level, across some fairly unforgiving terrain. As our road trip had to be planned pretty much to the day, we unfortunately were not given a lot of wiggle room to attempt the crossing. The odds were stacked against us; I checked the forecast every day since our arrival and even though we had tried to be as prepared as we could, the forecast for high winds and wintery showers were not easing up.

As the noble Boromir, may he rest in peace, once stated, one does not simply walk into Mordor. Don’t get me wrong, we really tried to experience Frodo and Sam’s valiant quest to return the one ring back to the fiery depths of Mount Doom. We loaded up with carbs for breakfast and adorned our 4 or 5 layers of clothes. We’d set out early to see if the shuttle to the start of the walk was running, alas it was not. We drove ourselves to the start point at Mangatepopo, hopeful that the easing of the recent rains would also ease the winds but Mordor’s wild weather got the better of us in the end.

The cloud didn’t pose a problem for the first 3 or 4 km of our trek across the Tongariro Alpine crossing. The fluoro markers were easy to follow and aside from a few streams that we needed to cross thanks to the recent deluges, the terrain was fairly easy. We reached Soda Springs checkpoint in good time and even managed to fit in the brief detour to Soda Springs Waterfall. As we ascended up the flights of Devil’s staircase leading to the South Crater, the winds whipped up and with it plunged the temperature. Visibility diminished and the markers became much more difficult to find. Hail arrived with the winds, ferociously blowing it into our faces. It signalled the end of our endeavour. We made it to the 6km marker, a third of the way in. It’s a good job the weather was a bit better the day Frodo arrived into Mordor because the outcome could have been very different!

Perhaps one day we’ll return when the weather is better to complete the full 19km crossing!

The poor weather followed us from Tongariro all the way to New Plymouth, where we’d hoped to catch a glimpse of Mount Taranaki. Alas, it was shrouded under a thick blanket of cloud, and with time against us, had to depart for New Zealand’s capital city to conclude our first full week of Kiwi van-life.

Unlike the length of this blog post, our first trip to Wellington was brief as we were booked in to catch the ferry to the South Island. Of course, we were greeted to a delightfully sunny day to enjoy being parked up bumper to bumper whilst we waited for the ferry to be emptied, loaded with lorries, unloaded again as they’d been loaded incorrectly the first time, and then finally be allowed to board. The light winds thankfully gave us a very calm crossing to enjoy our arrival to the south.

(North Island, Vol 2. will be much shorter, I promise!)