From Parakai we headed South through Auckland and Hamilton and on to a camp site at Waitomo, known for its glowworm caves. We could not stay there without visiting the caves where we traveled in total darkness in an inflatable raft under a cave roof covered in a mass of glowing points of light, a bit like a lumpy Milky Way. By the end of the trip we could see our hands and other people, just by the light of the glowworms. No pics of those I’m afraid, too hard to photograph under those circumstances. However, here’s a pic from another cave we visited.

From there we went back to the West Coast and stayed in Mokau and had their much touted whitebait fritters for supper – vastly overrated. The beaches there have purply black sand – volcanic origins.

Next day we shopped for food in New Plymouth and headed through Stratford for Egmont National park and the slopes of Mount Taranaki, New Zealand’s ‘most climbed mountain’. We spent a stormy night, howling wind and rain, at Dawson’s Falls in the car park with other campers. However, the following day was a peach. The top of the mountain is still snow covered so there was no climbing that, but we walked down to the base of the waterfall which is quite stunning.

On the following morning we did a two hour climbing trip to see pools carved out from the volcanic rock – somewhat sensuous looking, don’t you think?

From Mount Taranaki we moved on to Foxton Beach for one night and then today we are on the outskirts of Wellington, ready to board the ferry tomorrow morning to take us to New Zealand’s South Island.

P.S. I've figured out how to get the time-zone right so now the postings will have the correct date and time. Up until now they've been GMT. which is a day behind.