#campermate

The Campervan Life – New Zealand

Sharing my Road trip itinerary with you guys! Date: 20 March – 1 April 2017 8 Days Roadtrip by Campervan + 4 Days Airbnb & SUV After much discussion fiancée’ (now wife), we decided to go for a 12 days adventurous and laid back trip for our honeymoon. Where else than to experience kiwi (better known as New Zealand) life, up close and personal by campervan (equipped with queen bed, shower, a…

Tanum sands

After our last installment we book a spot on the Waitomo glow worm caving tour for the following day convincing ourselves it'll be excellent cross-training. Things were starting to look up. Even better news, we are now the proud owners of Kmart's finest tent and keen to put it to use. 

A photo posted by Bets & Sean. We run and travel (@we.ran.there) on Feb 6, 2017 at 11:13pm PST

Thanks to our new favourite app campermate, we pitch our new home in the glorious sunshine at a free campsite and wolf down some pre-run Tim-tams. We carefully amble over the world's most rickety bridge and start a trail run up the river. The run could only be described as a jungle obstacle course, opening out into vast overgrown fields. A few miles in, Sean lands his right foot square onto a sharp rusty spike in the undergrowth, straight through the shoe and about half an inch into his foot. What a twat. Limping back to camp like the human version of our shit van.

So that's the caving tour off the cards, not to mention the running. Bets suggested we head to Lake Taupo, as at least kayaking is something we could do without being on our feet. Lady luck of New Zealand you haven't beaten us just yet. Kayaking was awesome and we had a great time charging around the lake dodging paddleboards and speedboats. Sean enjoyed being a lout:

A photo posted by Bets & Sean. We run and travel (@we.ran.there) on Feb 6, 2017 at 3:27pm PST

In high spirits we return to the car, go to unlock the door and the key pretty much shears off... So it's Sunday midday, on a long weekend, in the middle of Taupo and we're locked out. Lady luck we're getting sick of your shit. 5 Hours of waiting around for the nearest locksmith to come visit us, our wallet ever lighter, we're back on our way again.

Next stop: Napier/Hastings, where orchard work is abundant as are wineries. About time we think about putting our working holiday visas to good use. But first, time for a cheeky wine tasting, nodding along politely to all the flavours that were being described that we couldn't detect and ever wishing the tasting portion was slightly larger.

A photo posted by Bets & Sean. We run and travel (@we.ran.there) on Feb 7, 2017 at 5:51pm PST