We have been on the road now for 97 days…gosh that seems like a long time! We have taken 7 flights and traveled to 5 continents, had 4 hire cars, 2 caravans and 1 wheel blowout. I’d love to say our sanity is still intact but that would be a big fat lie! Mostly its been a blast and we wouldn’t change anything but there is too much to share in this post alone so I’ll share the places we have been to on the New Zealand destination page! If you are thinking of visiting New Zealand then all I can say is “just do it!”, you really won’t regret it and perhaps you won’t want to go home…(and that’s OK too!).

I won’t try to sugarcoat our adventures as we want to share the good and the bad days. But even on the not so great days I still like to think we are only going a little bit crazy with a dash of silliness and some cheerful ignorance – definitely the only way to be when traveling with little ones and basically winging it!

The kids have adapted beautifully to all the change and along with growing lots they now have another level of sibling play which mostly involves trying to beat each other until one squeals – yep. At the moment my mornings consist of playing referee and trying not to wake up the entire campsite at 7am (however if its nearer 8am then its fair game!). They have made some lovely friendships along the way too and are really starting to blossom as outgoing and friendly kids (*high five!*) although several people have also mentioned with a horrified look on their face to me how “Olivea is fearless!” which I shrug off as her wanting to not be outdone by her older brother so always gets involved even if shes told shes too small (go girl!).

How have we as a couple adjusted to life on the road? Well, Brad is a lot browner than he used to be and it suits him and I now have freckly knees (which is not a great look). We live in flip flops or jandals as the Kiwis call them and our already previously infrequent date nights are now replaced by looking at the stars whilst the babies sleep and with the soft buzz of mosquito’s eating us alive in the background! Has it made us stronger being in each others company all day everyday? Ummm… its made us have some fairly heated discussions on many things (including how terrible I am at helping Brad park the caravan – haha – I blame it on us being 2 strong-minded people!) but we have found our routine and our own responsibilities and being Engineers we always needed some order in the dis-order of travelling family life so its worked out well! We know we made the right decision in what we are doing and its been really nice trusting each other to take action and make things happen – its not an easy thing to do and at times you wonder what on earth you are doing but for us its been well worth the risk!

Its been 36 days so far in New Zealand and what an amazing place – it really does seem to have it all. The landscape is breathtaking and I don’t think we have had an ugly or boring drive since we’ve arrived. The geothermal activity is really fascinating and although we have done some tourist attractions we have made a point of trying to do things that cost nothing and soak up the beautiful outdoors. The weather has also been immense with temperatures averaging 25 degrees but often feeling a lot hotter. We have also learnt to respect the sun here – its incredibly strong and I find myself re-applying SF50+ cream every few hours unlike in Europe.

Then there’s the people – WOW – just WOW. Perhaps we have grown up believing manners, common courtesy and good will are from a distant past and I guess they do say that New Zealand is many years behind the UK in many aspects but its clearly behind in all the good ways! We have been blown away by the customer service and helpfulness of almost every Kiwi we have met and that includes expats too! We have been given some great advice on where to go and what to see and ways to get things cheaper (loving this!) and that’s from almost everyone we meet – even the guys in the tire shop spent 20 minutes sharing their favorite places to go, must see’s and pulled up a map showing us what routes were the best to take! It really has been a refreshing introduction to the country and Kiwis in general.

Here are just some of our favorite things so far on our travels:

• Relaxing in a geothermal waterfall called Kerosene Creek. Cost = FREE
• Watching the kids explore the many beautiful beaches and hold a baby crab in amazement. Cost = FREE
• Going for a dip and an impromptu picnic at Lake Taupo with a lovely family we met. Cost = a few bags of curly fries and toasted sarnies
• Taking in the lovely view and beach from our FREE campsite in the Ngatitoa Domain. Cost = FREE
• Eating amazing fresh fruit ice creams (and you are never far away from ice cream!). Cost = $4

I will update and release the New Zealand page shortly with a full breakdown on our travels and we are also going to start a weekly video log on youtube (very excited!) so check in again with us next week for some more travel gossip! Hope you’ve enjoyed reading and sorry about the mind-dump – catch-up soon!