We did it!

Happy 2008 to everyone. Sorry we haven't kept you undated but we were literally in the middle of no were. We managed to see all of the North and South Island. It took allot of miles and searching every night for a perfect campsite. The 4 wheel drive came in handy on the gravely unpaved roads. The scenery is amazing and so diverse. We have seen glaciers,waterfalls, valleys, mountains, rainforests, rapids, beaches, forests etc. all in the size of the state of Calorado. We have been in the country for 3 months about. We are now ready to settle down.
We spent Christmas Eve camped at a site next to the ocean on the top of the South Island. It was sunny and Matt went for a dip. We exchanged presents sitting on our fold out travel chairs and a bottle of bubbly. We bought a crank radio for tunes but no Christmas music or any other signs of the season here. Christmas is being fazed out and the next day Boxing Day is the big deal. I bought Matt a Maori tiki, some t-shirts, fillet knife for diving and other odds and ends picked up on our travels. It's kind of hard hiding a present living together out of a van. He bought me a sarong with fern print a hand weaved backpack, a leather bracelet and some other hand made crafts. It was a unique experience. I had planned on finding a tree to decorate with the Pua shells we dove for at a beach but there wasn't a tree.
. We drove onto the ferry Christmas afternoon as planned with no troubles just a bit of rain. We sat in the front of the boat in reclining seats as we navigated through islands. We drove off the ferry 3 hrs later in Wellington on the North and started having engine trouble. The beast was on it's last leg and we knew we had to get to a camp fast. We tried to get up a hill but it died in the middle of the highway. There we were on Christmas in the rain in a foreign country with a dog and most our possessions with us. We had no time to get down we had to act fast. We each grabbed a pack and filled it with survival gear and important documents. We next called the Police who had trouble understanding were we were. Finally we got a tow # and he was able to come out for a fee and tow us. We had no were to go so we pleaded with a hotel nearby to let us stay with our dog. The van got dumped outside the hotel door and there it stayed for 3 nights while we had to wait out the holiday. The kiwis all go on a month holiday at the same time. Everything is closed while they go set up camp on the beach. Luckily Matthew is a trooper and got on his bike in driving rain and a hail storm to find the info center, bank and finally a car dealer to buy us our new Toyota 4 runner. We were so glad to get out of there on our way.
We were having a stretch of bad luck. Our camera broke at the most scenic lake at Mt. Cook , Matts surf board snapped in half before he got to the good beaches and then the car. The other day Matt misplaced his wallet at the library. For once I stayed calm and ran back to beg the librarian to open up. I knew our luck couldn't get worse...
We got the wallet back, got a new camera and today found a house to rent a street away from the most amazing beach. It has it's own private garden with fruit trees, lavender, hydrangeas, roses a shed, a garage for me to transform into a studio, a enclosed patio for entertaining and two beds. A young couple just bought it as an investment and we got along so they said it's a go in 2 weeks!
New years we saw Rhythm and Vines, a concert held on a vineyard in Gisborne. This is one of the towns that was days earlier struck by an earthquake. We haven't felt anything yet but we do sit on a fault line. It keeps us on our toes. We were by far the oldest at the concert. We didn't know any of the bands but were just glad to hear live music. We have been without tv or a radio for so long. They had fire breathers , acrobats, people on stilts and firwork show at midnight. We were able to set up a tent during the show in one of the fields.I'll post pics.
I posted only a few of the pictures we've collected.I am working on a slide show with it's own soundtrack. Hopefully I can burn everyone a copy and you can print out the pictures you each like. I can't wait enlarge a bunch of them. I kept two small journals too. One for North one for South. Keep reading the blog. We will change out the pictures in a few days.