Island Time

Our retirement on Island Time as liveaboards.

Island Time crew goes to New Zealand
Part 12

The north Island is about 500 miles north to south

New Zealand Days 10 and 11 Travel Days

We left Whakatane and continued our travels south toward Wellington, the capital of New Zealand, on the southern end of the north island. Our first day travels took us back through the thermal areas again with its hot springs and geysers. Once south of Lake Rotorua we headed for Taihape through the Rangipo Desert.

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On the road again through the mountains

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Lake Taupo in the background

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Lake Taupo

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Our first view of snow capped volcanoes

Tangario National Park: Mtn Ruapehu (9176 feet, highest peak on the North Island) straight ahead and Mt Ngaurihoe (7500 feet) and Mt Tongariro to the right, tops obscured by the cloud. Mtn Ruapehu has two ski areas open June to Oct.

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We were travelling in lush green pasture land and then suddenly we are
In the desert of New Zealand - the area is surrounded by mountains that
traps all the moisture.

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The desert continues to the base of the mountains (Mt Ruapehu)

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The day we travelled was very windy and we even had a sand storm

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The only town that we passed through in the desert was Waiouru where the New Zealand army base is located. As quickly as we entered the desert it ended and the landscape turned green again. We stopped for the night in Taihape (S39 degrees 39.3 minutes; E 175 degrees 46.8 minutes). We continued the next day down Route 1 towards Wellington where we planned to stay for two days (S 41 degrees 13.8 minutes; E 174 degrees 48.6 minutes).

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In Australia we had exotic birds in our camp site – in New Zealand sheep
In our campsite (what else could one expect?)

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Typical sheep pasture – the larger poles of the fence are embedded in
the ground – the smaller poles are only attached to the wire –I assume this design is to keep the lambs from escaping