Sunday 27th

I woke up in Napier this morning, and hired a bike for an hour in order to see as much as I could in the short time I was there. It was nice enough...though a bit of a grey day, with showers! Lots of beaches, with quite dark coloured sand rather than a typical golden sand, which was interesting. I think it's quite a popular place with water sports and surfing types, but for a visitor, it's not the most exciting place on this Island when the weather isn't great...one overnight was fine for me! The experience of getting on the coach was fairly unpleasant, and three coaches arrived, and shed their passengers, each to get onto a different coach to continue their journeys. But it was fairly unclear which coach was going where, and there were so many confused people that it was difficult to navigate through them with a large rucksack, in order to try and find someone who knew!

But eventually I got on the bus, and had an interesting journey chatting to the man next to me who was of a combination of Maori and English descent- so he was able to tell me loads of things about the land and it's traditions, and he also pointed me in the direction of the youth hostel his friends run and we all had a nice drink and piece of cake together :-) 

After settling into my room, I went for a walk to the geothermal stream, and had a brief dunk in the water (was too hot to stay long, I went all headachey!) it had a somewhat unpleasant aroma, which may not have helped. Sulfurous and nasty!

There's lots to explore here...oh I didn't say where I am! I'm at Lake Taupo... There are lots of bike and walking trails, so think I'll have another cycle tomorrow!

The pictures show the beach in Napier, and a lovely sunset in Taupo, which of course looked better in real life.