Drive down to Rotorua

20-03-07
Cleared through Auckland airport really quickly, and just had a 5 minute wait for the hire car to arrive. The hire car isn't the best in the world, but we're not paying much so can't really complain. It's a Suzuki station wagon, given that everyone round here seems to drive Subabru's it would have been nice to had one of those to blend in and at least I would know where all the controls are!

For a minute I thought we'd got off at the wrong country and ended up in the USA, the airport and surrounding areas looks just like Orlando. Wide open spaces with bunches of low rise condos everywhere! We stopped off a couple of times on the drive down to Rotorua, and you can really tell they're in a different century round here ;o) The first stop at a motorway station reminded me off the Little Chef's when they first opened!!! The second stop, in Cambridge, we had a quick coffee in a historic building, very much like a southern Americon wooden gospel church.

The road down to Rotorua was great, wide open fast sweeping bends, through some great countryside. I think this was the area where they did the Hobbiton scenes in LOTR. There were tree ferns and Pampass gress growing along the side of the roads like weeds! This is very much an agricultural area with farm steads everywhere, primarily cattle, although I did spot one Alpaca farm! I reckon they must resurface the roads this time of year though as there were at least 5 sets of resurfacing works going on in the 250 KM's we covered from the airport to Rotorua. I think Deb missed most of the scenery, as she kept nodding off!

My GPS receiver is working fine and I've been able to grab some GPS tracks from my PDA on the way down. When I get chance I'll upload them so you can follow the route ;o)

The motel room is fine, it has seperate lounge and bedroom, plus a spa pool in a private enclosed patio area and a communal swimming pool in the grounds. I was straight in the spa for a soak and refresh myself after the flight and drive down. Popped out for a quick bite to eat and prices seem very reasonable.

Gave Deb her birthday present today, with it being a new handbag sized camera, it seemed better to give to her at the start of the holiday rather than at the end! She seemed pleased and promptly took a few pictures of me in the spa pool.... censored!

It's just beginning to sink in now, we're on the other side of the world......

Had a drive down the main "strip" to find somewhere to eat. No shortage of motels round here, and plenty of fast food joints, that said it's not too objectionable. Still feels a little like the US, I guess we'll find more of the reel NZ when we head further South.