The Forgotten World Highway & The Dairy Farm

We left New Plymouth on Monday October 5 to begin the next part of our adventure. We started up The Forgotten World Highway (Highway 43), one of New Zealand's most secluded roads. Don't worry, we will filled up Black Betty before we left and we had 5 liters of extra petrol. You can read more about it at the following site:

http://www.aatravel.co.nz/101/MustDo_The-Forgotten-World-Highway.html

These photos are of the old single lane Moki tunnel we went through. It was surveyed in the 1890s and constructed in 1935-1936.

On our way to Turangi, near Lake Taupo we got to experience some southern hemisphere kiwi snow! Big wet flakes. This was a pretty big storm and many of the roads around us were closed. It made for a very chilly night of camping in Black Betty. Check out the road sign, "slippery when frosty."

From Turangi we headed north to Maramarua (East of Pukekohe on Highway 2). This was a very beautiful drive through the middle of the country. Rolling hills of green and lots of sheep. We are going to visit and stay with some good family friends (the Smith family). They live and work on a Dairy Farm. We spent the day visiting the calves, pigs, sheep, chickens, etc. John is helping feed the calves. This sheep had triplets! It's pretty unusual for them to have three lambs at once. They are only about a week old and so cute.

Later we got some fresh milk to put it in the fridge overnight so the cream and milk would separate. The next morning we used the cream for our coffee and the milk for our cereal. So tasty! A few hours later Angela made butter. It turned out great!

We had delicious fish and chips down by the Firth of Thames (pronounced Tims). This was a beautiful sunset.

Funny sign at the mall:)

Chaddy's Charters & Lone Star

The skies cleared this Saturday and we saw the sun again! We took a boat ride with Chaddy's Charters around the sugar loaf islands. These are islands that are extinct volcanos in the Tasman sea just off the coast. Chaddy let us both drive the boat.

Chaddy always brings his dog along for the ride. Sometimes he goes fishing while they are out and every now and again he catches something. Today he gave it a great attempt but he did not catch anything. He pulls on the line every once in a while to see if there is a fish on the end. It was pretty funny to watch.

A few days ago we were walking around the streets of New Plymouth and came across a delicious smell. It happened to be this Turkish Kebab place. So today we decided to give it a try. It was very tasty! This goes to show that a little hole in the wall can make a very great meal.

Sunday night Jilling and Janine took us out for a very nice dinner at Lone Star New Plymouth. This was a nice feel of "home" but the menu looked a bit different. They have sea food, mexican food, and of course steak. Since I have a mexican food shaped hole in my stomach I ordered one of the best burritos I've had in weeks! John got some tasty prawns.