Day 1 and 2 of the North Island Hippie Tour

So I decided that I need to get a better look at the North Island of New Zealand before school started, and just happened to run into 12 other people who had the same idea. Well more like we all hooked up on a whim and hopped into a van not knowing each other. Well it may relieve you to know (it did me) that we did bring 1 Kiwi guy with us. By the way a Kiwi is a local, we called him Kiwi Mike (the guy with the dreads in the sun glasses). We took off Thursday and drove until we found a nice little beach just North of New Plymouth where we whipped out our togs and jandals (swimsuits and sandals) and took a dip in the Tasman Sea.

This is a really rough Idea of what we did. I wasn't driving as I have not gotten ahold of the whole lefty road and wheel thing yet, and the driver didn't really know where we were going because we didn't have a plan.

(Left: Kiwi Mike, Julie,Cassandra,Nick,Marika,Mike, Eve)Our camping style was what you might call "modest" as we all brought the bare essentials. However we were lucky enough to have two camping stoves and thus warm dinners! The first night we were desperate for a place to stay so we talked to a lifeguard training center and stayed in their backyard.

This is our first recreational breakfast- I have to say we did alright for ourselves in the food department.

Our only "shower"

I saw my first possum that night, thought it was a cat. They are a lot like raccoons as they dig through garbage and will try to get their sneaky paws into anything. And I should add a couple nights later they surrounded Cassey and I when we were trying to get into the trailer which was full of food. OO OOO and later that next morning Amanda woke up to her finger being sucked on by what we think was a hedge hog.

After a long day driving we found a great spot to jump in the lake. Though we had cool weather the water was just the perfect temperature- just after Kiwi Mike steered us to a natural hot springs where skinny dipping wasn't an issue.