Been and gone (group email)

Well, mum's been and gone and what a wonderful 3 weeks we had together! It's just been amazing. We saw and did so many wonderful things around the North Island, but it was also simply magic to get to spend some quality time together after almost a year and a half away from home.

We left South Auckland with a vague route in mind, but pretty much made up most of it as we went along. The (summarised) itinerary ended up as follows:

WAITOMO CAVES (abseiled 100m in then scrambled and swam back out over 6 hours, including enjoying the beautiful glow worms, eels, fossils and everything else along the way)

TONGARIRO CROSSING (excellent long hike, really lovely although relatively busy, we opted to climb up the bitch of a mountain that is Mt Ngauruhoe - Mt Doom very apt - that is best compared to a 750m struggle up a sand dune, well worth it for the views though)

FORGOTTEN WORLD HIGHWAY (2 days over one of the most scenic roads on the north island, stopping off to search for random 'historic' disused tunnels, boat landings, waterfalls etc along the way, and an overnight in the Independent Republic of Whangomomona, whose last president was a goat)

TARANAKI REGION/NEW PLYMOUTH (vegging time, after Ngauruhoe we couldn't face hauling ourselves up another young volcano, so we chilled in town, went for a boat ride and explored the festival of lights)

MATEMATEAONGA TRACK (4-day tramp through NZ bush, more views of Ruapehu etc, but a really fab experience to use the back country huts and rough it for a bit, plus we heard wild kiwis and mum got her first jetboat ride at the end)

WELLINGTON (I can't seem to stay away from this city! We indulged in the delights of the cable car, botanics, good food, Parliament visit with a dreadful guide, Te Papa - the national museum, a spot of theatre and one of our highlights of the holiday: nightwalk in Karori Wildlife Sanctuary where we saw tuatara (rare NZ lizards that live to over 100 years old) and wild kiwi)

MARTINBOROUGH (hired bikes and swayed our way round a good selection of Martinborough wineries, sampling everything along the way, including gorgeous pinot noirs, and sea salt chocolate at a specialist chocolate shop)

MT RUAPEHU (very strange to be on this mountain in the summer, but it gave us the chance to hike up to the crater lake and slide back down on the remaining bits of snow, as well as catch up with old housemates Bex and Basil)

ROTORUA (tourist central, we tortured ourselves with a 'maori cultural experience' evening - only the bus ride there and back saved it; we also visited a good range of thermal springs, sulphur lakes and glooping mud pots (my favourite), took a thermal mud bath and the other big highlight of the holiday: Kerosene Creek, a natural thermal river that you can just go and bathe in for free)

And then we came full circle back to my NZ family in South Auckland, took a wee visit to see the fish and penguins at Kelly Tarlton's before getting mum back on a plane home!

What now? Not quite the million dollar question it could be. I've got work in the NZ Festival covering February and most of March, which is great. I can't wait to get stuck in to that. I head down to Wellington on Monday on the Overlander train. Before that, I'm cashing in my birthday voucher from my parents and going to canyon down Sleeping Gods Canyon, one of the more extreme canyoning experiences in the country.

And the festival ends just before the other female member of the Odds clan arrives on these fair shores for a month. Excellent!