After a grueling 12 hour flight, I had high expectations of New Zealand. A plane ride that long with my three year old brother had been an awful experience, and I would settle for nothing less than the best of New Zealand. My expectations were met beyond what I could have ever imagined.

We began our journey in Auckland- a large city overlooking the ocean and spreading over multiple volcanic islands. Here we enjoyed shopping, traveling with a ferry to the different islands and enjoying the beautiful bay. To me, Auckland reminded me very much of Seattle- both cities even have an identical space needle, called SkyCity in Auckland, that dominates the skyline. After spending two days in Auckland, we drove to Waihi Beach, where, surprisingly, there were no beaches. Instead, there were hikes through abandoned gold mines and walking along hanging bridges.

We then made our way west towards Rotorua. Rotorua was composed of gently sloping hills, small towns and lots of sheep. We visited the Lady Knox geyser and the geothermal pools. In Rotorua, it was common to see steam rising from the ground in seemingly random places. At first, I thought there were a lot of forest fires- it was only once we visited the geothermal pools that it became clear that the whole area was built around a volcanp(edit.) We then went to an amusement park, and went lugeing, which is basically racing down a racetrack down a mountain sitting on a plastic rectangle with wheels and a handlebar attached. Quite the adrenaline rush. The highlight, however, was going on the gondola up the mountain and watching the sun set over Lake Rotorua. The next day, we drove to Taupo and took a tour of Huka Falls by jet boat. Our captain almost ran into the riverbank on purpose, braked randomly and performed dizzying 360 degree turns. While it was a little nauseating, the pictures of everyone’s faces were funny.

We then traveled to Waitomo Caves, home of the worlds only glow worm caves. As we traveled inside the cave by boat, we could see thousands of glow worms dotting the ceiling above, creating a starry sky indoors. We also saw two other caves, one of which was almost two kilometers long. Both caves boasted amazing rock formations, as well as hundreds of stalagmites and stalactites. After spending a day in the caves, we took the Forgotten World Highway (FWH) to Stratford. The FWH is a scenic highway with different historical sites and hikes along the way. My family underestimated how long it would take to complete the FWH, and we ended up parking the RV somewhere along the way. The next day, we made it to Stratfod and stopped for a quick hike. We continued to Wanganui and straight on to Wellington.

We ended our trip around the North Island in Wellington, the capital of New Zealand. Also built on a bay, Wellington was a beautiful city with something for everyone. We visited the te papa museum. My family was in Wellington during a monumental time- it was the rugby world championships and the Wellington Hurricanes were playing. It was so fascinating to see the whole city rally together, wearing the team colors and crowding the streets with their cheers. That night, my family got our first introduction to rugby at a sports bar. While the Hurricanes didn’t win, I thought it was amazing to see how dedicated all of the fans were.

The next morning, we woke up bright and early to take the ferry to the South Island and start the second part of our New Zealand journey.