North Island Day 1

Rachel was up before the crack of dawn today as she was so very excited about going on holiday.

The final bits of packing went really quickly and we even got the floors cleaned and the kitchen spotless before we left. We were on the road just after 8am. So a lovely early start to the day.

We headed up to Kaikoura for lunch. We chose the inland scenic route all the way and that was a mistake. We should have cut across where I drew that red line. The road after that was very windy and so very slow. Thankfully I had a motion sickness spray that I could give myself and Ruth - we seemed to struggle the most. It was only 130km but it took over 2 1/2 hours. We arrived a bit earlier than expected (thanks to the hour early start) and so we stopped at the beach in Kaikoura. What a magnificent day. It was so very beautiful. The girls enjoyed picking up stones that had been smoothed so wonderfully. You can't believe a stone can be so smooth.