Auckland - Bay of Islands

Today was mostly a travel day, and I didn't really see anything new for most of today but through a bus window, but those views have been great!

I stayed at Dermot and Sheenas Auckland apartment last night and this morning Sheena and I had a slow walk around their neighbourhood with the pups, sat and had a coffee in a lovely hipster cafe, then just chilled at the apartment watching Netflix till I had to go get the bus, a very stress free and relaxing morning. 

Last week when I was in Auckland I got myself a bus pass through the Intercity flexipass scheme, and loaded it with 50 hours of traveling. After doing some research both at home and asking folk once I got here, this seemed like the best and most reliable way to travel relatively cheaply over here. The busses (coaches) all have free wifi and your journeys work on an hour tariff. So I paid something like £350 ($nz 400) for these 50 hours and I book my journeys using a unique booking code and if the journey takes say 3 hours then it deducts that from my total hours on my account. Its much cheaper than booking individual trips, and so easy to do online/by phone! Will keep you posted with how this goes in practice, but so far so good. 

The bus journey was relatively painless, with the added bonus of having some totally epic scenery along the way!!! Comfortable coach, good aircon/temp, and good music (on my iPad (thanks Elephant Sessions and Adam Holmes for giving me a taste of home!) 

 

 

 

 

I arrived at Paihia about 5pm and was dropped off right outside my hostel, The Mousetrap. It's clean with nice beds and ace communal spaces, really can't complain.

I took a walk around the small town, which is basic but really lovely with some great restaurants and pubs, I stopped at a supermarket and got myself some stuff for breakfast, then found a nice bar called Thirty to eat dinner at. Started chatting with a lovely kiwi bloke at the next table and four beers later we were giving travel advice to each other for Nz and for Scotland /the Hebrides. Haha thanks Mark, as a solo traveler it's great to meet and chat to some locals especially when they give advice on things to do/see!!

I also tasted the local craft beer which was also, weirdly, the most Scottish sounding!

Tomorrow will be more exciting as I'm doing some exploring!! :D