Dinner at Celine's

After leaving Whakapapa, we took the windy road West towards Taranaki.

When we finally emerged from the windies, we drove up to the base of Mt Taranaki and went for a walk up to Wilkies Pools. Unfortunately, the weather was a bit overcast, but the walk through the forest and up to the pools was still lovely. James went in up to his knees but that was quite enough, even in the middle of summer.

Afterwards, we headed into Hawera to meet up with Celine. When James first came to NZ in 2000 he stayed there with Celine for a few weeks before moving down to Wellington. We had dinner and drinks with a whole crowd of people including Celine's parents and Mary (the ex Mayor) who James also used to live with. Some of us stayed up late playing cards and Celine even sung a few songs.

It was nice to have a bed again for the night and we got up and went to have breakfast in town before getting back on the road and heading North.