After two months at the Takapuna Motorcamp during some amazing weather, and driveways and friends places inbetween, it was time for a change of scene.

We had always planned to go to the South Island while we were “homeless” and with Devonport prices flat, there’s every chance they ‘ll get flatter during winter 🙂

The plan was to shoot a Photographic job for a really good client I’ve had for more than 25 years in the middle of may, and to catch up with friends in Cromwell and Gary and Dianne in Taupo on the way down and back.

Click on an Image for Hi Res

We spent our last night at Ardmore with Alex, Sarah and the grandsons parked next to the horses and early the next day, we set off to Taupo. It was an uneventful easy trip and we seemed to miss most of the Easter traffic too.

Arriving in Taupo, I texted friends Gary and Di who were just arriving back from a holiday overseas that day to see if they were up to a drink and catchup and got an immediate reply to say they were now screaming through Tirau and would be here soon.

We had a great night catching up with them, hearing about their travels in Thailand and early the next day, we set off towards Marton.

We stopped for lunch right in the middle of the Desert Rd  and I though out of curiosity, I’d try our Netspeed connection and I was gobsmacked to get around 50 plus Megabytes a second.. huge! .. miles from anywhere !

After a pleasant trip through Waiouru and Taihape, we arrived at Marton and settled in for the night.

The Netspeed Speedtest
Download: 56.03 Mbps
Upload: 29.33 Mbps
Ping: 58 ms