At the end of the week, it was time to think travel again and with a son with a birthday, Ardmore was the destination. After provisioning for the weekend at the easy to park in Countdown Takapuna, I headed to the Ardmore NZMCA park after getting some diesel at .91c a litre In Manurewa ! Fiona was driving out to join me after work.
I caught up with some if the regular liveaboards in the park which was great.
Our view of the Freewheelers.
The Freewheelers were having their Christmas rally and were there in great numbers, all parked outside the NZMCA Ardmore park.
Click on the images to see them in Hi Res
Freewheelers enjoying catching up on Satruday morning
Freewheelers are single people out enjoying their Motorhomes and they’re a lot of fun.
They had a Its in the bag night in the hall and it sounds like they had a great time.
The crew looking happy on Saturday morning
With more than a hundred people turning up in 80 vans, it was a fantastic turnout.
Inside the NZMCA park looking out towards the Freewheelers in front. Fiona’s car next to us.
We went out to tea in Takanini with our friends Roger and Marion which was great. In the morning moved around to son Alex’s family in Ardmore in the morning.
We are still waiting for a tenant for the house but it has only been just over a week. Rome wasn’t built in a day as they say.
We’re really looking forward to heading south in a couple of weeks time. Here’s another great recent trip in the meantime.
All the Vans at the LakesAt Kaiwi Lakes Rally
Late in July, we arranged to meet friends at a NZMCA rally being held at kai Iwi lakes .. somewhere I’ve have never been to before north of Dargaville on the coast. We left Auckland on a Saturday morning and arrived there just after midday.. its a good 2.5 – 3 hr run.
There were a lot of vans and a lot more of them were European Motorhomes than the traditional bus conversions that we’ve seen at these events. A really interesting place and another well organised event by the Northland NZMCA crew. Along with meeting our friends from Snells Beach, we met many Dethleffs van owners, some who have travelled quite some distance to be part of the fun. Remember to click on the images to enlarge them.
One of the biggest in the parkLots of Ferns
There aren’t many DOC camps around the Auckland region and on the way home, we were keen to try the Trounson Kauri park which is just up the road (15k’s or so) towards Waipoua Forest . .. somewhere else we’d never been to.
All parked up
After plugging in to the power and settling down, we were off to explore the park. It is really nicely set up .. a boardwalk stretches through the whole length of the forest. Amazing huge Kauri Trees mixed with new growth.. It’s very clean and an easy 1/2 hour walk through the whole park. Well worth doing.
And I took one of her 🙂Just to prove that I did the walk, Fiona took this cell phone piccy
We got back to the van and settled down in front of the heater to warm up with a glass of something cold .. This must be one of the few DOC parks with power. Several vans of nice French tourists arrived just before dark which was good.
There is also a building with a hot shower and kitchen facilities and nice clean toilets.
The walk was fantastic and its a great spot for a night in your Motorhome.
During the walk
As the posts here are a bit infrequent at the moment, if you click Follow at the bottom, you’ll be notified of a new post to save you checking in. 🙂
It was this time a year ago that we went to our first ever NZMCA rally in Northland. A really nice bunch of people and there were in excess of 90 Motorhomes in attendance, quite a few of them from Auckland.
One row back !
Notayot
The spectators
Balloon blowing
Balloon blowing
The games
The Beach
Happy Camping
Under the Tree
Early Morning at Balnd Bay
Early morning
Prizegiving
The prizegiving on Sunday morning
At Russell with the Sutherlands
With The Sutherlands at Russell the next day
A magic spot just south of the Bay of Islands right on the water. It was only our 5th or 6th trip away in a relatively new machine so we were still very much finding our way so when the North Easterly gusts of 30-40 knots odd rolled in around 11pm and the van started rocking, it was a bit interesting 🙂
We arrived around 2pm on the Saturday afternoon. Many of them had arrived the previous day so all the primo waterfront spots were all taken.. that was before we found out about the wind, then we were quite relieved to be a row back!
The Games started soon after we arrived.. lots of fun and good to see everyone having a good laugh.
We met Rob & Helen who have become good friends since and we spent the the next night with them in the Russell RSA carpark. The following night we spent at Uretiti Doc park another magic place in the world.
Uretiti Doc park with the Awning out
If I remember correctly, that was the first time we used the awning and the BBQ gas jack.. funny what you remember.. a great weekend away.
Fiona & Chris, two empty nesters put their dreams of doing something different into reality… Now back in a house, they were living in their Motorhome, come along for the ride.
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