The party of 8 became a party of 13 today. We met “the cousins” at the airport and flew to Auckland. We were too tight to pay for seat selection, but discovered at check-in that we had all been seated together, yay!

For the first time in five years, Zac managed to survive a flight without vomiting with anxiety, which made a good flight even better for the rest of us. Once through customs, Beck and I fed the kids McDonalds for lunch (at the local time of 3pm) while Ross and Luke went to the depot to pick up our 15 seater bus.

A long drive was then underway as we headed straight for the Coromandel Peninsula and our destination for the night. Many country towns along the way but not many dinner options! We found a little town called Tairua which had two “restaurants”…..a generous term perhaps…..an unpatronised sushi shop where even the staff were hiding out the back, and a fish and chip shop with a parade of interesting customers! Ross and Luke were hungry as they hadn’t had anything since coffee before our morning flight, but for the rest of us a simple toastie was enough.

We arrived at our accommodation well after dark and were happy to settle in to our three villas quite quickly. The touring starts in earnest tomorrow!