The first few days

At the airport, everything was taken care of and we also had a SIM card. We took the bus to our Airbnb in Otahuhu but the door was locked when we arrived. Great, our host Ady was not home. So, we had to find a way to contact him, which wasn't easy since I couldn't use my old SIM card and the new one had to be activated. We stood in the pouring rain outside the house, trying to activate the SIM card. The mood wasn't the best, as we were both exhausted and just wanted to rest. After a while, we reached Ady and finally got inside. We put our backpacks in the corner and took a short break. Since we wanted to avoid jet lag as much as possible, we soon went out to open a bank account. We visited all the banks in Otahuhu, but none of them knew how to deal with backpackers, as it's not a touristy area. So, we returned to our accommodation without a bank account. It was... cold... very cold, as there was no heating and the outside temperature was not pleasant either. So, we snuggled up in the blanket that we had prepared and by 4 in the afternoon, I had already fallen asleep, while Pascal stayed up longer and was still awake when I woke up for the first time at 11. I quickly sent 1-2 WhatsApp messages and fell back asleep. I knew it was a mistake, but I had no other choice. The next day, jet lag hit me hard. I felt nauseous, had diarrhea, just wanted to sleep, and felt completely worn out. This lasted for about 2-3 days, after which I adjusted to the new time as well. Pascal handled it a bit better. Now, we had to buy a car. We looked at a car from two Germans, but it wasn't right for us. Too expensive and not nice at all. So, on a Saturday, we went to the big car market in Auckland to try our luck. We didn't have much time left, as our accommodation was booked only until Monday. We looked at many cars and asked about each one, but the right one just wasn't there. Of course, we had our own idea of our future home on wheels. After some time, we met David, who asked us what we were looking for and what price range. And then he showed us our Rudi. We looked at it carefully and immediately fell in love. The price was amazing and everything looked neat and just the way we had imagined. So, Pascal took a test drive with David and then we withdrew the first $500 :D Now, we owned a Honda Stepwagon. There were a few things that needed to be fixed by the dealer (Nasser), but during that time, we could sleep for free on their yard, in another van and later in our own. We quickly realized that in New Zealand, things take longer than we're used to. Everything took forever, but after 4 days, we could finally hit the road.

Now, we could finally test what it's like to be on the road in a campervan. Our first destination was Cape Reinga.