In My Shoes: "Take me back to the sweet times, the hot nights"

**CAUTION** LONG POST/PHOTO STUDY TO FOLLOW

Every New Years, since the summer we finished high school, my friends and I have seen the turn of the year together. For two of the five summers we have celebrated at home, with good food, good company, and great music. This is not usually how we roll. We much prefer to, and always attempt to make a camping trip happen. We love camping. It is so good to get away, and enjoy each others company. Just as with the dinner parties, when camping we always have good food, good music, good wine and...board games. It makes for a very entertaining trip! When we were seventeen, we camped by the river in Otaki. When we were nineteen, we ventured to Pohangina, a campsite by the river near Ashhurst. This year, we went on an actual roadtrip and ventured all the way to beautiful Waiheke Island. It was by far the best holiday we've had yet.

The low down: 16 hours of driving, 9 people, 6 days, 2 ferry trips & 1 people mover (a.k.a rave-mobile).

At 4.30am Mark, Katrina & Cam arrived at my house in the R-M, to pick up Dyani, MK, Brad & Myself.

After handing out the roadtrip survival kits, donning our roadtrip t-shirts, staging a photo shoot, slapping our 'Road Trip' car door magnets on the R-M and cramming ourselves in...we were on our way.

And on we drove, whilst listening to our Road Trip playlist, all the way through to Taihape before stopping for a McDonalds fix for breakfast.

We were so excited to be running ahead of time and to be leaving the cruddy weather in our wake. Here are some of my fave pics from the trip to Auckland.

We arrived in Auckland around lunch time and headed straight to Te Atatu to visit the 'West's' house, from the television show 'Outrageous Fortune'. It was surreal to be standing outside the house, which we all had seen on the show. I felt like an Outrageous Fortune geek, as we took photo's from the footpath. We left the West's house and headed round the corner, for our number one guilty pleasure when in Auckland...Wendy's.

After eating our combined body weight in Burgers, Frosty Shakes, Nuggest & Fries, we once again sardined ourselves back in to the R-M, and headed to Sylvia Park for groceries & to meet our Auckland dwelling friend Scottie & her partner Skip.

One hour later...Groceries = bought, Scottie & Skip = waiting in the carpark, time until we had to leave Sylvia park for the ferry = 30 minutes.

Packed people in R-M? Check. Packed groceries around said people? Check. Ready to roll? Check. Broken fan, possible cracked radiator n Skips car? CHECK. Everyone freaking out and yelling at each other? Check.

It was ugly. Luckily for us, AA arrived in 15 minutes, sorted, and advised on what to do with the vehicle. We left just in time to make our Ferry Check in time. Before we knew it, both vehicles and all nine of us were on board the ferry, and taking a major chill pill.

Once on the Island, we felt our way to Hekerua Lodge, where we were greeted by the owner Tom, who showed us the house facilities, that we were free to use, the pool & spa & of course the camping dell. We set up camp & got some Fish'n'Chips for dinner. We went to a fish'n'chip shop called 'Ao Place' They have a really cool photo montage of customers from all over NZ & from all over the world. Every photo had a funny caption with the phrase "Ao" in it. They saw our t-shirts and loved them. They decided we had to have our picture taken. So we are now immortalised at 'Ao Place' with the caption "All the way from Paraparaumu in a van, with matching t-shirts Ao"

We had an awesome time on Waiheke. The weather was amazing, we spent the next 3 days at the beach or in the pool. I could rattle on and tell you how beautiful it is, but I may aswell just show you.

Here are a few of my fave pics of us playing around at the different beaches on Waiheke.

Playing 'Battle of the Sexes' board game was hilarious. It is highly amusing to recall such comments as, "I'm pretty sure it's a french tip bro..don't ask me how I know *shifty eyes*" & when some answers were shouted out with such authority, like.. "Will & Grace!!"

Then the game got serious...

We visited Mudbrick Vineyard. It was beautiful beyond words.

We left Waiheke on Jan 3rd and headed back to Scottie & Skips place in Auckland. Some of us just chilled for the evening, and the rest of us went to Sky City for dinner. On the way we stopped to look at this pretty tree. It reminded us all of Twilight. So we staged a photo shoot. New Zealands Next Top Models, I tell you!