Our destination for today was Napier, a town on the east coast that's supposed to be very pretty. It was destroyed by an earthquake some time ago, and they rebuilt the whole place in Art Deco style. It rained all the way there, which meant that all the scenic viewpoint places only looked onto cloud. But, two hours later, in Napier, the sun was shining brilliantly, the sky was clear and cloudless and it was very warm.

Napier was certainly worth visiting, it had a beautiful beach, some nice shops, lots of green spaces. We had lunch on the beach, in the sun, then went for a walk, and did a little bit of shopping. By 3 we were back in the car, it started raining about 10 minutes out of town, and we drove to Taurangi, at the bottom of Lake Taupo. New Zealand is really spectacular when it's clear, but when it's raining there's very little to see except clouds. But they were nice clouds.

It was raining in Taurangi too, so after finding the hostel and the supermarket we made supper, checked e-mail, did some washing and watched Men in Black 2. Good film. The hostel has a climbing wall, and since I've never climbed anything, I quite fancy trying that in the morning.