bases in the carved-up international pie that is the great southern continent. There are 30 countries with summer or year-round bases in Antarctica, so this strikes me as being a fantastic bit of business for New Zealand, not to mention a huge missed opportunity for Chile or Argentina.
The kids enjoyed the penguin enclosure, which had an area for viewing them from underwater, and some little peep-holes into their nesting boxes. Lara was captivated! There were so many great exhibits for all ages, that we could have spent all day there, in fact we did spend most of it. Emma wanted to
experience the blizzard room, so we got huge parkas and in we went. Well the temperature started at -5 degrees Celsius, but when the storm blowers started, it dropped to -18 wind chill and they dimmed the lights to add to the tension. I can only say that my respect for explorers and researchers grew considerably, and I vowed never again to wear shorts in a blizzard if possible. 
As an end to the day, Emma and I took a ride in a Hagglund, this is a boxy two-part truck designed in Sweden for use in ultra-low temperatures and rough conditions. I thought we’d do a big circle and come back 
to the car park, but no. Our driver took us to the Hagglund testing area and rove it up and down hills, over a 30 centimetre crevasse, and even made it swim across a small pond. We were shaken about like crazy in the back, but it was great to experience. The final drama of the night was back in the campsite.- We had used Kiwi Holiday parks wherever possible in NZ, as we had a discount card, but here it all became worth it. Our campsite (the all-season, I think) had the best playground ever. Unfortunately we have no photos of it, but it was amazing. There was a jungle gym right outside our chalet door, the old playground, but the new one was a massive affair complete with an inflatable bouncy thing. Not a castle, but a kind of flat inflated trampoline the size of a tennis court, complete with a wall/platform thingy in the centre to fight over! Oh to be 5 and a half again!
We flew off in the morning back to Auckland, where we had two more days before our big flight to Taipei. We didn’t have too much time, so we decided to just take things easy – on our first day we took a bus (no more wheels, but at least because we rented rather than bought, we didn’t have the hassle of needing to find a buyer at the last minute) and headed for Misson Bay, where we swam and ate and watched the kiwis do their typical Sunday afternoon stuff. It was amazing to see how active they were. The seaside park was full of games – here badminton, there cricket, and rugby all over the place. After a late meal, we narrowly missed the bus and had to wait ages for another, but finally made it home tired and full.
Our
last full day in NZ was spent on an excursion to nearby Waiheke Island. This is an exclusive little corner of the world- close enough (via ferry) to be convenient, yet separate enough to be exclusive. It was very idyllic with a slightly Caribbean feel somehow. We made our way slowly to a bay and lazed the day away. We had to finish our Auckland time with a swim, so we jumped in the sea, dragged Emma in too and had one of our most enjoyable splashing sessions of the whole trip. We body-surfed, swam and then just had time to drip dry before running for the bus-ferry-bus combination that would take us back. This was, in effect the very first stage of our journey home to Budapest. 
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