Wrapping up New Zealand

We finished up our time in New Zealand by biking up around the Bay of Islands (the northern peninsula). We decided to try to save some money by working at campgrounds in lieu of our nights tariff. We were able to do this at 3 different campgrounds and we were surprised that they only required one hour of work from each of us to cover our costs. Most campgrounds were trying to spruce up their grounds in preparation for Christmas so we had extra work that we could do for pay. We really enjoyed doing this. It made us one of the staff which allowed us to spend more time with the locals and enjoy their company. Sometimes they actually gave us nice cabins to stay in vs our tent. The New Zealand campgrounds are some of the best campgrounds we have seen so far. Before we left New Zealand we had entered a 160km (100 mile bike race. It was the Taupo Lake Challenge which was sponsored by the Rotary and had 10,000 bicyclists. It was GREAT! Then off to Australia.