What can be said about Fiji, wow, the most amazing place I have ever visited! The island was amazing, the people so friendly and the surf, well 10ft faces and resembling a mini Teahapoo, crazy shit!

Will do a full update when I get some more time, as I am now in LA and have to go and hit the beach and hopefully get some waves!

Hope everyone back home is having a great time!

Last night I stayed in Paihia, in the world famous Mousetrap hotel. I met 2 Scots guys: Kenny and Steven, we went out for a few quiet beers which quickly escalated into 10 or so. Come 3am we were all pretty worse for wear after dancing the night away at some dodgy haunt!

I am back in Auckland now, gonna head out for my noodle fix and then maybe have a quiet beer at the hostel bar and then get psyched for the big trip to Fiji! Can’t wait, checked the webcam the other day and the waves were 6-8ft on the face, should be pretty challenging and probably the best waves that I will ever ride, here’s hoping!

Today has been a really cool day! I started off by wandering down to Haruru Falls, just north of Paihia, where I met two cool Argentinian folk. Chilled out by the beautiful waterfalls for 30 mins or so, and then I drove 5km down the road to Paihia where I hired out a Kayak for 2 hours.

I paddled over to a few of the islands and then across to Russell, on the other side of the bay. It was my first time in a kayak, and it was all good! I got back to the kayak place about 3pm and then jumped back in the car and headed up to the Kauri forest, just north of Waipapa.

The forest was amazing, huge ancient trees about 90 feet tall, surrounded by lush sub-tropical vegetation, simply beautiful, kinda like something out of Jurassic Park.

I then headed back towards Kerikeri and stopped off at Rainbow Falls, another beautiful waterfall spot.

This evening I have been chilling after muching a big tasty pizza and scoffing a few brews. Tomorrow I make my way back down the coast to Auckland, where I will stop off along the way to Waiwera to see the hot springs!

3 days until I hit Fiji and the serious surfing kicks in!

Today was a tripple whammy!

I started off by packing up the car to head off up north to go camping and in search of surf up at 90 Mile Beach. So off I set, iPod charged up, a full car of food and supplies and full of good vibes. I made it up to the beach where the waves were shitty onshore and classic chop! So I decided to head over to the east side of the peninsular to see if it would be offshore and clean. As I did this it started to piss down, nice!

30 minutes later after driving down a gravel dirt track I got to Henderson Bay. On arrival at the beach the water was completely flat, not a sausage, crappolla! I then headed back down the track from which I had driven up previously. On the way back I managed to loose control of the car, swerving it across the road and ending up in a ditch! Nicely done I thought. So now I am in the middle of frigging nowhere, shitty waves, pissing down with rain and the car is stuck in a ditch.

After a few minutes of wheel-spinning and me trying to single-handedly push a saloon car out of a soft verge, I thought, god I am truly fooked! No reception on my phone, and feeling pretty bummed out! I started to dig the crap out of the front wheel arch, finding that I had nicely dented the front wing, also discovering that I had landed on a hornet’s nest, resulting in me getting stung!

5 mintues later, I managed to get the car out of the ditch and decided to call it a day and drive 150km back to the ranch! I stopped in at Taupo bay to see if there were any waves, but no of course not, flat flat flat!

So today has been dry dry dry, a truly arid few days of surf. I guess I should consider myself lucky that I didn’t roll the car and that I didn’t get hurt!

Anyway Fiji in 4 days, surf looking amazing, temperature around 31, can’t complain!

Today the search has taken me along the east coast of Northland. I set off this morning and took the car ferry over to Russel and then scooted down the coast passing numerous bays and towns: Oakura, Helena Bay, Matapouri and Tutukaka. Unfortunately there wasn’t even a hint of surf, flat flat flat!

After driving about 200km I eventually came back to Whangarei, so I decided to pop in and visit the waterfalls there, all good, an amazing view and nice little walk! I took the freeway back to Keri Keri and have ust been to the pub for a few beers and a feed.

Tomorrow I am going to drive up to the tip of the North Island in search of surf, there is a fresh 9ft swell coming in to 90 Mile beach and I have also packed the tent and camping gear and plan to stay up there overnight.

Hopefully tomorrow will prove to me a little more rewarding on the surf!

Today the search has taken The General, The Duke and myself north up the coast to Taupo Bay. We set off about 9.30 this morning and drove up the coast, checking out the amazing scenery on the way! On arrival at Taupo the waves were pretty small, but some peaks were creeping up to the 3ft mark.

I took out the Duke for about 3 hours and got about 25 waves (in the super low-rider stance), nothing particularly to write home about, but it’s all about having fun and getting out there!

Taupo Bay is beautiful, there isn’t that much there, a few houses, a beautiful sandy bay surrounded on both sides by high cliffs. The water was quite warm, I went in with my new shortie wettie on for about an hour, but then got a bit hot, so decided to take it down a level a just surf in board shorts!

In the arvo I headed up to Mangonui for fresh fish and chips overlooking the bay, a nice way to spend an hour or so after a surf. I then drove up a little further to Cooper beach, Cable Bay and finally ending up in Taipo.

Now I am back at the ranch, just polished off a steak sarnie and ready to chill for the night and start a new adventure tomorrow!

New photos are uploaded and ready to check out here!

The past 3 days have been a bit of a whirlwind.

I left Melbourne on the 31st March, after spending an amazing week with my top Aussie girl Cathy. We headed off to the south coast to surf (some albeit small waves) down at Bells beach, Apollo Bay and Torquay, travelling along the Great Ocean Road through South Victoria. We swam in secret waterfalls, visited her dad’s beautiful farm in the outback near Chepstowe and saw some of small-town Oz. Although the waves were lame, the views, experiences and places were so beautiful, and a real treat to have my own personal guide to show me around!

A big thank you to Cathy for putting up with my grumpy moods when the waves were shitty, I’m no sure my patience would have been so good if the shoe had been on the other foot! Anyway, it was crappy having to say good bye at the airport the other day, after having such a nice time together, but I am sure that we will meet up again in the future! So thanks again for being so kind and showing me the best bits of Victoria, gonna miss ya loads!

So on to NZ!

To sum up my first night in New Zealand, all I can say is pile of shit! Not beacause NZ is shite, but because I managed to leave one of my bags on the airbus on the way to the hostel. Might have been something to do with me being forgetful, but also maybe the 3 bottles of red I had on the plane. I arrived to my room to find myself one bag short! What made it worse was my bag had all the video footage of all the places I have been to so far, all my electronic cables for cameras, laptop etc, cd’s and some nice sarongs from Bali.

I had a really shitty night’s sleep and kept myself up all night worrying about whether someone would be honest enough to hand it in to the police. I had probably my first “oh fuck this I want to be home, or at least have someone to comfort me”, rather than alone in my hostel room feeling down and out! But I guess that was one of those testing moments that life throws at you, or something!

As it turned out I awoke the next day to a sunny Auckland cityscape and to the fact that my bag had been handed in! Feeling refeshed and relieved, I headed back to the airport to pick it up as well as my hire car! I then made the 250+ km journey up to the Northland to Keri Keri, in the Bay of Islands. The landscape is so diverse here, one minute you are driving through farmland, the next pine forest, the next it is all sub-tropical and funky shit! What a cool drive in my Daewoo 1.6L surf mobile, tunes pumping, chocolate milked to the eyeballs, all good!

Today I headed out with Nigel for a mini tour of the local area, stopping back off home for some lunch! This arvo I headed back to Matauri Bay for a late arvo surf! The conditions had the potential to be great, a strong offshore wind, clean waves, although the swell just wasn’t there, maybe 2 ft at the most!

So in the morning I am heading a little further up north to Taupo Bay, where the increased exposure should hopefully kick up some bigger waves!

Now that I am back to spending most days on my own, surfing and passing through new landscape, it gives you time to reflect on the people you have met, the things you have seen, what you are doing now, what comes next etc. I am thinking about maybe doing a working visa next year, maybe OZ or NZ, anything to escape the monotony of London life!

Anyway time to hit the hay, early start tomorrow, more pictures to be taken, more video to shoot, and more waves to search for and ride!

To all the special people in my life, I love you all!