After we feasted for three days in Auckland, we were really excited what to expect culinarily from the rest of our holidays. If you already cooked a few of our recipes you know that we refrain from finished products and prepare everything ourselves instead. Furthermore, we have a huge shelf full of spices, from which we help ourselves as we wish. Of course, this way of cooking is pretty difficult to keep in a small camper, when you only have one stove field and little storage for basic products. Nevertheless, we had a good time every day! Seriously, every farmers’ market, supermarket or booth on the street, be it tiny and small or in a bigger town, had a rich product range. Sure, because of the climate we had everything the heart desired, and everything was regionally produced. We grabbed plenty of fresh vegetables and fruits and did not need much more to stuff ourselves and be happy.

In Germany, we rarely buy exotic fruits, so we had a plethora of avocados, kiwis, kakis, feijoas and more in our grocery bags. Apart from that, we found a lot of great products you find even in Berlin only in very few organic supermarkets. Usually, we started the day with paleo cereals and coconut yoghurt or nut milk and fresh berries. On mornings after long and exhausting hikes, we took the time to bake whole meal pancakes with maple syrup and to laze away the morning hours in bed before we were off to our next destination. Delicious, roasted bread with yoghurt and caramelized fruits were also on our breakfast menu. On top of that, we always had a great view. When had the pancakes, which you find further down in this article, we looked directly at a beautiful, light blue lake. The morning air was still chilly, and wrapped in blankets we could pass half of the day just sitting there and enjoying the panorama.

Admittedly, we take or time on every holiday to explore the country rather than spending most of the time in the kitchen. If kitchen, bed and living room are one and you have to be careful with your resources, you try to keep cooking as short as possible. Often, we had simple one pot dishes, couscous with plenty of vegetables, curries or just sandwiches. We discovered a lot of different and delicious hummus variants which we had with us regularly and honed with fresh ingredients. We cook a lot of chili when we are on holiday, since you can easily vary it and prepare in bigger amounts, so you can take a serving with you on a hike. Along with the chili, we either had freshly baked flat bread or, on the hikes, polenta wedges.

One evening, we even baked pan pizza. We just put whole grain yeast dough into the pan (preferably made of cast iron), covered it with pesto and other ingredients and baked it covered. In a supermarket, we found the perfect items for a delicious burger! The bun was like our homemade ones back in Berlin and did not have the typical sticky texture we know from finished burger buns here in Germany. The patties were made of black beans and beetroot, in addition to that we had hummus and fresh vegetables, and ready was an astonishing delicious burger made in a camping kitchen. However, our holiday was about everything but not cooking, and we’d like to show you a bit more!

There is so much to say about New Zealand and so many photos to show, and still, we wouldn’t do this country justice. Often, we just stood there, amazed and overwhelmed by nature, which changed within minutes of driving from rough, black sandy coast to brushwood, in which glowworms shone at night between the moss-grown trees. Steamy brimstone sceneries were replaced by soft, grassy hillsides canyoned by runlets of glacier water, which together formed crystal clear lakes.

The booming slide downs of masses of ice and fog in your face let you feel the immense force and wayward character of nature marrow-deep. Suddenly, everything seems minor and being here and now is more present than never before. Galaxies of tiny sparkling dots keep you awake at night because you can’t keep off your eyes of such beauty. Everything seems so perfect, you have the feeling to have been travelled even further than the other end of the world. We hope, we could take you with us on our journey.