First Light Marathon - New Zealand North Island 14 Day Itinerary - Britz

Thirteen nights and 1,450 kilometres in a loop from Auckland in a campervan, built around the First Light Marathon at Gisborne.

The race is run on the coast that sees the sunrise before anywhere else in the world, which is where the name comes from. The Coromandel comes first on the way round: Hahei, Cathedral Cove and Hot Water Beach, where a hot spring rises under the sand at low tide.

Mount Maunganui follows, with a volcanic cone at the end of a sandspit, then Rotorua in the geothermal belt, and Opotiki on the way round towards the East Cape. Gisborne is the race itself. Afterwards the route runs down through the Mahia Peninsula to Napier and its art deco streets, then inland to Lake Taupo and Tongariro National Park, where three volcanoes stand together, with Waitomo before Auckland.

Britz supply the camper and the day-by-day plan, and the hire is priced live per vehicle rather than per person; campsites, fuel, ferries, park fees and activities are all extra, with a nil-excess insurance pack available at booking. Fourteen days allows for the race and a proper holiday either side of it, which is the sensible way to build a trip round an event. Accommodation in Gisborne is tight on race weekend, which is where a camper pays for itself. The East Cape leg is the quietest part of the North Island and the stretch most visitors never drive: empty bays, small settlements and almost no traffic for a hundred kilometres at a time.