If you start your roadtrip in Auckland you will be quite surprised by this area in the centre of the North Island. After the sub-tropical north and the rolling green hills, the spectacular geothermal area around Rotorua with its bubbling mud pits and beautiful Lake Taupo, there's this: flat, sandy, dry nothingness, with the exception of the three mountains to your right. You wouldn't expect to find such wide flat open spaces right there in the middle of the North Island but then again, you've just seen a few very different sets of landscapes that you didn't expect either.