We left Auckland on a grey morning, and the rain soon started. Not a good omen! However, the rain had more or less stopped by 10.30 when we stopped in a small town called Thames for coffee. We had a bit of a wander, and were admiring a beautiful 1928 Austin 7 and some other cars through a showroom window when the owner, a car dealer, came along. He let me go in to photograph the Austin 7, which had a painted wooden body.
He brought out one of the other cars, a tiny Subaru, which he has set up as a police car, with a model of a policeman in the front, and Mickey and Minnie Mouse in the back.
He parks it outside his premises every day. He also has an enormous 1950s looking red Cadillac. His premises are a historic building, which he has restored. It was built as a saddlery in 1868, and later became a car showroom, then a hotel and later still, a dairy.
We had bought sandwiches for our lunch, and we drove on across the Coromandel Peninsula, through very fertile farming land, to the east coast to visit Hot Water Beach. Here, geothermally heated water bubbles up through the sand and at low tide you can take a spade and dig a hole to create your own personal spa. Paul and I ate our lunch at a picnic table before going onto the beach, so as to have a sand-free lunch, and to give other people time to do the digging.
Our group digging was not particularly successful, but there were plenty of other holes full of nice warm water. If you stood on the beach and worked your toes down into the sand, it soon got too hot to bear.
After a couple of hours on the beach, we were back in the bus and off again for Hahei Beach. We started out at a viewpoint which looked out on the volcanic slopes with a fringe of tiny islands, and out into the Pacific Ocean. We were intrigued by a bird, called a Tui, which mimicked the sound of a camera.
This is part of the view; to the right of these cliffs is only ocean with no land for 16,000 miles until you get to South America.
In the other direction, we looked down onto Hahei Beach which is very attractive, with pinkish sand and beautiful greeny-blue water.
We took a walk down the cliff path to the beach, with some beautiful views on the way down. The beach is wide and the sand is full of shells.
Back in the bus, we drove to a lookout - apparently there are a few here and there - for wonderful views over the sea and the surrounding volcanic landscape.
Our hotel for tonight is very nice - little cottages with a verandah set in a garden - and we have lovely comfy armchairs.
Tomorrow, we are staying on a farm somewhere, small groups of 2 or 3 of us staying with a local farming family. This should be very interesting, but I may have no phone connection, so I don't know when I can post the next episode!
- Posted using BlogPress from my iPad
No comments:
Post a Comment