Leisurely drive up to Auckland and waterfall pool swim

Today's route

With heavy hearts we took a slow drive to Auckland, visiting 3 waterfalls on the way.

One waterfall towards Port Waikato was nothing spectacular - blink and you could have missed it.  We stopped at the outskirts of Port Waikato and wandered around a public garden (Cobourne Garden Reserve).  The area had landscaped garden terraces which led from the road down to the waters edge.  It is a lovely place to relax and have a picnic.

Hunua Falls

From Port Waikato we made our way to Waitangi Falls.  It looked nice but the pool underneath it was quite small and there were already a few people there.  So, if we had joined in for a dip it would have been crowded.

The next waterfall (Hunua Falls) was situated in the Hunua Ranges Regional Park and had a big natural pool below.  The water looked tempting and being a hot day we took the opportunity to have a dip - no questions asked! The water was not too cold. Some young people were climbing the rocks near the waterfall and jumping in.  It was nice.

In the water - cool but very refreshing.

We arrived at Airport Manor Inn - a motel near the airport and checked in.  After that we took a drive to the airport to drop the car off.  Whilst there, Paul took the opportunity to see if he could get some help with online check-in but unfortunately there was no airline representative.  So we will wait until tomorrow and Paul can check in then - but we will see if we can have our seats together.

Getting back to the motel was a bit of an issue.  No taxi drivers were prepared to take us to the motel and advised us to catch the bus - but there was very little information about busses.  We decided to walk back to the motel even though it was quite a distance but just as we were heading out of the airport we flagged down a taxi.  The chap stopped and we explained our situation.  He admitted that he was not allowed to stop to pick up passengers - he could only do so from the designated zone; but on hearing our story - kindly broke the rules and gave us a lift.  Apparently the other drivers were reluctant to take us to our motel because the distance was considered short (but a half hour walk for us) and they wouldn't get much money if they did so.  When we were dropped off at the motel Paul gave the driver a tip - over and above the minimal fare shown on the meter.  We were grateful that he had given us a ride despite his working rules.

Unfortunately I don't know what has happened to the pictures from the Cobourne Garden Reserve or Waitangi Falls so this blog is lacking the usual pictures that I try to upload.

Tomorrow we fly to the Netherlands if all goes well.

Waterfall pool swim and feeding eels

Our route today

We had a nice day today, wild swimming in the natural pool below Owharoa Falls.  It was wonderful.  Children and adults climbed part the way up the rock-face of the waterfall and dived or jumped in.  We didn't though.  We ended up swimming behind the waterfall curtain and sitting on a ledge, listening to and seeing the water falling around us.  It was magical.

A bit later on we took a drive to Waihi and had a wander over to a viewpoint overlooking the opencast gold mine which has yet to re-open because of rockfalls. 

We continued on to Waihi Beach and drove a long the sandspit to Bowentown and had a lovely view of the lagoon and surrounds.

On the way back to Katikati we went to a McDonalds to use the WiFi to check-in our flights online.  Unfortunately Paul's check-in failed for some unknown reason so it looks as if he will have to check in when we drop our luggage off.  If he can't fly then I won't go on my own!

Back at Katikati Naturist Park we took some old bread crusts to the river to feed eels that swim up the river. We had to wait for about 5 minutes or so after throwing the first few pieces of bread before the eels came, swimming upstream to were we were.  It was amazing seeing them.

Afterwards we had a nice soak in hot tubs and a cool swim in the pool.

Sadly we will have to leave this lovely place and head to Auckland tomorrow.  We have a flight to catch the day after.

Photographs

Owharoa Falls

Waihi

Katikati Naturist Park

Hot sand beach and the Coromandel Peninsula

Our route today

Today we took a scenic drive in a north easterly direction toward the Coromandel Peninsula and around it, anticlockwise.

We found a hot sand beach along the way and stopped to take a look and experience the phenomenon for ourselves.  Initially I didn't want go onto the beach - it was crowded with people and I felt panicky.  In the end I'm glad I did go.  People were digging out small pools in the sand, using spades or hands, during low tide.  The hot spring water then seeped up from the ground into the makeshift pools.  Some areas of sand were warm but there were also patches that were very hot and one had to be careful not to burn one's toes.


We were going to cross to Whitianga via a ferry near Cook's Beach but discovered that it was a foot ferry so we had to backtrack to Whenuakite so that we could continue our round trip of the peninsula.

We would have liked to have headed further up north from Te Rerenga  to Fletcher Bay and back down to Cormandel but time was not on our side so we cut across the neck over to Cormandel and headed southwards along the coast back to Katikati.  During our drive we found parts of the road washed away, the result of last week's storms, and were in the process of being repaired.

It was a nice drive and a nice day.

More Pictures

Hot sand beach

Hot and cold spring rivers, and a naturist campsite

Hot & Cold river/hot spring

Today it was time to leave Rotorua Farm Stay and see where the road took us.  We stopped to soak in the Hot and Cold spring rivers on the way.  Once again we enjoyed rubbing clay all over ourselves and soaking it off, and relaxing.

From there we headed further north in the direction of Tauranga to Katikati Naturist Park (http://www.katikati-naturist-park.co.nz/) which is a naturist campsite with a few chalets.  The campsite is lovely. It has a pool, sauna, 2 hot tubs, mini golf, a pentanque court, a play area for children,  a river to swim in, you can feed the eels; barbecue facilities and kitchen amenities,  a small shop, etc.

Mini golf at Katikati (photograph off the internet)

After unpacking we had a game of mini golf - Paul won hands down!  I have a problem with accuracy...  One of more permanent campsite owners has a cat which plonked itself down on the mini golf green to sun itself.  We didn't mind it watching our game but we ended up having to play our balls around it - an extra skill we could add to our mini golf skills!

The campsite has WiFi which is great because we can try to plan what we would like to do tomorrow.  However, we had a bit of trouble with the internet.  Paul went onto his telephone and discovered that there was WiFi and there was a prompt to get a voucher code to get access to the internet.  So he went through the motions of getting the code but the code was never sent to his telephone in a text message; and he couldn't log on to get access to his email to see if a code was sent there.  We went to reception to find out what the problem was.  Apparently you had to physically buy a voucher from reception and use the code.  Although the wiFi seemed to be Katikati's own wiFi (even though it was named as such), it wasn't really - they got a special deal from the network for users.  Paul wasn't terribly happy because he had naturally paid money for a service that he wasn't getting.  Eventually the campsite owner agreed to give Paul a voucher to log into the network.  Soon afterwards Paul found that he had also access to the package that he had originally tried to sign up with!

Today's route, more or less.

Oh, a smile a while moment...  One chap at the campsite, obviously batting for the other side, brazenly asked him about his penis tip full piercing. Paul didn't bat an eyelid and said it was fine, didn't hurt. Methinks the chap is going to go to Rotorua tomorrow for one!

PHOTOGRAPHS

Hot & Cold

Getting white clay from the river bank

Mix it with a bit of water to make it more into a paste

Smear the paste on. 

Lovely gooey stuff!

Rinse off and relax.  The clay also works as a good sunscreen
for shoulders and face!

Katikati Naturist Park 

(Photographs off the internet)

Entrance to reception and small shop

Mud pools and hot spring rivers

Kerosene Creek

After a delicious breakfast Paul and I headed out from the farm stay to explore the surrounding
countryside, ideally hoping to come across hot springs.

We found a place called Kerosene Creek and found a quiet spot in the warm stream for a dip after which we headed upstream to the waterfall where there was a nice natural pool below the waterfall.  It was like getting into a warm bath so we couldn't stay in the water for too long - we got quite hot!  It was a very popular area for visitors!

Wai-o-Tapu mud pools

After our dip we headed to the Wai-o-Tapu geothermal area and stopped to watch a mud lake bubbling and steaming away.  We could have gone to see the Lady Knox Geyser and visited the Wai-o-Tapu Thermal Wonderland close by but the parking area was full and the place looked very busy.  We decided to give it a miss.

Hot and Cold (hot spring rivers)

Just a bit further down from the thermal wonderland car park we came across the Wai-o-Tapu Bridge Hot Springs (it also goes by the name of Hot and Cold).  Two rivers merge into one; the one river being cold and the other hot but merging to make a lovely warm area to sit in (the river is quite shallow).  And it is for free!  We discovered that part of the river bank was of white clay so we got some, made it into a paste and smeared it on ourselves.  We then allowed it to dry off a bit (it became powdery) before sitting in the river and soaking it off.

After an hour or two at the river we took the back roads to Taupo, on the edge of Lake Taupo, had a quick bite and took the back roads to our lodgings.

There is a nest of 5 chicks outside our bedroom window, in a rose bush.  And below, on the ground, a hen is brooding.  The farmer's wife is keeping an eye on the hen so that she doesn't go hungry while incubating her clutch of eggs.  It's a nice little nursery area outside.

Time for bed.

More or less our route today, in a clockwise direction

PHOTOGRAPHS

Kerosene Creek

 

 

Wai-o-Tapu Mud Pools

Hot and Cold

The nursery outside our bedroom window