Part 4 – Almost a holiday

Having gotten through all my requested watercolours in the Auckland Art Gallery and with many more hints what else might be useful, I tried to switch to the other mode of our NZ time: Holidays. Checking the spots on the North Island, that we wanted to show the kids, I realized that it is summer and we should have booked those way earlier. No Matamata for us now, Flo and I keep that in mind for our way back up to Auckland shortly before we leave. Also, the Waitomo Caves had a three day waiting period in which they were fully booked, whereas Wai-o-tapu has no restriction on visitor numbers per day. Anyhow, the kids needed to see glowworms. So we had a weekend to fill before having a cave tour booked for Monday now.

Here, Flo’s completionistic streak kicked in and he went “let’s show the kids Coromandel!”. Which turned out to be lovely but a heck of a drive along those windy roads. We left Woodturners Cafe towards Coromandel town for some smoked mussels (Flo!) and a surprise pick-up of sausages (Agent of Entropy!). Thus, we now had to have a BBQ sooner rather than later. We kept going but it was late afternoon before we made it to Hahei. Hahei is still my favourite beach spot despite having a miserable Christmas here in the remnants of a cyclone and a completely rainy experience when we stopped here in winter. The kids immediately loved it. There was no freedom camping however and I got slightly worried where we would stay tonight.

NZMCA to the rescue! We managed to talk the kids into abandonning their beach experience which had just started in order to go swimming tomorrow morning and left for a NZMCA POP over the next hill. Which was lovely and also a big hit with the kids who built intricate structures out of pebbles.

I missed out on the swim at Hahei beach due to having to work on my laptop but we left at lunch time and drove to Waitomo. Arriving there, both kids were knackered. Still, the Top 10 Holiday Park came with a pool and it was quite hot so 3/4 jumped back into the water for a second time.

Unfortunately, it started to pour and neither our BBQ nor the night walk to the glowworms seemed to still be viable…

Grumpy kids ensued. Luckily, the weather cleared up right around bed time so we did get to go on the night walk. It was quite the experience for the kids: being in the NZ forest at night (being told to keep the torches turned off) and seeing glowworms.

Very, very tired we returned. Just to have our scheduled cave tour the next morning when we saw more glowworms, this time mostly from a boat in the cave.

Now towards Rotorua and Wai-o-tapu tomorrow.

They were kind enough to let us run our d&d game until 10am, so we returned the favour with an order of second breakfast
Flo has some fond memories of that road – on faster wheels
The one shot of the birds hanging out – they were on every second rock
From Coromandel Town, we would cross the peninsula over this terrain
Last lookout before decending into Coromandel town
The AoE had a spark of brilliance and got us into a hardware store to sort out the last few items (Knife, oil for the locks …)
Looking back over Coromandel Town
My dearests
Number 3 is ensorcelled by New Zealand money, for some reason
10$ for the night, including fresh water – just perfect
Antropolis in the making
First test for our new chairs, the table came with Timmy
Almost would not go to bed due to the hard work on Antropolis
Nina and I got to watch the sunset, blogging a bit
Tag team for the water tank
still a bit cool, but running helps
Good thing the Agent is still so light
metacommentary
stopped just off the road for lunch
A lunch stop with free entertainment
this is really just of the highway, maybe 50 meters – we love New Zealand
Waihou bridge and guardian – the river is massive
A typical view of rural New Zealand
both exceptionally determined to improve their swimming
We learned about a peculiarity of Timmy’s design, the hump dumps the water right where the window opens
Start of the night time bush walk – while there was still light, obviously
can you spot them?
deeper into the bush
Too small for us, just right for the kids
This one was big enough for all ouf us … quite scary on the way back, in the dark
the astute follower of this blog might know: We love limestone landscapes
and the sun is gone
hoods up, the mozzies are coming
exploring every nook