Surf's up!

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We awoke to bright sunshine, a sure sign that we were leaving the Coromandel. After a quick breakfast, we headed down the east coast, with a quick coffee stop in Tairua, to Karanghake Gorge for lunch. The gorge, with it's old mine workings and abandoned railway tracks was as impressive as we remembered. We also passed through the town of Peroa - home of the soft drink L&P ("World famous in New Zealand") which is commemorated with a huge L&P bottle. We stopped for supplies in Hamilton before arriving in the surf town of Raglan at the time we had told the backpackers we would arrive! This is a first for us because we usually get side-tracked so many times on the way that we arrive just as they are giving up on us...

We took a quick walk into town and ate seafood and steak at the local pub/hotel and then watched "Blood Diamond" in the evening (washed down with a few nice bottles of Speights' Distinction - which is fast becoming Tim's favourite beer).

The next day, we planned to walk 6km up the coast to watch the pro-surfers but the rain had followed us down from Coromandel! Instead we got on with more mundane stuff - setting up a PO Box address in Christchurch with the local Post Shop, browsing the surf shops, checking out the forex markets and looking at job vacancies online...all things which needed to be done...


Thanks to everyone for your birthday wishes and comments and messages in general - keep 'em coming.

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Comments

[Mike]

Belated birthday!
Hey guys, a belated happy birthday form me and Dawn! Tim - I got a new bike. Joking over now. Where is my old one!!!! :)