Advertisement
Published: November 18th 2006
Driving north of Rotorua, you soon hit the northern coast and the Bay of Plenty, named as such by Captain Cook when he first hit the coastline and observed an abundance of food supplies in the Maori villages. It still is an area with an abundance of food being a major citrus fruit and kiwi fruit growing region - in fact Te Puke, a small town on this stretch of coastline claims to be "the kiwi fruit capital of the world". For tourists however, this stretch of coastline is more a "Bay Of Very Little" - a few garish beach/harbour towns often dominated by tasteless beachfront concrete structures, are dotted along the coast. We hot-footed it past the bay to the large Coromandel forest park on a large coastal peninsula of the same name.
The Coromandel is supposedly a real highlight for NZ travelling but we were a little disappointed. Our timing was probably the main factor - coinciding with Labour weekend (a NZ public holiday), our visit was shared with thousands of Aucklanders getting away from it all, crowding the beaches and in a case of pathetic fallacy, the gloomy miserable skies, reflected our mood.
There were highlights
around Mercury Bay where Cathedral Cove and Hahei Beach are loacted. The coastal scenery there is spectacular - high cliffs give amazing views over the bay and its scattering of islands and the work of the waves has left some magnificent caves, coves and stacks. Laura and I spent a good couple of hours there - following a clearly defined path down to the water's edge, we got a closer look at the sea's work. The walk back to the clifftop was strenuous but well worth the effort.
Hot Water Beach, another must do according to the Rough Guide, was packed with city folk frantically digging holes to reach the hot spring water below the sand. As high tide was fast approaching, their efforts were more and more in vain and so we simply sat and watched as their futile attempts were countered by the onslaught of the incoming cold sea water. On a quieter day at low tide, digging a hole in the sand creates a natural hot pool to sit in and even without digging a hole, the beach is naturally heated by the hot water below. On our visit though, Hot Water Beach was just another
Koru (The Silver Fern)
A symbol of strength for Maori and Kiwi alikebeach but on account of its reputation, a very busy beach, so we swiftly moved on in search of hidden secrets yet undiscovered by the masses.
We stayed a night at Coromandel Town, one of the nicest places on the peninsula, nestled between hills, the sea and a ragged hilly coastline, and the natural harbour on which it sits, is a wide bay guarded by numerous islands. We found a nice hostel with a room for the night, got some good grub and had a little wander before retiring to bed. The next day the weather was still unimproved and we joined the holiday traffic on a congested slog along the western edge of the Coromandel to Auckland and beyond.
WARNING, THIS SECTION IS POLITICAL!!! Driving on the motorway section to Auckland (the only genuine bit of motorway in NZ), we started to realise why NZ has such a high rate of road fatalities, especially for an underpopulated place with quiet roads. Firstly, many Kiwis have no idea how to drive on multi-lane roads, which was exemplified by their under-taking, tail-gating and lane-weaving habits. We saw 4 crashes on a 20Km stretch and very little regard for the
fact that it was very heavy persistent rain, which sounded like gun fire as it pelted our car. Another problem with NZ's road users are the number of young kids ragging it around in big engined, turbo-charged Japanese imports. The minimum age to drive in NZ is 15!! Insurance is not required (the government pays out on all liability), there's no sueing and consequently no financial burden for kids to own powerful sports cars (apart from the price of the car but they're actually inexpensive). In the UK, the insurer would either say "NO!" or "£10,000, thank you very much" and that stops the Chavs and Kevs getting their mits on these dangerous motors (unless they nick them and joy ride). In NZ, the utes all pimp about in Toyota Supras, Nissan Skylines and Mitsubishi Evos and evidently, wrap them around far too many trees and lamp posts!
Advertisement
Tot: 0.074s; Tpl: 0.011s; cc: 13; qc: 29; dbt: 0.026s; 1; m:domysql w:travelblog (10.17.0.13); sld: 1;
; mem: 1.1mb
