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Our flight from Singapore to Auckland was certainly not as nice as our flight from London. An oldish 777 which was full and with several small children on board. Apologies to those with small children, but flights without them are much nicer. Getting through bio security controls into NZ is far more difficult than getting through customs. Were our boots clean? Did we have any plant products or food? What medication did we have? Very thorough, but we passed with flying colours.
We stayed in a hotel in downtown Auckland for a couple of days which was more than enough, though we did need the sleep! We spent quite a lot of time in the marina, which was interesting for a while, but we were pleased when the day arrived to pick up the campervan and we could get going.
The whole check in process for the van worked very well, and within an hour we were on our way being extra careful not to turn the van onto two wheels which would have invalidated our insurance -as if! I confess we were both rather surprised by the overall size of the van and disappointed with the quality. That's a whole other story and we are already in email correspondence with Trailfinders who booked the trip for us!
Our first journey was to the supermarket so we could stock up with essentials. That done, we set off for Coromandel Peninsular, a journey which took about five hours. This did include a couple of stops and began to show the benefit of having a campervan - we could just pull over and make lunch! We took the long route so we could go via the seabird coast and visit a reserve and saw these Oystercatchers.
The journey was very beautiful, but along very windy roads and poor Graham was exhausted by the time we got to our first camp site in Coromandel Town. The whole area was part of a gold rush in the 1870s and the small towns looked like some thing out of a Western! We stayed two nights here getting to know the van, catching up on washing and generally sorting out. We had been 'on holiday' for a week but felt we had only just started our adventure. We visited the Driving Creek Railway - an attraction mentioned in all the guidebooks. It was built, and is still run by, an eccentric artist called Barry Brickell. Originally made to bring clay for pot making down from the hills, it is now over 3km of narrow gauge railway which goes through the most amazing forests to various stunning viewpoint - with all manner of artwork along the way. Quite mad, but wonderful.
We have discovered how to make a journey into an event itself rather than just being a way to a destination. We left Coromandel Town and made our way to Papamoa Beach via the coast on the east of the peninsular (have got there on the west). This is known as the Pacific Highway, and is beautiful. We stopped off at Catherdal Cove for a 45 minute walk to this beach.
The site at Papomoa Beach was so lovely, as was the beach and the sea, that we stayed an extra night and just sat around watching the surfers and a wedding!
Another big advantage of a campervan is that you can choose to stay or go, just as you like. This is quite a new experience for us as people who always have a plan! We now have half a plan, or a general idea, which is more than good enough. That said, we did need to be in Rotorua by Saturday to meet our really old (in most senses) friends Brian and Mary who, by coincidence are visiting NZ too. Our itineraries only crossed for one night, in Rotorua. On the short journey there we came across this kiwi fruit centre where we learned that at least 50% of the worlds kiwi fruits are grown in this one very small area of NZ. The things I could tell you about kiwi fruit! Here are a couple of photos instead!
And then on to Rotorua......North Island part two to follow.
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