Coromandel trip 2016 - or - checking out paradise to chill out in

Tuesday 8 March

Sunrise at 4.30am at Whitinaga

We had a steamy night - NO not wehat you are thinking! Steamy as in humid – definitely so thick you can almost swim in this air!  Luckily it eased off by around 4.30am – then got woken up by car leaving right past our window at 5.30am.

Sighs

Turns out that the "Motel" was built way back (1950's???) and it has now 3 permanent 'renters' in some units - one working for a gravel company.  The three units were so old that it had an outside shower and (almost guaranteed) an OUTside longdrop - eg you had to leave your place and go round the back to a square little dunny! Anyhow - the chap at the front had a Diesel pick-up truck and - yup - left for work at 5.30am, right past our window!

The Bed was ok-ish - soft but firm. It did have a feature that encouraged both us to roll into the middle - so there was lots of body contact! This could work out for us ok in the long run *grins*

Had breakfast – then strolled into town  (3km ) for supplies (citronella candle \ badge?!)  and window shopping.  Decided to let the Phone camera take a panorama - not half bad!?
Had lunch from/at a local bakery – and doing the touristy thing - sitting at a table outside the bakery in full sun -NICE – then walked back home – and still NO badges!!!  I may never find a Coromandel cloth badge!!

Temp 25 degrees – and full sun – so we 'chilled' out at our motel for 2-3 hours – then headed to the beach for a cool-down – managed to swim a bit having forgotten how salty the sea was.  Not a single shark in sight - so that was good!
Back home for a rinse off (salt and sand) and then out for tea – Cafe Dino's place (we have been there before some 5 or 6 years back)

Dinos was unexpectedly closed, so walked around town to find a decent place to eat and eventually settled on Irish pub  'Grace O'Malley's' !  Big mistake!!!
It took one hour and 14 minutes to get basic food out.  When we queried the waitress having waited 70 minutes, said something along the lines of 'coming to grips with the kitchen'!  Poor excuse.   They could have said when ordering, that there is a delay - or even offered us free somethings.  Sighs - such bad customer relations. We decided there and then not ever to go back there.

The Garlic bread was not much better.  There was no Garlic butter inside the cut bread at all - so you had the options of buttering up yourself - heaps or as little as you wanted.  Well - ok! ONLY problem was that the loaf came out Luke warm AT best so by the time we had eaten the first slice the rest was actually cold - no melting of the butter there.  Try eating raw uncooked garlic - it is salty and a touch of sulfur.  yuk!


After we eventually had our meal we headed home for a sat on the shady balcony and a wino-fino – and perhaps later some night time photography on the beach!! Stars are clear as and you can clearly see the Milky-way.

While relaxing and slurping the nectar the  clouds were rolling in - so nope - no night excursion – besides the mozzies are out in force. 


Time for bed . . . . . .   wonder if we will get woken up again at 5.30am

While strolling round town we found a late blooming Pohutukawa!!
Turns out this year they had a poor showing - putting their energy into leave growth after last years stunner season!  Still, unusual to get a flower this late.  They are more of a spring/summer flower - by February they are usually gone.   Lucky us to see this one!






Have fun!