COROMANDEL PENINSULA – THE EAST COAST

We stayed at Whitianga for five days. Our room at the hostel on the seafront was great – comfy bed, fluffy duvet, dressing table and mirror, wardrobe, reading lamps and a heater! By the time Marc had carried up the last bag, the room was as warm as toast, my few reminders of home were arranged on my bedside table and I was catching up with ancient celebrity gossip and with a dog-eared copy of Hello. I was well and truly settled in for the night.

We were up early next day to explore the bays and headlands of Mercury Bay on foot. Armed with a bag of sarnies and sketchy map we took the passenger ferry all 50 yards across the estuary at Whitianga and started out by climbing up to the site of an old Maori pa – a fortified lookout , high on the rocks overlooking the harbour and town. After slipping and sliding our way down the muddy track to Back Bay we walked across the shoreline of the sheltered little cove full of swanky yachts and scrambled up the other side through the bush and out onto the creamy coloured sands of Flaxmill Bay, fringed with pohutukawa trees. It was beautiful as it was – it must look stunning when the trees are ablaze with colour at Christmas. We walked the length of Flaxmill Bay towards the next cross on our map - Shakespeare’s Point, a headland high above the water on bush-cloaked cliffs. James Cook woz 'ere too and he named Shakespeare’s Point after he spent a week sat at the top observing the transit of Mercury across the face of the sun. As I sat there munching my cheese and tomato sandwich, fantails flitting around us, I couldn't help wondering what he he’d enjoyed for lunch all those years ago and about the poor souls who had to carry it all up to the cliff top as he gazed into the sky from the comfort of his deckchair. We took a steep cliff track down to Lonely Bay – a small cove hemmed in by rocks that felt a million miles from anywhere as the only views were straight out towards the horizon. Marc seems to have a compulsion that makes him want to know what’s around every corner so he disappeared over the rocks whilst I walked the shore soaking up the late afternoon sun. The last ferry of the day was the school-run and the post-run and we joined a dozen children and a pile of brown paper parcels for the journey back across the strong currents of the estuary. No sooner had we had supper than we were out again. We had reserved tickets for the Whitianga premiere of the new Indiana Jones film. Marc judged the film as disappointing and predictable but I’d had low expectations to begin with so didn’t feel let down, only that I’d wasted precious time.

Next day, we picked up a nice, shiny, white hire car to go exploring more of the east coast of the peninsula. Otama Beach and Opito Bay are said to be two of the finest stretches of sand on the Coromandel. Off the beaten track in the middle of nowhere these were deserted and windswept, made even more beautiful by the dark skies on the horizon and a silvery sun on the crashing waves. Behind the dunes of Opito Bay, a small community of boarded-up baches huddled together against the wind awaiting the return of their owners and calmer weather.

We took the ‘309 Road’ inland to look for a small grove of Kauri trees that had escaped the saws of the loggers many years ago, probably because they were in a gold mining field. An unsealed road, the 309 was being resurfaced in what can only be described as grit in thick mud. In about two minutes flat, the car was covered in it and when we stopped at the Kauri Grove, huge lumps just dropped off making a perfect outline of the car. Young Kauris, known as Rickers, grow very tall and fast in a race for the forest canopy. Once they reach the light the shape of their leaves change and they shed all but the top few branches, maturing over hundreds and sometimes thousands of years into kings of the forest. The trees were magnificent – a small group protected and viewed from a boardwalk that had survived against all odds. A little further down the 309 we took a walk down to the picturesque Waiau Falls – not very high or dramatic but a beautiful setting with a deep round pool at the base.

Two popular features of this area are Hot Water Beach and Cathedral Cove. We’d taken our swimming togs and a shovel from the hostel to Hot Water Beach as two hours either side of low tide it is possible (apparently) to dig a big hole in the sand and wait a few minutes for it to fill with hot water for your own private spa. One problem – the sea was crashing over the rocks in a howling easterly and it was impossible to dig anywhere. A busload of backpackers were up to their knees in the surf, burrowing their toes into the seabed where they could feel a little warmth but it was all a hilarious waste of time. Never before have I seen people standing shivering in the sea – bare legs below, fleeces hats and scarves on top, and I was one of them! Marc, of course, braced himself and went for a swim.

Cathedral Cove was a different story. An hour’s walk along the coastline led to a beach with a giant limestone arch above it. It was ‘side-on’ to the sea and as it was low tide we were able to walk through without getting our feet wet. Not far down the beach a tall limestone island with trees growing on the top sat in the water a stone’s throw from the shore. Many years ago this would have been another arch before its erosion and collapse into the sea. On the walk back we wandered down to the gorgeous rocky shores of Stingray Bay and Diamond Bay and daylight was fading fast as we made it up the last pull to the top of the cliffs. Our car was a forlorn sight as it sat all alone in the middle of an otherwise deserted car park, caked in mud. Fantastic!

The Coromandel really is somewhere special.