The Bay of Plenty

A bright start, but what a cold night; inside the cab of the motorhome it was -2°C, so presumably colder than that outside.

The Top-10 site in Rotorua was a bit disappointing, the internet access was so slow that I wasn't even able to upload the few photos and text for the blog in the one hour of time I paid $7.50 for (I did get a refund) and the hot tub was locked well before 8pm (its advertised closing time), so we didn't get to enjoy that either.

Anyway, we moved on to Whakatane, in the Bay of Plenty. We'd read that there was a waterfall somewhere and were directed a little way down Strand Road, where we found a big rock with a tunnel through it:

But no waterfall .... we did find some steps though, and they had some interesting decorations. Apparently, this is called the World's first Vertigraph:

A few hundred steps later, many of them beside a small waterfall (rather insignificant due to the lack of recent rain here), we came out at a viewpoint high above the town:

There were some good views out over the bay:

Then on to the Okere Falls:

In the midst of yet more rain forest, a fairly sizeable river drops through a series of moderate drops between foaming pools:

The water alternates between black, dark green and white, and looks immensely powerful:

We met a canoeist at the end of the track we climbed up beside the river, who told us that the river was currently still quite low at about 400 m³/s, it can get up to 1,400 m³/s apparently.

Along the way, we encountered some nice examples of the Pōhutukawa (Metrosideros excelsa) tree, also known as the New Zealand Christmas Tree:

Moving on, we arrived at our next camp for the night at Papamoa Beach (http://www.papamoabeach.co.nz/). Another great location, literally on the beach with the pounding Pacific surf just a few tens of metres away:

And great views up the beach of the sunset:

Despite the scepticism of the girls in the site office, I was determined to get a swim in the New Zealand Pacific, even at this time of year (they thought it rather too cold), but I have a good covering of insulation:

written by  Saros on May 22, 2009 from Papamoa, New Zealand
from the travel blog: The Hairy Animal 2009 World Road Trip
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