Wanted to take the famous 309 route but Navman took us on the state highway instead. Slightly dejected, we continued on with yet another bout of disappointment. After a series of super windy road, we reached the town of Whitianga 50 minutes before time, but without lunch. So we quickly parked our car by the wharf, crossed the road and checked out the cafes. Walked into one or two and when we were trying to leave Espy cafe, we sort of got stopped by the staff to check out their full menu; and so we did, and so we stayed.
Nothing impressive
Food was good but nothing impressive; saw that their milkshake won the national competition but was too rush to try it so we thought maybe later. Met Ken, our skipper, just on time at he wharf and the sun came out for us after the rain died out while chasing us. So off we go!
Snapper viewing with cool equipments; beautiful singing in the echoing cave which is one of the biggest by volume in the world; fishing birds diving straight into the water; and of course, the cheeky rocking of his coast guard vessel (super stable though) to catch the girls in horror.
Check this improvised device out
Find Shakespeare. This cliff is named after him
Bigger version of Alice's rabbit hole
Cathedral cove, so big you can walk in. We didn't cos the boat can't get near anyway
Won't wanna fall into the water with these hungry snapper inside
Mirror. Sort of
Is it Christmas already? Cos Santa's here...
And yep, that's the captain with his cheeky ethics. Haha
Ended the full tour of the cove and marina reserve gaining some volcanic formation knowledge and it was time to bid goodbye. Would definitely recommend this "private tour" for less than what you would pay to the bigger operators!
And then it's time for milkshake and I tell you, it's really deserving of the title.
Legit
I may be slightly biased since I like richer milkshake with nutty taste but it can't be that the whole nation is wrong! And Ms Blur also agree that it's good haha.
And then we thought it was too early to check in and since the weather is good, we thought maybe we can check out this end of the 309 road. And so happens that the only real attraction we wanna visit, the 308 Honey, is on this end of the route. And so we went, and we we were slightly disappointed once again after a series of lucky finds. This route seems super dangerous cos of the gravel road and narrowness. That's not all, the honey shop we tried to find turns out to be a small little stall in a deserted house with no one tending it; the only excitement was when we had to drive across a river stream and was greet with tail wagging aggressive dogs on the other end. That helped us to decide not going off the car and leave...
so we turned back after 5km on the 309 road, counting our luck that Navman didn't bring us here to waste our time when we were heading towards Whitianga. Checked in early and the host was welcoming; water view was really just a canal but it's quite a nice place nonetheless.
Squint and you'll find the canal
Headed out to town shortly after and went walking abit before we settled for dinner at Squids, as recommended by our host. And we were rather lucky as well, as they were having a Friday night promotion of two mains sets for $50 and so we got a "fish and chips" and a kilogram of mussels! Inverted comma cos it's really just pan fried fish with wedges and they were meh; but the mussels were delicious.
Reminiscing our time in Europe
Went over to the New World supermarket to shop for some tidbits to bring home and then we ended the night by watching 1/3 of a movie before we knock out...
Woke up to a rainy morning as expected. Slowly got ready to leave and then we headed over to the Lost Spring even though it was raining. Online review said it was perfect for rainy days but we thought otherwise when we were hopping around the various pools under the ice cold raindrops. Nevertheless, it was quite a nice (though pricy) place. Service was good but we didn't really make use of it. But us arriving early and opting for the dip-and-dine option meant we got nice seats reserved for us after our 90-minutes of mineral thermal spa.
Satisfied and nua-ed
Older than your Grandmother
Lunch was super worthwhile despite us forsaking our 10% discount for the combo option; risotto was tasty and the scotch fillet (along with the sauce) delicious. Rain also started to get even heavier after this so our timing was pretty on point.
Yumzzz
Next stop:
Jason of all Spade
Master of nun! Hahah
Borrowed the spade from our host and off we go! Hot Water Beach was fun and not as crowded as it should be cos of the impending storm. Found a good spot but can't quite dig deep enough to find the joke... I mean to get enough depth to submerge our body
Drove back to escape the rain; got back to return the spade that our host lent us and took a quick bath. Headed back into town to grab some dinner; tempted by the Chinese takeaway but was really too much and we did takeaway despite not having the intention to do so.
Tabao. Portions are comparable to Europe's Chinese takeout.
And then it's movie time! Now You See Me 2 is not too bad; if you like the first one, you'll probably like the sequel. And yea, finally fulfilled the movie "craving" in NZ and it's also my first movie in months! (Excluding those we had in our various accomms)
Very cool promo
And here we are! Super small cinema where the adverts are done with PowerPoint slideshow hahaha
Got back to our accomm to finish what's left of our takeaway and some packing, and we're off to bed.
Strong wind and rain woke us up the next morning but when I was finally out of bed, the sun was shining bright! Got to the front porch and absorbed as much vitamin D as I can while Ms Blur got ready to leave. Rain came and went but the sunshine prevailed; even as we bade our hosts goodbye, the sky was clear! So we set off to a hopeful morning, only to meet with disappointment the very first thing we set out to do: the Jap stall we wanted to have brunch at was closed on Sunday! And so we went ahead with plan B.
