South Arm

Did a great walk with Probus ladies yesterday, empty beaches, clear blue skies with lovely cloud formations, and a communal picnic to finish it all off.

The highlight was the sight of the Iron Pot Lighthouse, the closest one can get to it except, of

course by boat.   This little island used to have houses and enough children to justify a school. It stands at the mouth of the Derwent River, guarding the entrance to Hobart.

Gannets

There is a colony of breeding Gannets on the west coast, where the beaches are all black sand.

It was a windy day and it was a delight to see these graceful birds soaring above us on the thermals.

And on the way home we stopped for refreshment!

Auckland

Auckland from the Harbour Cruise

The bridge proved inadequate so a Japanese company designed and made two extra lanes on each side of the existing bridge, and they are jokingly called the Nikon Clipons!

and my favourite view of Auckland 

Hobbiton

Today we went to Hobbiton, the film farm set where Lord of the Rings and The Hobbit were filmed so now I need to go home and watch the movies!

Nevertheless I enjoyed it all, it's amazing what lengths they went to to get everything right.   Even choosing the location involved months of searching from the air because they wanted rolling hills, a lake and a big tree for the birthday party scene.

It is big business in this little town and brings in the tourist in hordes.

At any time I expected Iain McKellar to loom up in front of us, staff in hand, but perhaps it was his day off!   We were lucky to be in a tour group of just eight people so we had plenty of time to take photos and at the end we enjoyed a drink in the Green Dragon Inn.

Here's a few photos.

Cathedral Cove from Ha hei beach.

Today we did the hour long walk down to the Cove we visited from the water yesterday.   Bit of a slog back up but it was all worth it.

This afternoon we went to suss out Hot Water Beach where every man and his dog digs himself a hole in the sand and it gets filled with hot water (from their faces we are not convinced)

.

Ha hei

Today we left Coramandel and drove over the pass to the other side of the Peninsula.

We arrived in the little town of Ha Hei and checked into our accommodation for the next two nights.   Very nice.

This afternoon we did the scenic boat trip, we were lucky to have the whole boat to ourselves so we had no trouble getting some great shots of the Cove and all the volcanic rock formations round the coast.

Tonight we drove to Captain Cooks Beach ( yes he came here too) and had great fish and chips, ( fush and chups) by the beach, cooked by The Frying Scotsman with a great Scottish accent

Fourth attempt

Keep loosing it!   Not me, the blog!   This is my fourth attempt to tell you that we picked up our Mazda 2 and headed out of Auckland in peak hour traffic on our way to the coramandel peninsula.   It was only a couple of hours in reality but with a few photo stops and time to pick up our groceries we arrived in the town of coramandel around lunchtime and went first to the Information Centre to check a few things out.

We had a bite to eat then drove out of town to a pleasant short circular walk in a Kauri Forrest which was very pretty and different again from our rainforest.

And the bark is so pretty, and the trees are so straight, they would make ideal telegraph poles!

Ten days in New Zealand

I have come to New Zealand with friend and neighbour Shirley.   At the mement we are with her daughter in Auckland but we pick up a hire car later and tomorrow we will drive to the Coromandel Peninsula to do a spot of walking.
Yesterday we went to church, a lovely little English style church where they were blessing the 108 wool blankets to be sent to the Fistula Hospital in Ethiopia.

Back home

For some reason I can't give my blogs titles, this one should be headed Bay of Fires.   The weather was not the best but it did mean the waves were mighty and we had the place to ourselves.

We are up at St Helens for a couple of days with friends Jos and Daphne.

On our way up we stopped off at Devil's Corner Vineyard for a look at the fantastic view and to suss out the architectural award winning Viewing Platform.   Bit different from all the viewing platforms we have seen so far.

 Tomorrow we will go to The Bay of Fires.

Yum, new dessert for me, Chocolate Puddings

The Azaleas are putting on a show.

Friends to lunch

The seven of us is now the three of us!