Coromandel Peninsula

Flying Kiwi: Thursday 17.01.08

Going back south we passed through Auckland, dropping off some people and picking up others. Then we headed toward the beautiful Coromandel Peninsula. A sea kayaking trip or 2-hr walk to Cathedral Cove was available, and I heard that it was absolutely gorgeous, but it had gotten extremely hot while we set up our tents at the new campsite. So we decided to forego the siteseeing and just get down to the beach for some sun, sand, and waves. The waves were brutal, swirling up the sand from the bottom, tossing our bodies around with no effort whatsoever. Sam determinately kept trying to surf the waves with the boogie board, but I gave up quickly, having swallowed enough of the salt water that burned my throat.

That evening, we all went to Hot Water Beach, where there are extremely hot rocks underneath the sand along the shore in some areas. So at low tide, people (usually tourists, haha) bring along spades (kiwi for "shovels") to try and build hot pools in the sand where the hot rocks are located. To find a good hot area you just had to dig your feet into the sand and see if you felt any warmth - in some places, resting your feet in sand less than 6 inches deep for more than a couple seconds would cause burns. It took us awhile to get a sandbar going to keep out the water from the waves, and in the end our hot pool was somewhat disappointing. We were too close to the water's edge and the waves kept breaking our sandbar, refilling the holes we had just dug. I didn't feel like getting wet, so I just huddled with some girls with our feet resting in warm sand. Further along the beach, a massive group of people had succeeded in creating a large hot pool. Enough water from the waves had gotten inside the sand bar area to create a pool deep enough to soak in, they had a solid wall going around the area to enclose it, and they had found spots so hot that even if you weren't resting on top of that spot, the heat had warmed all the water to make a good hot pool. Very nice.

If you've read my previous blog, you know that I was freaking out about some pictures I had lost. I did manage to find the pictures from the first couple weeks of my trip. It turns out they were on another SD card I'd forgotten about. But I know that I did have pictures on my USB drive, but now I have no idea what was on it. Hopefully they were just copies from an SD card I'd already uploaded or didn't erase...