From a Hot Beach to a Cool Cove

Leaving the Coromandel Forest, we headed for the East coast of the peninsula.  We were a bit delayed arriving at our final destination because we didn’t realize that the ferry from Whiting to Shakespeare Cliffs was just for people. You would think that the words “pedestrian ferry” in the tour book would have alerted us but we missed that crucial bit of information. So we drove down to the dock and then still spent about 5 minutes pondering if a very small ferry with just people on board could possibly carry our car. After finally admitting the obvious, we drove the long way around the small bay and changed our camping location from a more primitive location to another Top 10 Holiday Park at Hot Water Beach. To be honest, the kids were fairly relieved by this decision as they really wanted to have hot showers (and Jen was not too bummed either).

We had heard a lot about Hot Water Beach. It is a popular tourist spot because of the thermal springs located just under the sand.  If you dig down a bit at low tide, hot water springs up, mixes with the cold ocean water and makes for home-made hot tubs.  We speculated that in the US such a phenomenon would have been commercialized for sure, requiring an admission fee, and would be surrounding by tacky tourist shops. But here in NZ it is free for anyone to use. Sweet As!

As the next low tide came at 9 PM, we had a nice dinner at our campsite then donned our geeky headlamps and ventured down the boardwalk to the beach.  We had expected a larger stretch of beach so were surprised to find that the thermal springs are only about 75 meters wide.  As per usual, we found mainly young Germans tourists, about 20 of them, all crammed like sardines into one pool, laughing and drinking alcohol (not that sardines laugh or drink alcohol). BTW, that was the first and last time we came across anything resembling a party during our entire trip as people are very low key here and the holiday parks don't tolerate partying.  Although the Germans invited us to join them, we opted to walk down a bit further to find our own stretch of beach (and we were not totally sure all of them were completed clothed either).  Using the handy spade we rented from the holiday park (very essential to have this) we dug down into the sand to create a shallow depression, built up some wall to keep the water in, then laid down to get out of the chilly wind.

We were having a lovely relaxing time, when Jen made the mistake of digging a bit deeper only to unleash a torrent of truly scalding 150 degree water! The rest of the night was comical - alternating fits of perfect temp, then chilly gushes when we would let in too much cold water, then OH MY GOD MY (fill in the body part) JUST BURNED OFF! Seriously. At one point Pete was walking through the pool when he suddenly made a vertical leap he hasn’t hit since he was in high school, and proceeded to speak in tongues while wondering how many layers of skin had burnt off his foot (thankfully none). Finally, a family vacated a more temperate nearby pool and we quickly moved in before some some Germans could grab it.

As we lay back in our little salty hot tub, we gazed up to behold a clear sky filled with brilliant but mostly foreign constellations. Being in such a rural location, there were no lights obscuring our view.  It was slightly disconcerting to be missing the familiar Big and Little Dipper and other such constellations that I can never seem to learn the names of but yet are familiar friends that hover above  every night.  We spotted the Southern Cross, which despite the hype of the Crosby, Stills and Nash song, is just pretty much just 4 stars low on the horizon.  Seeing it for the first time did not really "make us understand just why we came this way."  But every time I think of the words "Southern Cross,"  those lyrics still come unbidden into my head!  We did recognize the constellation Orion, even though it is upside down so that the hunter appears to be standing on his head.  Another spectral treat are two white patches called the Magellanic Clouds, which are actually satellite galaxies of the Milky Way. Behold, the Southern Cross (well I do admit, CSN, that the bottom star is pretty bright)...

We headed back to the beach the next morning at next low tide, but struggled to find a good spring with the right temp. The pools we tried to dig were simply too hot, or too cold, or too big or too small (just call us GoldiLocks). Eventually three friendly Kiwis took pity on us and invited us into their tub.  They own a vacation house nearby so were hot water beach veterans (and also seemed to have skin made of asbestos as the occasional hot geyser had no affect on them). We had enough space for just 3 of us at a time, so dared each other to dash into the chilly ocean, and then would make space for the returning person to jump in and warm up again.

In the afternoon it was on to Cathedral Cove which we all agreed must be one of those 50 most beautiful places in the world!  It is just up the road from the Hot Water Beach but requires a 45  minute downhill walk along a path, thus eliminating the unfit from visiting this gem of the North Island. The beach is simply stunning, with coves of white sand, rock formations in the water and framing the shore, and several giant caves and archways you can walk through. The water is crystal clear and aqua blue, and to top it off, at one end of the beach there is waterfall that falls down along the limestone, creating small rainbows against the cliff. Really?

Thanks to it being a relatively down time of year, the beach was fairly empty (and strangely lacking in German tourists; maybe they were hung over from the boozing at Hot Water Beach)?  The ocean was too chilly to be in for long, but everyone got in up to their knees and Pete even attempted a trip to a rock 60 meters out in the surf. He got about 15 meters there before deciding that there would be witnesses to his drowning.  Actually, there was no thinking other than "my lungs are collapsing...must get back to shore." Oh well, we stayed on the beach for a good while in the warm sun and got some great pics...