Tauranga Road Trip 2015 - 3 day Vacay!

Yes! Bay of Plenty Roadtrip 2015, we had talked about this plan for a little while as we haven't explored this area of home before. I had managed to organize leave from work around Anzac weekend which gave the wife and I some much needed time off to unwind and relax.

Day1
On the first day we got everything ready, beach clothes, toiletries, warm clothes, and even bought the new death cab for cutie album for some nice road trip music (been meaning to get this). The drive to Hahei Beach was beautiful, a little windy as it snaked its way through the hills but very picturesque.

 When we got there, we parked at the car park which led to the pleasant 40 minute walk to cathedral cove, which adorned many a placemat as a popular tourist attraction. To grasp the history of how long it would have taken over the years for the water to make it's way through the cave like that. Some other rocks in the area will have a century or so before toppling over I imagine.

Here are some pics from the walk. Took some for the album, took some for my website, Pleased with the photos. Got a lot of ideas for my feature film, especially since the paths were quite photogenic.

Other than being bullied off the road by a herd of cows ;)

We eventually arrived in Tauranga at our booked Villa, Seascape villa, It was beautiful. The Photos didn't really do it justice, I was saying to Melody, when we finish up, I want a place like this. It was modern, the design was aestheically pleasing and the room was comfortable.

 

 We unpacked then headed for a fantastic dinner at the Neighbourhood Beer garden. Not normally a fan of BBQ pork ribs but wow, tasty, also, if you plan on being refined, this is very much a handheld food lol.

 Day 2
The next morning came and the lord blessed with a gorgeous day!

We had breakfast with our hosts. This was a different experience for us as used to staying in hotels and the like, but they had a very mom and pop feel, they wanted you to feel at home, offered advice when you wanted it, their knowledge on the area was superb and they had led very full lives, both mornings our conversational topics were quite varied. While eating on our selection of cheeses, meats, breads, cereals , jams and drinks - we enjoyed our company lot.

The city was a lot different in the day time, everyone was at the beach no doubt soaking up the sunshine :) We parked the car and headed on up.

The walk itself up the mountain was pretty easy, it wasn't too steep (a little more on the final leg though to be fair) and we enjoyed the walk/trek up the mountain alot. We snapped heaps of photos (which probably didn't help the traveling time) but we relaxed and made the normal rocky/final countdown jokes of all the training montages we liked and enjoyed the journey - The destination of the summit was the icing on the cake. Here are some of our favorite pics from our time there;

 
After this we went shopping at Bayfair which was their biggest mall apparantely

Then explored more of the city before a private hot pools session :)

After this we finished off the night by watching Avengers 2 in 3D :) Wow, I was sort of over it to be honest but halfway through it became exciting again, Iron man is definitely the character that holds them together :) Great film, Ultron was a good baddie too :)

Day 3

The LAST day of our holiday :( but arguably our best :).  We said goodbye to the Villa and went kayaking. Kayaking! I've always wanted to do this but never had the time/opporuntity. Today was the day :) The weather was overcast so perfect for not getting sunburnt and the river not too busy, so Melody and I had a peaceful relaxing time kayaking upriver. There was one cow which must have been quite jealous because it stomped its foot and looked like it was going to come in after us. It's easy to laugh now but I'm sure we wouldn't have gotten away lol. Imagine a swimming cow coming for you like Jaws, I must put that in a future short film :)

That Black cow in the middle. Thats it. I hope it doesn't read my blog lol.

 After kayaking we left Tauranga and headed down to Te puke to see the much talked about kiwifruit and also take the tour which was quite informative. Who knew we were so innovative? Plus kiwifruit jam, soaps, chocolates and the like, so many uses? I was impressed. Great tour, brought back memories of my day as a produce store man.

Driving away from Te Puke we headed to a Live bee display near Tauranga, Did you know that bees only live for 6 weeks? I learnt alot of different things there. That if a Queen bee dies, the next of her eggs the worked bees feed them royal jelly and the strongest of the 3 is the boss. They fight and the others will work with the rest. Amazing.

Last but not least was the L and P bottle statue n Paeora. These monuments look so big in photos you get there and all like unimpressed, then after taking photos you realize how big these things really are. And Yeah, that was us. We headed home on the main highway which was great as it was straight roads for the majority and got to watch the sunset :)

Overall a great trip and tomorrow I'm doing some extra work in a NZ feature film, then it's back to real life work. Looking forward to the next holiday :)