Coromandel Pinnacles

After leaving Thames as quickly as possible I headed up to the Coromandel Park Forest. A DOC run area which has various walks located in the area. After travelling up the gravel track to the visitors centre, which Vanessa loves by the way. The lovely lady told me about the Wainora Kauris Track which would be a great short walk and then complete the Pinnacles tomorrow. Sounds like a plan, $9 paid for my camp fees and off I went up another 7k of gravel track.

I parked up and then headed through the not so smooth track towards my first stream crossing. When your shoes aren't waterproof, crossing the streams is a lot more difficult than you think. Especially when the rock to step on are just far enough apart so you can't step over easily. 6 successful stream crossings later, the start of the walk up. Not sure how much of a walk the lady at DOC thought I wanted to undertake but after 20 mins of walking up hill I reached my goal. At the end were trees, fantastic! I'd been walking through them for the previous 45 minutes.

Time to bed down for the night and prepare for the 8 hour tramp in the morning.

After a good nights sleep, it was time to head up to the Pinnacles. After seeing a few people with all their walking gear on, i thought maybe not. I set off at 8.30am, half an hour later than planned (good sleep). I passed the well prepared hikers quite soon into my journey and then it onwards and upwards. Passing over the Indiana Jones type bridge was quite strange..

The climb at times was tough going, mainly due to the fact I'd consumed a large amount of beer whilst at Mt Ruapehu and was pretty much out of shape. After a while I arrived at Hydro Camp, approx halfway. It was estimated to take 2 hours there and 2 hours to the Pinnacles. After Hydro Camp it was seriously up hill with many steps thrown in for good measure. Arriving at the hut was the build up to the big last hike. After passing some people on the way down, I managed to have the Pinnacles to myself. What a fantastic place to sit and try not to look down!!

On the way down I passed an array of people who were doing the walk and it was great to know I'd been up there without others around. The journey back involved a de-tour via the Billy Goat Track, which added a little change of scenery and also included the steepest train track I'd ever seen.

Great tramp to have completed and has made me want to do more. Especially slightly more difficult ones whilst here in NZ. Next was off to the hot pools for a soak and a lovely serving of fish and chips.

Next, is where I am now....... Auckland. And after 24 hours of life here I really do understand why Roomie packed his bags and headed back to Newcastle Aus. I'm currently looking and hoping to get some Wwoof work, which is working in exchange for accomodation and food. This is something I am keen to persue with Jen as it will help secure funds for other things.

Life after Ruapehu

After finishing at Mt Ruapehu, I think I may just restart my blog. Mainly because I feel as though it will become harder again to keep in touch. It's been 3 days now and no internet. In these times thats crazy!! Just not to confuse, i'm typing this out during a quiet evening and will post this as soon as I find so net access.

Hamilton – After leaving Ruapehu, I went straight to Hamilton, to visit some friends (Andy and Heather) they've managed to find work in the area and are trying to live an honest life for once, well Andy is!! Having seen the best attempt to leave accommodation, Andy and Heva win the prize hands down. Nice to see the guys and good to go to Raglan, may go back on a sunnier day. By the time I publish this I believe they may have a flat of their own as they were sharing with a crazy old woman who didn't speak English. I had the benefit of meeting her and she was crazy and did not speak any English at all. Planning on paying a visit back there with Jen on our way down south.

Mount Manganui and Te-Puke (revisited) – The Mount was magnificent as usual, lovely sandy beaches and a really chilled atmosphere! Matt and Josie, again who worked on the mountain live there now. Had breakfast with them before heading off to cruise round town. As always staff were not too far away. In a sports shop whilst buying some trainers met 4 others from Ruapehu. However it came the time to head back to Te Puke and revisit those horrid kiwi orchards. At the time the memories had died and it was a job to look forward to doing. (especially without moaning Craig with me!!!!)

Turns out that the kiwi experience is worse than I remembered. I started on the Saturday less than 1 week after leaving my comfy job as a Customer Service Superstar (my words but many would fail to disagree). Working with Andy a German guy was good. However the work of butchering the non fruit growing branches was soul destroying. Especially after the first 2 days of 8 hour shifts we were asked if we wanted our 10 hour shift to begin at 7 or 7.30am. Err neither!!! We had a decent team, myself, Andy, Timo and Peter the boss. Any and Timo were from the Germany and Peter was from Czech and sounded like Borat. Nice guys, shite job. Night times weren't too bad, a run in the early evening followed by some internet and a film before sleep preparation for the next kiwi mutilation installment.

Then the dreaded day came. We had completed our butchering job and now it was on to thinning. Now as soul destroying jobs go this was surely the worst. Pick all the buds that are mis-shaped and also the first two off every branch. Oh my god, really has it come to this. I'm sorry, respect to the people who do that job year in year out but, no way. The only thing goin through my head was how much money have I got and when can I leave. Screw the money lets go. End of Te-Puke revisited and onto being a beach bum.

After heading back to the Mount for a few beers with Matt and an arranged footy match with Matt's work mates, time had come to move on and travel again.




Walking, Really?? - As you can imagine the thought of me walking would probably scare some people, especially back home. My new venture started with a walk up Mount Manganui on the morning of my departure. Lovely walk up early in the morning and a chill out at the top. Followed by a brisk walk down and a chat with Nan before getting into Vanessa and heading North.

Waihi Beach – This was my first stop on my up North. Parked up on the beach front and a little stroll along the sand. Cue my second idea of walking. There was a board at the end of the beach marking out a walk up and over the facing cliffs. Off I went with packed lunch and planned to visit a waterfall that was marked. On the way there was a beautiful beach called Orokawa Bay, golden sands and only myself and two old women that had arrived not long before. The phrase 'you could be anywhere in the world' suited the bay perfectly. After the beach a further 30 minute walk to the waterfall. This was a little bit of an adventure as the sign posts were very lacking, almost as lacking as the track. You had to cross the streams about 13 times and crawl through fallen trees and eventually arrive at the not so violent waterfall. Planned lunch there was disturbed by the amount of insects and without repelant on I thought best to head back to the beach for some grub. On the way back I bumped into another person from Ruapehu. She lives there, sorry don't know her name, from rentals I think. Great walk for adventure, appetite for walks has now been well and truly set up.





Whagmanta – After a day of poor weather I travelled to Whagmanta, what a place!! Again lovely sandy beaches and a great place for camping for free to go along with it. Based from there I completed the Wentworth Valley walk. A little boring to be honest, straight forward stoned track all the way to the lookout for the falls. Only really got interesting when you went past the lookout and climbed down to the bottom of the falls or up and overlooked it from the top.


The Billabong Surf Camps are held in Whagmanta during January and so the surf does turn top class even though when I was there, the Mersey has higher waves. Great walk along the beach on my second day, lovely blue skies and a bit of typical British sunburn.

Thames – After deciding not to stop off at few possible locations I arrived at Thames. Now the reasoning for Thames was that it's the main town of the Coromandal area. It's more like whats at the bottom of the River Thames. My plan was for a few nights maybe 3 or 4. Wrong, I'd rather thin a kiwi orchard than stay here. Decision made, time to move on....