Early up chasing the sunrise up on the Pinnacles, but ended
up being a little late. The climb
supposedly takes about 40 minutes and I was only able to capture some photos of
the sunrise on the track on the way up.
When I finally made the stairs the weather changed for the worse and
wind, rain and a little ice pellets made me think twice about continuing. I was about to take on the next set of stairs
and decided it wasn’t going to be an enjoyable climb and the weather likely
would take away from any promising photos at the top. So, down I climbed and then snuck back into
bed for an additional snooze.
Tegan and
I actually got back on the trail around 9:30am and we managed to get back down
to the campervan in less than 2 hours.
When we got to the campervan, the first thing we needed to check was if
we had left the lights on… yes we had. There
was a group there about to head up and luckily upon me asking, they had jumper
cables. Phew. With campervan running again, we headed for
Hot Water Beach. 
Hot Water Beach is a very touristy spot; but only because it
is basically free and the appeal of digging a hole on a sandy beach and soaking
in your own thermal hot pool. The
experience is great, first you battle with the oncoming waves constantly
destroying all effort you applied until the tide recedes enough where this isn’t
a problem anymore. 
The next obstacle is
the temperature, the thermal springs that rise through the sand are extremely
hot, boiling even. If you have any of
these feeding your dug out pool, you will find it most uncomfortable in
time. We had a nice pool for a time and
then it got unbearable. A dip into the
ocean works to cool you off, but hoping back into the pool is only described as
a sensation of needles. The shovel
rental costs $5 and you have a 4 hour window to enjoy the beach, 2 hours either
side of low tide.
From hear we headed south to a beauty of a campground; Omokoroa
Thermal Holiday Park. It has 3 thermal
pools, nice facilities including SKY Sports TV, I watched the Irish win over
the Aussies here; fantastic game. I
missed a little of the game as Tegan had to have a soak in the pool first. The
sacrifices I make!
Once again Tegan was asleep on my lap watching rugby, so I
put her into the campervan to sleep away until I finished the game. Night done.
