Hot Water Beach & sea kayaking on the Coromandel

Trip Start Sep 21, 2009
1
44
83
Trip End Apr 10, 2010


Loading Map
Map your own trip!
Map Options
Show trip route
Hide lines
shadow
Where I stayed

Flag of New Zealand  , North Island,
Sunday, December 13, 2009

The Coromandel is a small finger of land to the east of Northland. It is home to various beautiful bays and more windy roads. We stayed on a campside next to Hahei Bay but didn't do much on the day of arrival other than investigate the tide times at hotwater beach and book a sea-kayaking tour (some people don't learn!). So it was the next day that we began in earnest to put ourselves in dangers way. First stop, Hot-water Beach - it was deserted except for the small patch in the middle of the beach that was packed full of people digging holes. So we did what any sensible people would do - we headed straight for the busiest place on the beach to try and find ourselves a spot. Actually there was method to the madness. Several hundred metres below the surface lay the smoking hot remnants of an ancient volcanic eruption. So in certain places, and at certain times it is possible to dig holes that then fill with hot water. Very strange but very true. Finding a spot where the magic happened was easier said than done. Most of our attempts only produced cold water pools, but thanks to the generosity of some fellow beach dwellers we found ourselves at hot hot pool eventually
Crowded beach
Crowded beach
.

Due to the fact that a number of the 'test-holes' that had been dug contained nothing but cold, there were several foreigners testing the pools and exclaiming, 'This isn't hot', like victims of some scandalous fraud. That was until they were invited to try one of the hot hot pools - at which point they quickly jump out as if they'd been stung by a bee and proclaim, 'Man! That is hot!'. 

My big mistake in the hole adventure was giving up the pool we'd dug while Gem was changing into her swimming stuff. So there were those few minutes between losing the old spot and finding the new one that I remained on guard, in anticipation of a punch to the face or another of Gem's deadly body-combat moves.

Once tired of hot we set off to rendevous with the kayaking portion of our adventure. We were pleased to be in the presence of an instructor - someone who might be able to stop us from sinking - and we were equally pleased to see that these kayak's looked less sinkable than our previous ones. They each took two paddlers and even had a peddle controlled rudder. So after a brief briefing and group introductions we were thrust into the sea to explore various bays along the shore, including the famous Cathedral Cove. Then we headed out to one of the islands further out. While out in the ocean we saw a penguin and gannet, and at one point found ourselves surrounded by strings of single-celled-organisms in the water that resembled small, salty (I ate one) jelly cubes.

Anyway - suffice to say, we arrived back on shore about 3 hours later without having sunk even once. Our next stop would be Auckland - our final north island destination before flying south to Christchurch. See you there ...
Slideshow

Comments

secker
secker on

i wouldn't mind a hot hot pool, looks better than our bath :-)

Add Comment

Use this image in your site

Copy and paste this html: