10/3/09 The pickup time for our hired car was 9 am, so we checked out of the hostel early and set off to find the rental place. We were loaded up with all our stuff, so although it was relatively easy to find, we had to stop a couple of times to rest. Our car is in the 'El Cheapo' hiring range and is tiny in comparison to the stationwagon we had in Australia, but it runs smoothly and nothing seems wrong with it.
We were heading towards Whakatane, because for the next week we were to be staying with Ian & Kaye, who are friends of Dave's aunt & uncle. We stopped at Tauranga for some lunch, and passed through Te Puke, which claims to be the Kiwi fruit centre of the world. It was a very scenic coastal drive after that, until we turned off before Whakatane to get to Waimana, the small village where Ian & Kaye's farm is. We got a bit lost at one point, but after asking someone for directions we were OK. The countryside reminded me a lot of the hilly/ mountainous parts of Britain, apart from all the tree ferns and some introduced eucalyptus and gum trees, because of the great amount of pine trees and fields of rough grass.
We had a relaxing evening with some lovely dinner and a sample of some of Ian's homemade lemon liqueur - very nice.

11/3/09 We decided to visit Whakatane today, which is the nearest proper town. We went into the small, but interesting, museum & art gallery first, and then had a milkshake in a cafe, looked at a Maori meeting place/war memorial, and drove along the seafront to slightly out of town, where there was a statue of the Maori girl who is said the words from which the name of the town was taken many centuries ago. After that we drove on to Ohope Beach, stopping at a lookout on the way. The sand at Ohope was brown/grey, but it wasn't mud, just sand. I was quite surprised at this. There were great amounts of hinged shells around too. We didn't swim because the wind was a bit chilly, so we just looked round and threw a tennis ball around to each other instead.
More liqueur sampling in the evening - this time a great apricot one. Ian & Kaye's son John was around for dinner. The chocolate pudding deserves particular mention!