Papamoa is a quiet village on the coast and the holiday park we stayed in was literally on the beach and we had a fantastic see view from our spot. Fortunately it was quiet on the camp site too, free from annoying children who must have gone back to school following the Easter holidays.

It was a lovely day so we got the table and chairs out and sat in the sun updating the blog and eating a late lunch-I know, bus passes please...!

After a while I got bored and headed onto the beach for a run. Nice beach, reminded me of the Gower. As I was jogging along I spotted a nice beach front restaurant which, shock horror actually had 3 vegetarian options that did not contain either feta cheese or excessive amounts of parmesan. Not wanting to miss an opportunity I wandered in and booked a table for later that evening and we had a very nice meal there in the end.

The following day we headed off to the Coromandel peninsular, an area fringed with White sandy beaches Pohutukawa trees and rainforest. It also has a rich history of gold mining. Sadly we didn't find any...must have been beaten to it!

Had we had more time we would have liked to have spent the night at one of the camp sites (or in my case in one of the boutique hotels). Unfortunately we were a bit under the cosh so it was mainly a day for driving, with a few stops for photographs.

However, today was a day when I had one of my bright ideas which ended up backfiring slightly. I suggested that we take a short cut about three quarters of the way up the peninsular along a road which would take us through rainforest to the West coast. The main reason behind this was that there was an opportunity to view a Kauri tree. There are NZ's largest and oldest trees-similar to the giant Redwoods in the US.

Before taking the turn off we checked for signs suggesting it might not be suitable for camper vans, saw none and went on our way. The road was about 27km's long and it soon became apparent that it was going to be an interesting drive! It was an unsealed track, in the main only wide enough for 1 vehicle and incredibly windy. It also climbed up over a mountain and had adverse cambers all over the place. A bit terrifying you could say!

About 10 minutes in we pulled to a stop so I could do some filming and take a couple of photographs. Meanwhile a jeep was travelling towards us and, instead of waiting for us to pull over further attempted to pass. There had been a lot of rain the previous night and the sides of the roads were deep ditches. Sadly this unfortunate driver ended up ploughing into the ditch as he attempted to pass! It soon became clear that he was not going to be able to drive out of the ditch as his front tires were almost completely covered by mud.

Remember we were in the middle of nowhere and nobody had mobile phone reception! We ended up driving the man to the nearest farm house where he was able to ask the farmer to pull him out with his tractor!

After the chaos we drove on, experiencing a couple of close calls with tractors and the like, eventually reaching the Kauri tree. It was big.

When we eventually rejoined the main highway we found out that the road we had been travelling on was not suitable for campervans and we would not have been insured if we had had an accident on there-oops! All part of the fun though!

That night we pressed in to a tiny village called Orere. It had a general store and that was it. The camp site was basic and had a resident rabbit which was quite novel. When I went for a run that evening I got chased by a dog which made me run a bit faster I suppose! We left the next morning for Whangarei.