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amethyst73Thursday March 11
I woke up with some sort of itchy rash on the backs of both hands. Will keep an eye on it and see what it does.
After getting up and eating breakfast, we hiked awhile along a trail that ultimately connects Paihia with the next town south, Opua. We didn't go nearly that far - just 20 minutes or so up to a camping beach. We saw a large rock that was covered with oysters which was quite impressive.
I then took a turn at driving over into town. It's a distinctly odd sensation - everything is on the wrong side, including the turn signal. My windshield wipers got turned on accidentally more than once, but nothing worse than that happened. When we arrived downtown, we were delighted to find a craft fair in progress. We wandered about and had the pleasure of knowing that our purchases were made in New Zealand by New Zealanders. We spent the rest of the morning wandering around the tiny downtown. The souvenir shops in Paihia are generally nicer than those in Auckland.
Paihia has various ferries and cruises. We looked into a "Discover the Bay" afternoon cruise, but instead decided on the much more flexible (and much much cheaper) ferry over to Russell, a nearby peninsula settlement that our condo-owning friend had recommended. As we'd just missed the regular ferry, we took the 'fast' ferry across. The skipper seemed to take pride in going quite rapidly once out on the open water and giving any passengers who were sitting out in the open a good wetting as he cut through the waves!
Russell itself was a bit of a letdown. One could tell that it was a tourist destination - they nickel-and-dimed one for all they could. There was the mini-tour, the mission, the museum... We found ourselves stubbornly unwilling to pay for anything extra. We did enjoy the tiny church and graveyard, which are quite old. Inside the church, members have made needlepoint cushions for all the seats, and the Bible has Maori and English side by side on the page.
We took a standard ferry back to Paihia, discovered that the local library had free wireless Internet till it closed at 5, got dinner, and drove back to the condo while there was still light in the sky.
------------
We really have crap free wireless access here; I haven't been able to successfully upload a single picture. Sorry for the inconvenience!
Post from mobile portal m.livejournal.com
I woke up with some sort of itchy rash on the backs of both hands. Will keep an eye on it and see what it does.
After getting up and eating breakfast, we hiked awhile along a trail that ultimately connects Paihia with the next town south, Opua. We didn't go nearly that far - just 20 minutes or so up to a camping beach. We saw a large rock that was covered with oysters which was quite impressive.
I then took a turn at driving over into town. It's a distinctly odd sensation - everything is on the wrong side, including the turn signal. My windshield wipers got turned on accidentally more than once, but nothing worse than that happened. When we arrived downtown, we were delighted to find a craft fair in progress. We wandered about and had the pleasure of knowing that our purchases were made in New Zealand by New Zealanders. We spent the rest of the morning wandering around the tiny downtown. The souvenir shops in Paihia are generally nicer than those in Auckland.
Paihia has various ferries and cruises. We looked into a "Discover the Bay" afternoon cruise, but instead decided on the much more flexible (and much much cheaper) ferry over to Russell, a nearby peninsula settlement that our condo-owning friend had recommended. As we'd just missed the regular ferry, we took the 'fast' ferry across. The skipper seemed to take pride in going quite rapidly once out on the open water and giving any passengers who were sitting out in the open a good wetting as he cut through the waves!
Russell itself was a bit of a letdown. One could tell that it was a tourist destination - they nickel-and-dimed one for all they could. There was the mini-tour, the mission, the museum... We found ourselves stubbornly unwilling to pay for anything extra. We did enjoy the tiny church and graveyard, which are quite old. Inside the church, members have made needlepoint cushions for all the seats, and the Bible has Maori and English side by side on the page.
We took a standard ferry back to Paihia, discovered that the local library had free wireless Internet till it closed at 5, got dinner, and drove back to the condo while there was still light in the sky.
------------
We really have crap free wireless access here; I haven't been able to successfully upload a single picture. Sorry for the inconvenience!
Post from mobile portal m.livejournal.com
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Date: 2010-03-15 04:20 am (UTC)concerts
Date: 2010-03-16 08:40 am (UTC)