Today we said goodbye to our beach. First a swim in the sea, and then a cold shower in the shower/toilet block (the loos are of the long-drop composting variety). There was discussion about the possibility of a coming Ex Cyclone. No one was sure whether it was going to hit. Rosemary claimed to have seen a kingfisher but I could not verify this, having forgotten where last night’s Safe Place for my glasses was. Eventually I retrieved them.

We headed off, and visited some limestone crags at Waro Reserve, not particularly impressive, but only a short distance from the main road.  We also stopped at the Whangarei Curtain Waterfall, this was more of a detour. More walking up and down steps, all well signed. We were now finding the area so much more built-up. Around the waterfall new holiday homes were being built. We even saw some prospective buyers being shown around. Estate agents seem very smart in NZ, huge, plush offices and we’ve seen lots of signs for open house visits complete with a photo of the agent.

We took in the Marsden Oil refinery, a must when touring New Zealand. Although you can’t walk around the actual site, the visitor centre has an excellent presentation about the construction and operation of the site. There is also a huge scale model of the refinery. We learnt how the refined fuel is shipped to Auckland by pipe line, the petrol, kerosene and diesel being shipped down the same pipe line. The rest of New Zealand is supplied by sea going tanker. What seemed inevitable was how much more diesel than petrol comes out of crude oil.

The road to Auckland was chocker with traffic driving in towards the city. We even hit a traffic jam. We were still 80 km from the city. We left the SH1 at Waiwera just before the toll road started and headed towards Whangaparaoa where we wanted to stay in an Auckland Council camp site in Shakespear Park. Electric gates and fencing around the whole park, all anti-dog measures to protect the Kiwis. You must phone the Council from a courtesy phone and wait in a telephone queue to pay by credit card. First we sat in a phone queue for ages, then when it was answered the voice quality was rubbish, you just could not hear. We gave up and left and ended up staying at the Orewa Beach TOP 10. A disgrace of a site, so huge, we are all parked on astro turf, no sea views. Sorry today has been a bit of a write-off. Did eat some fried fish, which I cooked in the camp kitchen in our van’s frying pan. Where oh where can you buy real good quality meaty fish? Not seen any shops selling fish, while the supermarkets have a dreadfully poor selection of fish.