Mt. Maunganui and Hot Water Beach

Mt. Maunganui was more like a hill on a peninsula. We walked the steep way up to the summit and admired the views from the top. Adam came to be our coat rack for the journey up and carried all our coats around him. He looked so funny carrying them all. The views were all out to sea and it was really impressive. My shins from doing the Alpine Crossing were killing on the journey down- I hate walking downhill! Jen tripped up, but she was okay and hadn't done any serious damage! We had some lunch in the campervan and made some tea. We then  did our first swap around and Jen and Adam went in our car while me, Mike and Mike were sat in the other.

Jen had done a lot of driving, but she seemed happy enough to continue. We arrived at Hot Water Beach and walked over to see some of the pools people had dug up that day. When you dig up the sand, boiling water rises up and fills the pockets in the sand. Some of the areas were really nice and warm so we paddled around and dipped our feet. We then made our way to a DOC campsite which was on the way to Auckland. We arrived pretty late at about 10.30pm and were all pretty starving. We'd had a petrol dilemma on the way there in that Jen needed petrol and there wasn't anywhere open. We found a self service one, which rejected all of our cards, but Mike's credit card worked and we filled up 30 dollars. We later drove past an open petrol station and both cars filled up on a full tank and we filled up our water as neither of us had any left. My back was hurting and so I sat in the back with Mike H for a bit. We quickly made dinner at the campsite in the boys' campervan and all fell asleep!