For the first time in our trip so far today was almost a complete wash out with heavy rain most of the day. Because of the weather we weren’t able to do the things we wanted to do in Auckland (or rather they wouldn’t have made sense) and so we decided to take a short trip to the Auckland Museum. The museum is quite impressive if a little confused in that a lot of the early history of art displayed is English! However, there are excellent displays both of the Mauri history and of the involvement of NZ in the various (mainly 20th century) wars. We could have spent much longer in the museum and still not touched a large percentage of the exhibits.
After a stop at a (largely anonymous) shopping centre we made our way back to the highway for our next two overnights – Jacaranda Lodge in Cormomandel. Coromandel is about a two and a half hour drive from Auckland with the last 30-40km on a narrow coast road (literally right next to the Ocean) with stunning views around the peninsula (particularly in the last 5km when the views of Wilson Bay are simply outstanding, particularly when greeted by the first sunshine of the day!).
We checked into Jacaranda lodge and spent an hour or so drinking tea and eating cake with our amiable host Robin before heading into Coromandel for a brief bit of sightseeing. Coromandel fits the American definition of a one horse town with one main street, a single ATM, a single petrol station but three supermarkets (the town has a population of 1,500).
We are looking forward to our walk tomorrow on the Coromandel coastal walkway and hope we have some decent weather!