Time to use the cabrio and to explore the island Oahu.
Chevrolet Camaro – a surprise for us, too!
There is more on Oahu than Honolulu. At least nature-wise. The Halona blowhole spits water like a geyser, but it’s sea water pushed through the hole by strong waves.
Halona Blowhole
From there we did the circle around the Ko’alau range along the coast. Unfortunately, the weather got worse and we couldn’t spot any turtles, neither at Turtle Bay nor at Laniakea Beach. Before returning to Waikiki we drove up and into the Punchbowl Crater which contains the National Memorial Cemetery of the Pacific – and also offers a nice vista over the city.
National Memorial of the Pacific Honolulu from Punchbowl Crater
The car rental company had a surprise for us. The “similar” in “Category C: ICAR: Toyota Corolla or similar” turned out to be a sportive Chevrolet Camaro (cabriolet). What a difference after four weeks in a clumsy campervan!
Camaro – outside
Camaro – interior
We didn’t use it much that day, though, but searched our hotel in Waikiki and explored this part of Honolulu. Not surprisingly, we soon landed on the famous Waikiki Beach.
But we had to agree to our guide claiming it to be a quite overrated place. Indeed: the beach is mostly man-made, partially with imported sand. The towels are close to each other. And actually, most of the guys are here just for selfies and not for relaxing. But maybe we’re just a bit spoiled from Fiji (29°C water temperature, natural corals…). And having a cold drink at the bar is much better than complaining. 🙂
First stop today: Hot Water Beach. Well, that was literally hot! You need: low tide (plus/minus 2 hours), a shovel and you’re ready to dig your own hot water pool. The water pouring out is either cold, warm or boiling hot. But you’ll realize it soon enough.
Hot Water Beach
Close to it is the Cathedral Cove. Very picturesque – very touristy. But again, just do the side-walk to a lookout and you’re alone.
Sailing Rock
On partially unsealed roads we passed the Waiau Falls (good for a short swim) and reached our campground at Shelly Beach near Coromandel just before the nice sunset.
A short walk to Wharariki Beach in the morning was a pleasant start for this day. The Archway Islands look amazing in the wild ocean, a significant contrast to the seal laying at the beach.
Archway Islands at Wharariki BeachSeal at Wharariki Beach
Just a five-minutes-drive away you reach Cape Farewell, the northernmost point of the South Island. Stone arch, seals, and in the distance Farewell Spit, a massive sand bank. Again a scenery almost out of this world.
Cape Farewell – Farewell Spit in the distance (the sandy thing)
But we had to take care of the strong wind blowing over the cliffs – and of the sheep poo. To get a nice picture of a typical New Zealand sheep Gerry had to sing a Peach Weber song: “Bäääähsame, bäääähsame mucho” – and it worked!
Bäääähsame…
A rather long drive to the Cable Bay near Nelson to set up our camp at a farm. This time no kangaroos, but dogs and chicken freely wandering between the camper vans. We liked it!
Time to use our legs again. We started with an easy walk to the Wainui Falls. Tipp: go early or late, on our return the parking lot was very busy.
Wainui Falls
Close to
the falls is the starting point for a few hikes. Actually, we wanted to do an
easy hike along the coast to Taupo Point but the track is flooded during high
tides. And somehow, we missed the alternative way, so at the end we walked up to
Gibbs Hill (405 m.a.s.l.). Sigh! At least we got a good view over the bay at
different tide heights.
Much easier was the last short walk to the Te Waikoropupu Springs, a sacred place with some of the purest water in the world.
Te Waikoropupū Springs
Oh yeah, the Kiwis say “tramping” instead of “hiking”. We camped in Pakawau at an old-fashioned campground (the host used a magnifying glass to find our booking).
Fraser Island is actually a big sand dune (largest sand island in the world) with forests (only place on earth where tall rainforest grows in sand), sweet water lakes, resorts and long 4WD tracks. Today’s tour was with a 4WD bus and covered most of Fraser’s highlights: refreshing bath in Lake McKenzie, walk in the forests of Central Station, drive on the beach-highway (80 km/h) along the 75 Mile Beach till Maheno Shipwreck and the Pinnacles and finally a stop at Eli Creek.
A rainforest… on sand!Lake McKenzie – bluuue and clear sweet water lake – a perfect place to swim!
We skipped the optional scenic flight, but admired the fact that the 75 Mile Beach is a beach (obviously), fishing spot, national park, highway, campground and even a runway for aircrafts.
A sandy highway
The dingo warnings made sense, we spotted one along the way. Dingoes were introduced around 4000 years ago in Australia and the ones on Fraser Island are considered “pure” and need to be distinguished from wild dogs.
Be Dingo-SafeBad image quality due to dirty window
I’ll remember our driver Martin (Bruce Willis’s doppelganger) and his sense of dry humor: once forcing a tourist car to drive back to a pass-by, commanding a 40-tons beast, he commented the scene with “Yeah, mine’s bigger than your’s… rarely got the chance to say this!”. Hilarious!
We set sail to the famous Whitehaven Beach, known for its fine and white sand (98% silica) and the beautiful landscape. As we were rather close to the beach already overnight, we could avoid most of the day-tour tourists in the morning. After lunch we sailed to an amazing snorkeling spot and could confirm that the word “Great” in “Great Barrier Reef” is well-deserved. A wonderful start into 2019!
Good morning sunshine – let’s go up to 250m on the Sydney Eye Tower observation deck. Sydney Tower is 309 meters to the top of the spire and the tallest building of the city.
View from Sydney Eye Tower
Then we used our Opal cards to get to the famous Bondi Beach. We just arrived at our hotel again before it started raining, and later on, hailing (golf balls in size).
We got up early to be at Monkey Mia before 8 AM to view the dolphin feeding. We had mixed feelings about this touristic attraction, but the dolphins are fed with just about 10% of their daily need, so they don’t lose their natural instincts for fish hunting.
On our way back almost crashed into an Emu family walking on the street. They were, well, pissed, and expressed it likewise… .
As Carnarvon didn’t offer much more than a Woolsworths shopping center we continued our drive and got a camp site at Coral Bay, where we also did a quick swim to cool down – again, we had almost the entire beach for ourselves.
