The Pacific Coast Highway

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The Pacific Coast Highway
When you are heading out of Auckland, on state highway 1, towards Hamilton, it will be nice for you to stop at the Autobahn café near a town called “Bombay”, near Pukehohe.
There, you can enjoy a nice morning tea or lunch and say goodbye to Auckland.
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Continue south along the highway a little bit further ....
 and then take the turn-off onto state highway 2, signposted for Tauranga. This is known as the Pacific Coast Highway, and you can recognize it by this sign:

Along the highway, you might enjoy stopping at Paeroa, not necessarily because of the food, but because the town specializes in antiques and has some interesting shops. Soon after Paeroa, you will go through the Karangahake gorge, which is really wonderful, and you should definitely plan to stop and explore this area. (also, check out:   http://de.wikipedia.org/wiki/Karangahake_Gorge)

After Karangahake Gorge, you will come into Waihi town, which used to be a gold-mining boom-town. There is still a huge quarry in Waihi where open-cast mining is still underway. Near Waihi, there are a lot of beautiful beaches to explore, which are very nice for swimming (follow waihi beach road). If you continue along the highway, you will come across a tidal beach area which is sheltered by Matakana Island. This area has wonderful coastal views, but can be a little dull. Matakana Island itself is a nice place to visit if you have time.
If you continue your trip towards Whakatane, and you want to stop for a coffee, I find it easiest to stop in Katikati or Te Puke rather than try to get a coffee in Tauranga, which is a pretty big and busy city. In either town, you can find a car park near the café and keep an eye on your vehicle, and you don’t need to wander off the highway at all.
Tauranga is a large port city with crazy real-estate development! It is a popular place for retirement due to the pleasant climate and regional hospital. It’s a beautiful place, and nearby you can visit awesome swimming and surfing beaches in Mt Maunganui and Papamoa. However, I hope you will continue along the highway and into the Whakatane district.
In order to get through Tauranga, you need to take a lot of roundabouts, which are sometimes signposted for Whakatane, and sometimes are only signposted for mount maunganui. (maunganui, by the way, is maori for “big mountain. But really the mountain is quite small). Basically, you head out of Tauranga towards mount maunganui, and then there will be a fork in the road where a right turn will take you towards Papamoa , Te Puke and Whakatane.
After Te Puke, you will need to take a turn-off to Whakatane. You are still following state highway number 2, but it FEELS like a turn-off. After Te Puke, the landscape changes a little. You have left the horticultural region and moved into more of a dairy-farming area and the land is bumpier and more rustic.
After a short distance, you will be following a coastal road that runs alongside miles and miles of beautiful beach. If you are looking at google maps as you read this, (http://maps.google.com), you will see that the sand is silvery colored, and the beach is very straight. This area is best for surf fishing as the water becomes deep very quickly at most points. Papamoa, mount Maunganui and Ohope really have the best swimming beaches.
If you stop for a look at the beach, you will see 4 islands in the distance. The big island is called Whale Island (it’s Maori name is Moutohora Island). If you have a good imagination, you might be able to understand why early explorers first mistook the island for a whale. To the left are two tiny islands, Raurima Island and Moutoki Island.
If you look to the right, on the horizon you may be able to see White Island , a live volcano and a major reason for tourist visits to this area.
On the way to Whakatane, you may like to stop for a look at Matata, which is the only coastal freshwater lagoon in the area, and consequently shelters many rare birds. The area was destroyed by flooding a few years ago and the community has been working very hard to restore the natural habitat. People are starting to comment that it now looks even more beautiful than ever.
From Matata, you only have a short distance to Whakatane, which is where I am, and where I hope that you will come to visit!
Whakatane is mostly a beach town, but also the center of commerce for the farming community. Here you can find a variety of tourist services such as accommodation, boat trips that offer you the chance to swim with dolphins, go fishing, or visit the nearby islands. It is only a short drive along the coast either way to see more and more beautiful beaches, or you can go inland to see native bush or volcanic activity in Rotorua.
Now that you have an overview of the Pacific Coast highway, and you are firmly centered in Whakatane, my next writing project will be to introduce you in more detail to some of the activities you can find in this area.
Many of the businesses that I will be presenting to you in this blog will not be promoted by large tourism firms in Germany because they are too small, and consequently may not stay in business for a long time. The operators usually can’t speak German, although some are learning a little bit. Any operators that I present on these pages will be updated every three months, and if you need any help with communicating with them, I encourage you to contact me by email.
In the future, I hope to organize some tour groups. If you are interested in joining a tour, please contact me at fairychris@web.de or telephone 04947/263331.