Tauranga

Well with me on a high after the auld jump I don’t think I took in much of the rest of reality for the day. I had a glazed look in my eyes.
However we motored on up the east coast of the north island towards Mt Manganui and Tauranga. The scenery was lovely on the way and we saw a kiwi fruit yard. Our bus driver was also very informative. The informative ones are great, it’s like a mini tour each time.

So we stayed in what was kind of like a hotel that had been downgraded to a hostel. It had a really nice decking area with great views of the sea and port. We dumped our stuff and went out for a celebratory dinner and drinks.

The next day we hired (free) bikes from reception and decided to cycle the 6 or 7k to Mount Manganui. It was a really nice day but the cycle was pantsy mc pants.. it was along the main road to the port and so trucks & cars were constantly going by us. It was stinky and it really put me off my cycling stride..
:/
But when we got to Mt Manganui it was great. The weather was terrific. We locked up the PINK bikes (he he – no it’s grand James don’t worry.. ) and went for a scenic stroll around the town. It’s a very touristy place with lots of holiday homes etc
Then we spent another 45 mins walking up and down outside the café strip trying to decide what to eat. After much ado about nothing, we had some Turkish kebabs & falafel salad.

We soaked our weary (haha) bones in the Mt Manganui baths. At first we asked for a private pool as it was only a dollar extra, but when we saw them – indoors and pretty seedy looking – we went back out and asked for our dollar back and said we would stay outside. Lol.
After a few dips in and out of the hot cold hot cold hot hot cold pools, we were wrinkly prunes and decided we had better face the long pedal push back.

A beer was needed after such cycling and then we set about pushing each other and other people around the very crowded hostel kitchen as we tried to cook pasta and burn some garlic bread.