Raglan and Bridal Veil Falls

Heading south I decided to spend a night at Raglan, a small town and supposedly a world class surfing destination.  I had a number of stops on the way as I continued to find things that I was missing to have Betty 2.0 fully kitted out.  I’ve found that the two major chains that are helpful in New Zealand are the grocery stores called Countdown and The Warehouse, kinda like a Walmart I guess with everything ranging from automotive supplies to kitchenware.   

I rolled into Raglan around 5 and after quickly checking out the town I headed to my camping destination called “Kev’s Place”.  It was situated up on a hill looking down at the town which is based around a small estuary.  The driveway was steep and curvy but Betty made it up there.  There was a nice flat grassy field with a great view of the coast.  A sign stipulated to check in before setting up camp so I walked up to this large catamaran boat that had been converted into a funky home…but no one was there.  A woman in a camping trailer I had passed on the driveway told me it was fine to set up and Kev would be back later.  There was only one other car in the field, Ben a brewer from northern England who joined me for dinner later.  The place was pretty rustic with a “long drop” toilet as they call them here…love the name, a cold shower and tiny little cabins with essentially just a bed inside.  It was $10 to camp and it did the trick for the night which was extremely windy.  Before I came to New Zealand someone asked me if I was bringing a paraglider and told me to make sure it was a small one as it is quite windy in this country and that certainly is the case!  Hopefully it’s only a spring thing.

The view of Raglan:

You can just make out the catamaran boat in the background to the right of Betty 2.0:

 This camper truck sure hasn't moved in a while.

Tough to see, but there's a surfer walking on the rocks just off center and some in the sea on the right.

The following day I planned to make it to Waitomo as I had booked to go in the Glow Worm Caves but I decided to take a circuitous route along the coast and I was not disappointed.  It turned into a windy and windy (gotta love English!) gravel road with wonderful views and hardly another human around, just the odd horse, cows and of course sheep.  The terrain made it obvious why there are more sheep on these islands than humans as it is so suited for them.

The windy windy road:

A stop on the way was Bridal Veil Falls, a 55 meter waterfall in a small forested area.  It was quite beautiful with lookouts at the top, half way down and at the bottom.

I rolled into the Waitomo area and freedom camped in the parking lot of a restaurant in the countryside.  The restaurant had a buffet but it was empty and I had read some mixed reviews of the food so I didn’t bother.  That night I watched the third place World Cup Rugby match between New Zealand and Wales with the All Blacks victorious.  I asked some Kiwis the next day if they had watched the match but no, once they weren’t in the finals (beaten by England!) they weren’t interested.  Fair enough.  Tomorrow: spelunking!