Juni enjoyed the lagom sized Hairy Maclary

Today we were expecting heavy rain, but it never really showed up so we instead headed into Tauranga. After parking and walking the stroller along the centre we passed a Japanese restaurant called Takara just around lunch-time, I considered this an omen so we had lunch there. It was nice to get some japanese food and the staff was friendly and provided Juni with a plate of rice and sliced grapes.

Nomnomnom

Mental note – never have round pieces of food in vicinity of Juni, even though we diced the slices up in better sized pieces she managed with her long octopus arms snagg two slices and shove in her mouth. Breathing issues ensured and we had a quick exercise in Heimlich for babies and out came the slice after a good slap on the butt.

After that excitement we scouted along the waterfront and by chance run into Hairy Maclary and Friends – which are characters from children’s books by New Zealands version Astrid Lindgren (Lynley Dodd). So these were made into statues and we realized that Hairy Maclary was the scruffy-looking dog that had been on all Juni’s diapers since we got to New Zealand. We added the book to future shopping list.

All Hairy Maclary’s friends…

After that we drove back home we had a look at the Alpacas on the farmstead and concluded the day with a calm night and watched a few Netflix episodes of Frequency. Eventually we realized that this wasn’t a completed series or even season so the last two episodes where scheduled to be released later. The struggle is real.

Long-necked Rastafari sheeps are called Alpacas.

We started the day with a drive to Omokoroa beach for chai and coffee. It was rather overcast but we strolled around and played at their playground, Juni was really enjoying the seesaw there but for parents it wasn’t perhaps that exiting and not really that picturesque either so we drove to Mount Manganui (which is a town, which also have the mountain called Mount Manganui – obviously).

In the beginning of the trek we were all happy

And from the top the same islands look like this

After some confusion of where the path actually starts (near the beach) we walked up and took the intermediate route up. We got some great views, it seems to be a popular place with the locals and there was a mix from rock-climbers to families or youths with portable music. As we walked down we went with the more difficult one, turns out moderate is by far more scenic. We walked a bit along Manganui beach then switched to the stroller and scanned the local restaurants.

Nod bad, not bad at all.

Supermom goes all out

As we passed The Barrio Brothers it struck us that we hadn’t had mexican food in quite a while and were rather fed up with New Zealand pub food so we gave it a try. Possibly the best mexican food I’ve had and for sure the best meal in a long time with nice drinks as well. Mona fell in love with a sombrero and was yelling Arriba to Juni and the others guests delight – and she was still the designated driver.

We woke up and after a glance of todays agenda had a earlier than usual check-out, apparently realizing some geyser in Wai-o-tapu activates like a clock at 10:15 every day so it would be nice to catch that moment – which was 35 minutes away.

We drove there with a full 5 minutes to go, well to Wai-o-Tapu that is. To find the geyser was another matter, we were running around like headless chickens back and forth before finally hearing from someone it was a 20 minute walk – we put Juni and stroller back in the car and drove to the geyser – perhaps it was still spraying water even though we now for sure missed the start. We got there, and see 100-200 people waiting for the geyser to start, I snap off a photo and then the geyser erupts within 10 seconds. Touristing like a boss.

Suspiciously well timed

We had a lot of ground to cover today so did the rest of Wai-o-tapu rather quick, an hour or so was enough to get a good look (and photos) of the champagne pool – a body of (very) hot water with various colors coming from minerals the water brought up from deeper earth. It was interesting to see the various pools and general hazardous environment.

An attempt to catch the complete palette of the pool

Visiting the Baggins

Enough with nature, we got a milkshake to go and drove off to Matamata for a visit to Hobbiton. We had some forebodingintermittent heave rainfall but once we got to Matamata the weather looked great – there was some confusion at the ticket office which claimed I had cancelled my tour but we got sorted out quickly. We were in luck (well, we chose Friday 14:00 in hope of beating the worst crowds) since when we entered the bus with only 12 people in total.

Inside of the Green Dragon

Hobbits or no hobbits, it sure looks idyllic

The Hobbiton tour was very well arranged – loads of pictures and designed in such a way that one group didn’t block the next groups photos so it turned out to beat my expectations. It was a cuteness overload with all the Hobbit-holes and interesting to see how they faked things looking old and the level of detail that needed to be exactly as Peter Jackson wanted it seems to a mix of myth and hybris.

After the tour we had dinner at The Redoubt Bar and Eatery, top-ranked by Tripadvisor and nice but not that much deviation from the regular pub-food. After we had filled our stomachs and Juni had crawled about and charmed the personell we drove to our final destination for the day. Mona had found an Alpaca farmstead on AirBnB about 20 minutes outside Tauranga. We said hi to the family living in the house and got our room (with our own bathroom as well) and prepared for bed while we noticed that Juni started to get a runny nose.