Waimate

Waimate, our next destination, is a charming little town with striking buildings, a nice "feel", a population of about 3500 in the town itself and about 7500 in the Waimate district. To find it you have to detour off the main road and that's probably why we have never been here before. 

2 people the townsfolk can look up to!

..and 2 more!

A standout feature in the town are the recently completed murals of famous locals on the 4 large grain silos in town - magnificent. High on the Hunter hills beyond is a White Horse Monument, a commemoration to the Clydesdale horses that helped break in the land and in these hills are lots of wild wallabies which were introduced from Australia in the 1870's. Waimate is also known for it's strawberries and wines.

Stunning NZMCA site.

The white horse on the hilltop. 

Soon after arriving we easily found our way down the wide tree-lined street leading to the NZMCA Park which must be one of their best parks in NZ being grassy, spacious, having fresh water taps and not being just a square block - a truly beautiful camping spot with perhaps about 13 other vehicles there. The bad weather is passing through but it was still very cold overnight, going down to 5°, but snuggly once we are in bed. Just a bit hard to get out of it this morning!

However the sun was shining, the wind had died and soon after we arrived at the Waimate golf course at 10.30am we were able to take our jerseys off although it was only meant to get to 16° today.

A course we should have played better on!

There were 3 or 4 cars parked at the course but the occupants were well on their way when we set off. In beautiful condition the whole course looked very parklike with many different varieties of trees, that was until we got to the undulating hills away from the clubhouse!! The greens were fast and sloping with a few surrounding bunkers and neither of us played as well as we would have liked. I was put off when I found that the back nine had no par 3s with which I could possibly improve my score - 7 par 4s in a row and then 2 hilly par 5s to finish. However it is a nice course.

Afterwards we drove out to Hook Beach, the last 2 km of the road being narrow and gravelly but luckily we didn't meet anyone and only one other car came down, just briefly, to the beach while we were there. Len had a surfcast while I wrote this blog covering the last few days. Then by 6.15pm we were back at the Waimate NZMCA  camp  for the night - about the same number of vans here as last night. I think it's going to be cold but we should have a nice sunny day tomorrow.