Tukituki Motel at Waipukurau

State Highway 2 heading South from Napier took us past Hastings and on down to the Central Hawkes Bay area.

A pleasant drive.

At Waipukurau we stopped at the first Motel we saw.

The Tuki Tuki Motel.

Named after the Tukituki River.

The first pic is from the Motel carpark across the road to distant hills.

The kitchen, dining and lounge area was quite cosy and adequate for our needs.

And the bedroom was lovely.

And we even had our own patio dining area.

Tony was happy that his Prado was undercover. 

That's 'our' Motel room on the left.

And the obligatory Peanut Prado photos follow.

Peanut

We stayed at the Tuki Tuki Motel most of the week. 

Very clean and tidy place and the owners were very helpful.

There was one problem, but it wasn't the Motel itself that was at fault.

There was a new petrol station being built on the side road by the Motel, and the workers started work rather early in the morning. Lorries and trucks carrying all manor of equipment were being unloaded. Cement mixer lorries tipping their load at 6 or 7am is not funny when you are on holiday.

We are not used to traffic noise either, so that also disturbed our sleep a bit, even though the road was not a main road or a busy road, it still had some cars on it.

The Thermal Explorer Route

From Tirau to Taupo on State Highway (SH) 1, then uphill on the scenic 

Thermal Explorer Route on SH5 where we see steam escaping from crevices in the hills. This is the area for lots of underground thermal activity. 

Up into the clouds once more.

We have a rest stop at the Opepe Memorial, Iwitahi, and had a quick look at the Opepe Bush Walk. As this bush is quite high in the hills it is rather damp and sub-tropical, especially as the clouds are lying low right now.

Back in the car again and on route to Napier, we head higher and higher into the mountain range and through Tarawera, Te Haroto, and Glengarry.

We now seem to have driven right into the clouds. Rather a lot of rain up here. An occasional break in the clouds give us a glimpse of beautiful scenery, but it's not light enough to take photos, and there is no way I'm getting out of the car in this weather.

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