The Forgotten World Highway

You could almost call this the Forgotten blog since it appears that it has been a l-o-n-g time since I have been here.

I've been busy. I have a job now, so not as much time to spend on here. BUT this weekend I discovered some new places and even some "forgotten" places.

It is a long weekend and we thought, we could have a quick break and still have time to do things around home once we were back.

So, we decided to set off for a four hour drive to Ohakune on Friday morning. We thought there would be some traffic issues - we do live in Auckland after all. But nothing could have prepared us for the shambles which greeted us on State Highway One. Once we passed the Coromandel turn off the traffic flow was as normal as you would expect, but then at Hampton Downs we were in a stationary queue of two lanes going south. No information, and no obvious cause. Eventually we made it to Te Kauwhata and turned off to take back roads and leave everyone else stewing in the queues. We knew there were roadworks, and some single lane patches, and just before we turned off we did see a "smart highway" sign advising of delays at Huntly, but seriously. 

So we traveled to Taupiri and saw maybe six other cars - at Taupiri there was no sign of the chaos we had left and we made it to Hamilton very quickly. But no, don't get your hopes up too much about our speedy journey south. Once more we found ourselves in a queue travelling at 5kph just north of Tirau. At this point we seriously contemplated turning around, or at least turning off and heading back home. I decided if it hadn't improved by the time we reached the Rotorua turn off we'd just keep going around the roundabout and start back to the north. Miraculously (and for no apparent reason) the gridlock cleared and all was well. Except that we had been in the car for FIVE hours by this time and weren't even halfway.

All that money spent on an unsuccessful campaign to change our flag to a tea towel when we could have been investing in better roads and perhaps by-roads to be able to divert some of the congestion (like they do in other countries), and driver education as well. But no, we have incompetence of the highest order. Buy up some of the blinking empty paddocks and make alternate roadways for goodness' sake - many farmers could do with a bit of financial assistance right now having blindly gone down the dairy path into a global milk glut !!

...and breathe...

Right back on track now, we took more back roads and eventually arrived at our destination EIGHT hours after leaving home. On a normal day we could have driven to Wellington in that time ! No time to go for a walk, or explore. All we wanted to do was get food and relax.

We found La Pizzeria at the Junction near the railway station and were impressed by the service and the product. YUM. The plan for Saturday was to travel the Forgotten World Highway, so we decided we would get up early, get breakfast and get on the road.

Breakfast was at the Sweet Pea Cafe. It was so hard to choose what to eat, we will need to go back to try out more options, and the smoothies and the lunch menu.

Then we were on the road - a wholly better day that Friday, I can assure you. We drove the Forgotten World Highway from Taumarunui to Whangamomona, and then back all the way home. Here are some of the photos.