Melodee finds a gem

Its about a 5 hour drive from Statford to Napier. We left on Thursday morning intending to split the drive over 2 days arriving Friday at Napier. Our thought was that we would get to Whanganui, a town of about 40,000 on the Wanganui river, not far from the sea. We took our time getting to Whanganui arriving at about 1. It was a typical New Zealand town with a very interesting downtown. We driove thru and headed out to the holiday park. It was nice enough, but had limited shade. The day was hot, the sun intense and it didn't seem to offer what we were looking for so we moved on intending to find a smaller park nearer the sea. Melodee found a compground indicator on the map – Koitatata. It wasn't listed in either travel guide, but I have along a pdf campground guide. The entry here looked good – “a small camping ground that is like staying in the back yard of a bach ...” It was only 8km off the highway so we drove down and took a look. It was exactly what we've been looking for. There was a path to the beach and what a beach it was. Probably at least 100 km long, possible 200. It stretched forever in both directions. A wide swath of black sand strewn with logs. A great surf, incredible views and almost deserted. The campground had everything we needed – fresh water and toilets. We spent a very relaxing day. Melodee grabbed a romance novel from the book exchange and finished it over the course of the afternoon. I walked the beach, read a bit, knitted and repeated the cycle. Just as we set up for wine and cheese, two girls we had seen earlier hiking along the highway showed up at the amenities building. They didn't seem to have any interest other than getting water and taking a load off for a while. I walked over, said hello and found out they were walking the length of NZ, from the top at Cape Reininga to the souther point where there's nothing between you and Antartica. They were following a defined path that links together a number of tracks. It zigzags back and forth so the entire walk is 3,000 km. It was about 6, but they intended to hike for about 2 more hours down the beach before making camp for the evening. We talked a bit more, they took my picture with one of them and parted company. The next morning Melodee met 2 more young ladies following the same track. It was raining steadily and they were hunkered down in the bathroom. We had the shelter of Sphinx and were able to get up and head on toward Napier.