River’s Edge Holiday Park at Waipawa

In keeping with our aim on this safari trip to stay in camps previously not visited, our next stop was River’s Edge Holiday Park in Waipawa.  This camp is delightful, and is set in lovely surroundings with good facilities.  A mosaic sign welcomes campers, and show the way into the men's and ladies ablution blocks.  The fees were excellent value, reduced to $20 a night with a member discount.

A quartet of alpacas were happily munching grass in the paddock behind the camp.  These pretty animals were rather shy and not at all keen to pose for a photo for me.   Keeping them company were several hens looked over by the resident rooster, clucking around and pecking for insects.  The camp owners have two large Boxer dogs who have the run of the camp.  Luckily these dogs were very well behaved and removed themselves when we told them firmly to “go home”.  Tuis kept us entertained with their song as they hopped from branch to branch in the tall trees.

Pretty alpacas behind the camp

The couple who own the camp are the proud owners of a lovely old homestead, which they told us, was moved onto the property several years ago from a farm out in the country.  The house has been beautifully restored and the garden is a delight to behold. 

The beautiful house and garden of the camp owners

We woke up to heavy river mist in the morning, the first touch of autumn weather perhaps?  But the hot Wairarapa sunshine soon took care of the mist, and it was another lovely day in paradise.  There is nothing nicer than having a large shady tree to relax under.  This camp was so pleasant that we re-arranged our schedule to stay on for another day before moving on.

Our sites at River’s Edge Holiday Park