Himatangi Beach

The showers cleared away by mid afternoon so a group of us decided to walk down from the motor camp to nearby Himatangi Beach. The overcast weather was keeping the swimmers at home, but some hardy souls braved the water and  very sensibly were swinging between the flags.  The group of young lifesavers told me they were hoping for better conditions and sunny weather to make their stint of duty more interesting.

Life Savers on duty at the beach

Swimming between the flags

Further down the beach we came across a family group using a Torpedo Kontiki to take their line out.  This bit of fishing kit was a Christmas present and cost $2500 we were told.  It comes complete with a GPS which keeps the line on course and in the right place.  The limit is 25 hooks of this type of line and the family were hoping that they would get plenty of fish to take home. The powered line reel was another expensive piece of kit at $4000 and this was the only item on show as the Kontiki was out at sea.  It may be expensive but as the owner said it was still less expensive than buying a boat.

Powered Reel for the Torpedo Kontiki

The tide was out and the wet sand made for quite easy walking.  We came across several Puffer fish which had washed up on the shore.  Those nasty spikes could do quite some damage if you happened to step on one.

Watch out for those spikes- poisonous

The temperatures were rising as our walk progressed and off came the jackets and jerseys.  After our walk we all decided to call into the local beach shop for an ice-cream, and sat at the picnic tables outside the shop trying to finish them before they melted in the sunshine.  Guess it’s a fact of life that our little bit of exercise was cancelled out by consuming that delicious ice-cream.