NEW PLYMOUTH

The whole way down to New Plymouth was rainy and just a crap of a day. But leave it up to New Zealand to turn a bad day into something pretty. Half the drive down we were driving into a rainbow. Then I saw the end of the rainbow at one point, so AMAZING.
The drive was comparable to driving to beaver lake or in the mountains of Colorado with all the windy roads and the edge of the cliffs just meters from the car. With Ryan behind the wheel and my hands on the “oh shit” handle with eyes closed. Yep. That pretty much describes the roads to put it more clearly.
Once we got through the “oh shit” part of the high way the road turned into a drive along the coast. Let me just say, if I was sheep. I would be a sheep along North Taranaki Bight (the coast of the Tasman Sea). It was literally ocean, rolling green hills with sheep and little farmhouses with million dollar views, high way and then more rolling green hills on the other side. I can’t even begin to describe it, its just one of those things you had to see for yourself. We ended in New Plymouth in the afternoon. Stopped at the Govett-Brewster Art Gallery to see an exhibition of photographic works then settled in at our motel.
We got an early start in the morning. Headed south along the coast to Wanganui where we went to another photography gallery. This gallery is the only curated photography studio in New Zealand. They had work up by Ans Westra. A Dutch photographer who came to NZ and photographed the maori people. We didn’t stay long in Wanganui, just enough to drive up to another gallery. Then headed back to New Plymouth. Sue and I got into town just in time to catch the last of the sunset on the coast, truly breathtaking.
Woke up bright and early the next morning to watch the sunrise on Mt. Taranaki. Now that is a sight. Then we drove to the coast to watch the sun peak over the water.

Our drive back was nice. Sue had driven her own car, so I rode with her. We left earlier than the others so we could stop along the way and take more pictures. We ended up at Urenui Beach. It’s a black sand beach that looks over the Tasman Sea.
Little fact: the West coast line of New Zealand is black sand and the East coast line of New Zealand is white sand. Sue says that if you grow up on the white sand beaches you don’t like the black sand and vice versa. I’m just happy to be at the beach and not a corn field.