KEY POINTS:
So what should a family do on a day like this in Whakatane?" The owner of the Awakeri Hot Springs Holiday Park seemed momentarily stumped by the question, which seemed a bad sign. The Bay of Plenty had escaped the worst of a raging storm, but vileness was still lashing in from the sea. Suddenly the task of occupying the family on an unpleasant day seemed just that little bit harder.
"Well," said the owner, "you ... er ... could try the movies?" Oh, great.
But when she sat back and gave the question some thought, the ideas started to kick in, and we found ourselves enjoying a busy day.
Whakatane has a very pleasing set-up, with a bustling town centre, complete with traffic jams, backed up against forested cliffs. A short drive takes you to clifftop lookout points, where the view of the Bay of Plenty takes some beating.
In ancient times this was a pa, named Te Papaka (The Crab) after a Ngati Awa ancestor who, according to his wife, resembled a crustacean. Their domestics must have been interesting.
My townie daughters delighted in being followed by four fantails at once, and giggled at the sight of obese wood pigeons blundering their way through the bush.
A 10-minute drive beyond the cliffs took us to Ohope Beach and an impressive storm surge. The girls had been promised a glimpse of White Island, which was just what they got through the cloud and spray. They were probably expecting something like Krakatoa but they hid their disappointment well.
One vital amenity for a family holiday is accommodation with thermal pools which Awakeri certainly has. Diana Clements covered this in the Travel section a few weeks ago, though I don't recall if she gave any advice on how to get your kids out of the pool again when the air temperature drops below 10C. Suffice to say they make a very odd squeaking noise coming out.
The next day was fine and we took ourselves to Tarawera Falls. This requires a $3.50 fee to be paid at the tourist information in Kawerau, then some motoring along forestry roads. Getting to the falls requires a 20-minute bush walk which is well within the attention span of most little ones.
Even the most TV-addled junior suburbanites will be impressed by the clarity and depth of the Kawerau River along the way, and the sight of the falls emerging not from the top of the cliff - how ho-hum would that be - but from the centre, blasting out in a huge cascade. Very cinematic. You could well imagine Andy Serkis leaping about and hooting in some sort of Peter Jackson-related costume.
Further motoring will take you to the south-east edge of Lake Tarawera, where the river can be seen diving underground before emerging in the falls. Any attempt at a quick dip would result in an instant Darwin Award.
Of course, the real highlight of the day for the girls was finding a dead wallaby on the road (unless it was Andy Serkis in another costume and the shoot had gone horribly wrong, but he's not that small). Daughter No 1 drew a picture of it later on a postcard for her Scottish grandfather, with the legend "ded wolobi" to make things clear.
The remainder of the holiday included a spin around Kiwi360 in Te Puke, without a doubt the world's greatest kiwi fruit-based theme park, and a 16C afternoon on Mt Maunganui beach.
Accommodation at the Silver Birch Thermal Holiday Park came with more thermal pools, which balanced out the vicious breeze coming off the harbour.
Waihi was an enjoyable stop on the way back, with good lunching to be had, and a very friendly tourist info office happy to tell you about the town's mining history and signature Cornish pumphouse (the new mine owners moved the thing a third of a kilometre a year ago, as part of heritage obligations).
Winters could certainly be worse than this.
* For further information see www.familyparks.co.nz.
