Planning is highly recommended

A few years ago, Ryan and I decided to take our kids for a bike ride on the Snow Canyon Paved Loop.
(http://www.utahmountainbiking.com/trails/snowloop.htm)

Thank you, stillhowlyntravels.blogspot.com

Luke was 6 and a pretty tough cyclist. We had Eric and Suzanne in a bike trailer. We left late and we miscalculated the distance. Before we knew it, the sun had set. Our headlamps we completely inadequate for the darkness and our tough cyclist, Luke, was getting horrified with the ups and downs of the trail. By the time we reached a well-lit neighborhood, Ryan was towing Luke, Suzanne and Eric AND Luke's bike. 

We swore we would never do that again as parents. . .until this week when we accidentally drove the Coromandel peninsula.

I had spent the morning writing and was nearly finished with my current project when Ryan convinced me we should go to the beach. It wasn't too hard to persuade me. We decided we wanted to see a new beach, so we thought we would head to Thames. We left late. We knew nothing of the western coastline of the peninsula, but assumed it would be AWESOME, like most of the beaches here. 

Our first beach encounter looked like this

Which is beautiful, but not very fun for kids who want to play in the sand and water. 

So, we kept driving. Surely, there would be another, nicer beach just around the corner. And, there was, but it was around a lot of corners. . .like 90 kilometers later. Oh brother.  We totally underestimated the distance. The Coromandel is beautiful, but we were a little disappointed because it looked so similar to 

Thank you, summitpost.com

Cedar Canyon in southern Utah. . .sorry Kiwis.  Instead of seeing vast amounts of desert plateaus through the vegetation, it's sea water. (Note: it is greener which is a nice contrast.)

We did get to the northern part of the Coromandel where we could see both the Firth of Thames and the Pacific ocean. I'm always amazed at how beautiful the Pacific is.

After driving some more, we found a private-ish beach with public access in Whitianga. We had to laugh when we parked and saw an American flag flying at the bed and breakfast right next to the public beach access. 

True to the beaches on the Pacific-side of the island, they were gorgeous!

Eric was finally able to do his sand angel after being in the car for  3 hours.

No matter how hard we tried, the black sand wouldn't shake off.

As the sun started to set, we figured it was time to start heading home. Like our Snow Canyon adventure a few years ago, we had completely underestimated the distance. AND,  it was too dark and too late to see all the cool  stuff on the Coromandel that we wanted to see. 

The lesson for the week is: plan ahead.