Thames New Zealand

Well, only just over two weeks now before we depart on our big adventure to the South Island. Unfortunately we were unable to attend the latest caravan rally to Thames as we had a Radio Club Christmas breakup on the friday night and an extended family get together on the Sunday. However we travelled down from home on the Saturday to Thames to attend the South Auckland Caravan Christmas Dinner. Just a one hour drive. The rally was held at the Thames Gun Club. A nice grassy level area, and we had use of the Gun Club facilities. There were 30 vans in attendance, the largest gathering since we have been coming along. The Caravan Club provided the ham and dessert and members bought other food to compliment. There was plenty to be had, and I think I over ate a little as we do at this time of the year. In the last few years we have had this December Rally up the Kauaeranga Valley in Thames, which is also a very nice area with plenty of space for our vans etc.

A small gathering before the dinner enjoying the sun and company. Air Drome and part of Thames in the background.

Thames is a lovely town at the south western end of the Coromandel Peninsula. It used to be a big gold producing area with tunnels going into the hills and a stamper to extract the gold. Later there was a large engineering facility in Thames where locomotives and rolling stock was manufactured and Toyota had a plant to assemble and distribute vehicles to the New Zealand market. There are many interesting bush walks and swimming in the river up the Kauaeranga valley.