So I finally made it to Thames or that is to say I am finally writing about it, I actually went there a few weeks ago but somehow my day to day life of doing very little hasn't left me with a whole lot of time to get writing. Anyway not having been to Thames I was interested in knowing what the town I would be living in was like as well as the flat I might be moving into and with Alie in tow as photographer, I set off.
Things I found out:
1) Thames is an hour and a bit from Hamilton
2) Thames has about 6000 residents
3) The USS Ronald Reagan also has about 6000 residents (though I learned that on T.V rather than in Thames but thought it rather interesting none the less)
4) Thames has the longest main street of any town in New Zealand
5) Thames has an information centre at the beginning of this street
6) It is very easy to miss the information centre and end up driving very slowly the full length and back the longest main street in all of New Zealand
7) Thames, like all Coromandel towns, has a beach and the flat I will move into is right by the water
Both myself and Alie were rather interested and I would even go so far as to say that I was excited. We looked at the flat and then went the extra couple of blocks to find coast as indicated on the map of Thames. My sense of excitement was increased when we found the bank that apparently bordered the beach:
I was hoping to see this:
Or perhaps even this:
But instead, we discovered this:
Which brings me to my next point -
8) The beach at Thames is more of an estuary than a beach. In fact, that's talking it up a bit because in reality - its just an estuary
9) I have also recently learned that when it rains the banks that do such an effective job of keeping the water out also do a reasonably good job of keeping in the water from the hills when it rains creating a large swimming pool of the local area. Fun.
10) Had there been 10 points it would have been nice, I could have entitled the blog 10 things I now know about Thames or something equally good but I couldn't think of a 10th point.
