Evening On The Firth Of Thames

Taken when Jayne and I spent a weekend in Thames at a croquet tournament our motel was on the edge of the Firth of Thames.  We spent several evenings wandering the water’s edge.

Pied Shags roosting between the Firth and the cliffs

Pied Shags at the water’s edge

Now who’s getting on whom’s nerves

Oystercatchers and New Zealand Dotterel (Tuturiwhatu) Charadrius obscurus (I’m fairly sure)

Gathering at sundown

Rapaura Water Gardens - 2

A few more photos from the Water Gardens:

Most people just use an arrow for directions.

 

 

Spooky

 

Amazing the things that leap out at one

A Weekend in Thames

Thames is about 5 hours driving from Napier.  With stops it took us a day there and a day back.  Because of the relatively short amount of time spent playing croquet we had time to see various other things and I'll blog about them over the next few days.

I can't recall when I last saw a public telephone box.  This one is in Thames's main street

One of the many Churches.  At one intersection we counted 5 within a stone's throw.

 
The band stand is over 100 years old

 

The trees are not!

Top right is our motel and bottom right is a public BBQ

The sign and house just took my fancy

A Tournament At Thames

Well it's been an interesting weekend.  And I use the word 'interesting' advisedly.  I shall probably do a short article for the croquet news but as it would mean little to most of you who may read this I shall confine myself to a summary.  The first thing was that the very late start of 0930 turned out to be 'time for a cup of tea' with a start of croquet at 10am!  Most tournaments are on the lawns at 0830.  We could have gone to the country market after all.  Like most we arrived half an hour before the advertised time and kicked our heels for an hour!

Then we discovered that the format was a melée and Jayne and I wouldn't be partnering each other but would play 5 games (one would expect at least 6 - the last tournament was 8) with 5 separate partners.  Three of us ended up with an equal number of wins and to determine the winner we had to each stand at a separate corner of the lawn and on the gun see who got their ball nearest to the centre.  I didn't!

At least on Sunday I was lucky and drew 5 good games.  Two of NZ's senior players cleaned up first and second but I really enjoyed the day and came away with a net plus on my index card.

I don't think we'll make the journey next year!

However I have now seen Thames and a little bit of the Coromandel Peninsula.

The Thames Croquet Club itself is excellent and even if the lawns were less than perfect the other facilities were first class.  The club was started in 1906 on that site as an addition to the bowling club (which is no longer there) for the wives of men who bowled.  

It's hard work this croquet!

Off For A Weekend With Jayne

In 9 hours I shall be setting off to Thames for a weekend Croquet Tournament with Jayne.  When she asked me to go to this tournament I was still in Scotland and I assumed at first that we were all going as a gang as usual.  But in this case Jayne's usual partner, Colleen, couldn't go and Jayne's husband wasn't keen (he doesn't play croquet regularly) and no one else was keen - it's a day's journey away.  So Jayne asked me.  'Is Norman happy with that?' was my first question.  'Oh yes.  It's just Graham!' was the response.  I'm not sure that was a particularly flattering sort of remark but, hey, I suppose it's something.  So Jayne and I are off for a long weekend together.  Should be fun.  It'd be a bonus if we could add another trophy to our list.