The difference between backpackers and dignified travelers is only a subtle one in New Zealand. The country attracts both with paradises for everyone. They meet on a hiking trail that is equally enchanting for everyone, or at a bungee jump that is equally terrifying for everyone. The difference lies in how vacationers stay between these experiences. Campsite or hotel, group shower or bath. At least the last contradiction is miraculously resolved by the country’s most reliable force, nature, on the Coromandel Peninsula in the north of the North Island. At Hot Water Beach.
The picturesque beach is a half-hour drive from the town of Whitianga, along the way there are cafes offering flat whites and shovel rentals. Holidaymakers use them to go to the rocks at the southern end of the beach, because there the low tide exposes a section under which hot springs bubble. If you dig a tub in the sand there, spring water with a temperature of 60 degrees is pressed into the hole from below. When the tide slowly comes back, wave after wave, cold seawater is washed into the tub again and again. The mixing temperature is just right for a bath.
The tides not only regulate the flow of water here, but also that of tourists. If the time window is open during the day, the beach is overcrowded. We had the lonely night shift. We didn’t bathe in the sea, but chortled on the beach. Before the day really started, we were gone again. And the bathtub too.