Mickey Smillie
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North Island ▷ Coromandel ▷ Whitianga ▷
Mercury Bay Council Area Office Carpark
3.5/5
Only 4 spaces, a couple of public toilets less than 5 minutes away and a good location.
The basketball court/skate park were busy and it was pretty noisy but felt safe. Also managed to get onto free wifi from the info centre/rugby club but I think we were lucky as signal wasn’t great and the phone had to be held in certain places.
Like other reviews say, this is just a small car park with limited spaces so only good if you’re stopping for a short amount of time.
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North Island ▷ Coromandel ▷ Whangamata ▷
Opoutere Coastal Camping
4.0/5
Traditional campsite (read no signal/No wifi).
Really good vibe though, good shop on site for basics amentities and walking distance to the most perfect untouched beach.
Very relaxing and refreshing and felt very out of the way (in a good way). Owners were friendly.
Downsides for us : filling up water for the van was difficult, only 2 drinking water taps not accessible by a hose and the camp is close to a sewerage so all other water taps aren’t drinkable. Also it was raining pretty hard when we arrived and our spot flooded so we had to move places.
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North Island ▷ Northland ▷ Paihia ▷
Paihia TOP 10 Holiday Park
4.5/5
One of the better Top 10s we’ve been to and we stayed two nights.
Great accommodation. Great wifi (free), close to paihia town, lovely coastal path walks and great views.
Toilets were clean, showers were free -couldn’t fault the facilities.
Only reduced a star due to the price
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North Island ▷ Coromandel ▷ Whitianga ▷
Kuaotunu Campground
3.0/5
Paid for wifi that didn’t work and also no signal.
Had to pay for hot showers but did realise this was quite common for campsites in NZ. Shower block/toilets were fine. Campsite is right by the beach and was quiet but wasn’t blown away by this place.
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North Island ▷ Auckland Region ▷ Orewa ▷
Laurie Southwick Parade, Gulf Harbour
3.5/5
Plenty of spots when we arrived and free.
Toilets were decent but they were locked after around 10pm, it did say 24/7 so not sure why (maybe for maintenance). Amazing sunsets, could see out over to Auckland.
In the morning the car park was full when we woke up with boaters/fishermen, was a little noisy but worth it for the sunset.