Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Wharepapa South
A surreal landscape of craggy limestone provides some of the best
rock climbing
in the
North Island. It's an area best suited to travellers with at least basic climbing skills.
Bryce's Rockclimbing
( 07-872 2533;
www.rockclimb.co.nz
; 1424 Owairaka Valley Rd; 1-day instruction for
1-2 people $440)
is suited to the serious climber. On site is NZ's largest retail climbing store,
selling and hiring out a full range of gear. It also has an indoor bouldering cave, free to
those staying out back in the shipshape accommodation (dorm/double $30/76). There's a
licensed cafe (light meals $6 to $16, open 8am to 5pm Friday to Monday), and accom-
modation is also open to nonclimbers.
TOP OF CHAPTER
Cambridge
POP 15,200
The name says it all. Despite the rambunctious Waikato River looking nothing like the
Cam, the good people of Cambridge have done all they can to assume an air of English
gentility with village greens and tree-lined avenues.
Cambridge is famous for the breeding and training of thoroughbred horses. Equine ref-
erences are rife in public sculpture, and plaques boast of past Melbourne Cup winners.
Sights & Activities
Cambridge Museum
(
www.cambridgemuseum.org.nz
; 24 Victoria St; admission by donation; 10am-4pm Mon-Fri, to 2pm Sun)
In a
former courthouse, the quirky Cambridge Museum has plenty of pioneer relics, a military-
history room and a small display on the local Te Totara Pa before it was wiped out.
MUSEUM
Jubilee Gardens
(Victoria St; 24hr)
Apart from its Spanish Mission town clock, Jubilee Gardens is a whole-
hearted tribute to the 'mother country'. A British lion guards the cenotaph, with a plaque
that reads, 'Tell Britain ye who mark this monument faithful to her we fell and rest con-
tent'.
GARDENS, MONUMENT