the guide to the Bay of the Plenty
firstly some important news:
The NZRU has announced that from 2006 - to 2008 - there will be 14 professional provinces competing in the NPC Premier Division.. which means no one got left out! Good news I guess coz if the NZRU want to host the World Cup, i think the last thing they want is a massive lawsuit.. there may be lawsuits but prob on a smaller scale.. The teams will play one round-robin before the pool is split into two: 6 teams would play in a top 6 pool, and then there would be a bottom eight repechage to decide 2 more teams to join the 6 in the knockouts..
Which means they will definitely have to start the NPC before August as this means far more matches than the 13 plus 2 i predicted if they went for 14... prob even as early as in the middle of the Super 14 but most likely in June..
Hearing the news while driving home from my lab, I was thinking that since the difference between Auckland and North Otago based on this review was the professional status, that the format could be like the Football Conference and League.. within the League of these 14 professional provinces, they would have 6 in the top and 8 in a second tier.. like county cricket.. well apparently not, and i wonder would there be too many rounds in the NPC that it loses that special challenge factor that typified the present format..
So to confirm it will be: Auckland, Northland, North Harbour, Counties Manukau, Waikato, Bay of Plenty, Taranaki, Hawkes Bay, Manawatu, Wellington, Nelson Bays-Marlborough, Canterbury, Otago and Southland..
anyway i wanted to talk abt the beautiful Bay of Plenty in the build-up to this weekend's tour opener:
where is the Bay of Plenty? it's the land around the Bay of Plenty, east of Hamilton and the Waikato Plain, on the other side of the Kaimai ranges, and stretches from Waihi Beach south of the Coromandel Peninsula to Whakatane and Opotiki towards the East Coast and Poverty Bay.. it includes Tauranga, Mount Maunganui, Rotorua, Papamoa, Te Puke, Whakatane, Opitiki and many towns within the region..
obviously with the likes of Rotorua and Whakatane, it is a Maori heartland, although it is still a Pakeha - White - majority.. and as you can obviously see, a good number of the Bay of Plenty team are of Maori origin/descent, i.e. Ormond, Bourke, Tehana, McQuoid, Cashmore, etc.. however it is a major growth region, and there are now plenty of immigrants from all over the world who choose Tauranga over the traditional major centres..
one of the reasons why growth in Tauranga is much easier than other prospective areas like Dunedin and Invercargill is obviously the weather.. it never drops below 10'C in the day time even in winter and still manages 20'C occassionally.. plus the weather is usually fantastic although recent rains have badly damaged areas like Matata, Otumetai and Papamoa.. in fact many homes which were built on cliffsides esp in Otumetai were written off.. which is a big shame for those who were looking for better weather and a more relaxed lifestyle in the Bay of Plenty..
staying on Otumetai, Matata and Papamoa, the Tauranga area and the Bay of Plenty really is a close collection of towns which have grown to the extent that they're almost touching or overlapping each other.. now u could call Welcome Bay, Papamoa and Mount Maunganui part of the Tauranga-Mt Maunganui area, when in the past they were separate entities..
my friend who's studying down in Dunedin, from Pyes Pa which is 10 minutes from Devonport Road in downtown Tauranga.. 10 years ago, it was houses with big lawns and massive kiwifruit farms.. now it's houses with big lawns but the kiwifruit farms are gradually being subdivided into new homes which could have been taken from a resort home in Santa Monica.. it's now v rare to find a kiwifruit farm 10 minutes from downtown.. there are just new homes being built all over the place..
at the same the real estate industry is reaching its prime.. houses esp on the famed Ocean Drive south of the Mount are prob the most expensive outside Auckland.. it's like Long Beach or Miami.. i'd love to own a house there but will prob have to own it further down the road in Papamoa.. get to do walks around the Mount.. which is not possible for the Brits atm due to the unseasonal rain that the region got resulting in these small landslides around the Mount.. which is really a blob of rock in the middle of the sea which bears much significance to the Maori.. a tower of strength i think..
that's just Tauranga.. Te Puke's got the kiwifruit and of coz there's Rotorua or Rotovegas to the locals.. i've never really been through Rotorua although it definitely has a far more touristy feel to it than the Tauranga-Mount region.. the buildings, the hotels, motels, facilities for tourists..and the smell.. of sulphur.. au naturel though..
The NZRU has announced that from 2006 - to 2008 - there will be 14 professional provinces competing in the NPC Premier Division.. which means no one got left out! Good news I guess coz if the NZRU want to host the World Cup, i think the last thing they want is a massive lawsuit.. there may be lawsuits but prob on a smaller scale.. The teams will play one round-robin before the pool is split into two: 6 teams would play in a top 6 pool, and then there would be a bottom eight repechage to decide 2 more teams to join the 6 in the knockouts..
Which means they will definitely have to start the NPC before August as this means far more matches than the 13 plus 2 i predicted if they went for 14... prob even as early as in the middle of the Super 14 but most likely in June..
Hearing the news while driving home from my lab, I was thinking that since the difference between Auckland and North Otago based on this review was the professional status, that the format could be like the Football Conference and League.. within the League of these 14 professional provinces, they would have 6 in the top and 8 in a second tier.. like county cricket.. well apparently not, and i wonder would there be too many rounds in the NPC that it loses that special challenge factor that typified the present format..
So to confirm it will be: Auckland, Northland, North Harbour, Counties Manukau, Waikato, Bay of Plenty, Taranaki, Hawkes Bay, Manawatu, Wellington, Nelson Bays-Marlborough, Canterbury, Otago and Southland..
anyway i wanted to talk abt the beautiful Bay of Plenty in the build-up to this weekend's tour opener:
where is the Bay of Plenty? it's the land around the Bay of Plenty, east of Hamilton and the Waikato Plain, on the other side of the Kaimai ranges, and stretches from Waihi Beach south of the Coromandel Peninsula to Whakatane and Opotiki towards the East Coast and Poverty Bay.. it includes Tauranga, Mount Maunganui, Rotorua, Papamoa, Te Puke, Whakatane, Opitiki and many towns within the region..
obviously with the likes of Rotorua and Whakatane, it is a Maori heartland, although it is still a Pakeha - White - majority.. and as you can obviously see, a good number of the Bay of Plenty team are of Maori origin/descent, i.e. Ormond, Bourke, Tehana, McQuoid, Cashmore, etc.. however it is a major growth region, and there are now plenty of immigrants from all over the world who choose Tauranga over the traditional major centres..
one of the reasons why growth in Tauranga is much easier than other prospective areas like Dunedin and Invercargill is obviously the weather.. it never drops below 10'C in the day time even in winter and still manages 20'C occassionally.. plus the weather is usually fantastic although recent rains have badly damaged areas like Matata, Otumetai and Papamoa.. in fact many homes which were built on cliffsides esp in Otumetai were written off.. which is a big shame for those who were looking for better weather and a more relaxed lifestyle in the Bay of Plenty..
staying on Otumetai, Matata and Papamoa, the Tauranga area and the Bay of Plenty really is a close collection of towns which have grown to the extent that they're almost touching or overlapping each other.. now u could call Welcome Bay, Papamoa and Mount Maunganui part of the Tauranga-Mt Maunganui area, when in the past they were separate entities..
my friend who's studying down in Dunedin, from Pyes Pa which is 10 minutes from Devonport Road in downtown Tauranga.. 10 years ago, it was houses with big lawns and massive kiwifruit farms.. now it's houses with big lawns but the kiwifruit farms are gradually being subdivided into new homes which could have been taken from a resort home in Santa Monica.. it's now v rare to find a kiwifruit farm 10 minutes from downtown.. there are just new homes being built all over the place..
at the same the real estate industry is reaching its prime.. houses esp on the famed Ocean Drive south of the Mount are prob the most expensive outside Auckland.. it's like Long Beach or Miami.. i'd love to own a house there but will prob have to own it further down the road in Papamoa.. get to do walks around the Mount.. which is not possible for the Brits atm due to the unseasonal rain that the region got resulting in these small landslides around the Mount.. which is really a blob of rock in the middle of the sea which bears much significance to the Maori.. a tower of strength i think..
that's just Tauranga.. Te Puke's got the kiwifruit and of coz there's Rotorua or Rotovegas to the locals.. i've never really been through Rotorua although it definitely has a far more touristy feel to it than the Tauranga-Mount region.. the buildings, the hotels, motels, facilities for tourists..and the smell.. of sulphur.. au naturel though..
posted by Unknown at 5:43 pm
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