ARTICLE
METRO (APC Media),"LIFE IN THE SLOW LANE", August 2005, TEXT: Simon Farrell-Green, PHOTOGRAPHY: Ken Downie
DRIVING CREEK VILLAS
21 A Colville Road, Coromandel
Ph (07) 866-7755
www.drivingcreekvillas.com
Where the air feels distilled by the bush and the soundtrack is courtesy of the tuis. Owner David Foreman has built two cottages on a sliver of family land beside the Driving Creek stream in Coromandel township - light airy structures, beautifully constructed, with a double bedroom downstairs and an attic bedroom upstairs.The front windows over look the stream and the regenerated bush. The cottages are furnished with a pair of very comfortable couches, a lovely old table with bentwood chairs and flax mats on the floor: the essence of Coromandel style.
Distance from Auckland:
Two and a half hours
If you do one thing when you are at Driving Creek Villa:
Take a trip on potter Barry Brickell's eccentric narrow-gage
Driving Creek Railway. brickell started the railway - which crosses
two spirals and three tunnels, all painstakingly built by hand
- in 1974 to carry wood and clay down from the hills to his studio
on the flat.
Now, it's a one hour-long trip through regenerating native bush
up to the "Eye-full Tower", with its view over Coromandel
and the islands of Te Kouma Harbour, floating in the sea.
