Has anyone seen Herne Bay?

Gareth and I headed downtown to check out Herne Bay beach in the early morning. Not as early as we wanted though due to a flat battery in my car, we arrived at 7.30 am. I spent many a day on this beach in my youth and also worked in the area through the eighties. So I was a bit shocked when after following the path to the beach we found that we were on Home Bay beach and not Herne Bay! I had forgotten which was the right access way.
Home Bay is a smallish crescent shaped beach and we decided seeing as we were there we would give it a run over. 


Home Bay 1911.
(Acknowledgement 'Sir George Grey
Special Collections, Auckland Libraries)

 I headed to the wet sand and Gareth seemed busy up at the top of the beach in the dry sand. In my first three digs I found a $2 and a 50 cent piece and my hopes were high of a good haul. There, my finds of anything valuable stopped. Suddenly I was a pull tab and bottle top magnet. In the couple of hours or so that $2.50 was my lot. Gareth meanwhile was well in to double figures, his ATPro finally kicking in and producing lots of $2 and $1 coins. He was a happy man.

After having to drag Gareth away we were off to Herne Bay but once again we failed to locate the walkway to the beach.
We asked a local and he in his wisdom somehow sent us to Sentinel Bay. So Sentinel Bay it was.

Sentinel Bay - Ponsonby Auckland.

I found just 40 cents on the wet and Gareth once again found a few dollars in the dry. I went around the boat sheds and exposed bedrock at the city end of the beach but found nothing but trash. I took as much broken glass, whole bottles and plastic bags as I could to the rubbish bin. How different from the clean Cheltenham Beach almost directly opposite on the other side of the harbour where we were at last week.
We had been on the go for nearly four hours so thought to grab a feed. Whilst munching down some not that tasty morsels we decided to forget the lost Herne Bay beach and hit the a couple of big playgrounds in Walker Park, Point Chevelier. It was very hot at the park with little cover. I managed just a few coins, including a 20 centime French coin, but Gareth once again was having a good day. He found a few dollars and a pocket spill of old currency of four coins in the same hole as well as a Singapore 20 cent coin and a cheap earring. I had had enough though Gareth was still keen. The heat was sapping a lot of our strength, mostly mine it seemed.
He talked me into a quick run over at the Walker Road beach just a hundred metres away. Lot's of trash but a few coins kept us interested and maybe a place to visit properly at a later date.
Around 1pm we headed home.
I had managed the grand total of $4.90 for the day. Gareth was unsure of his total as he bought his lunch, a coffee, a pair of shoes and a shirt from the local op shop out of his finds but still had $15 or so left.
So the ATPro has beaten my Beach Cobra twice now on a hunt. This time quite spectacularly. Maybe Gareth is getting to master the machine, we will see.
See you out there.