Our accommodation in Collingwood was a beach-side bach called Beach End Cottage. A bach (for an Aussie or Brit, it’s pronounced like birch, but shorter) in Kiwi-speak is short for bachelor pad, but now is thought of as a holiday home.

In distant times, baches might be thought of as a simple beach-shack (aka SeaChange), and Beach End Cottage is a good example of one of these. On the end of a beach, away from town, set into the bush, an arms-throw from the water’s edge and with a neverending view of the bay. Nowadays baches can also be water-front resort holiday ‘houses’ (or is that just for the city slickers?).

Anyway, I’m glad that the bach was still there for us to experience. There are worse ways to experience Collingwood and Golden Bay, I’m sure.