Our brief stay on the Seabird Coast was as enjoyable as ever. In fact I
slept better than I had for a week. The following morning the Coromandel coast
line remained obscured by haze across the stretch of water, although when we
left, the tide was well out and the oyster catchers and other shore birds were
quite distant as they picked their way through the shell fish left by the
receding sea.
And speaking of receding, it had occurred to us as we sat over our
dinner the night before that we were very vulnerable there at sea level,
particularly with the earthquake activity going on all around us, albeit
further down the country. We spoke of the route we would take should tsunami
sirens rouse us from our sleep, but realised that we would probably not make
high ground in time to avoid being swept away in the rogue waves. But this was
all supposition, scaremongering, and the next earthquakes of any consequence
were to occur after we had moved on the next morning; one of 7.4 magnitude off
the east coast of Japan’s Honshu far to the north and several more at 4.5
magnitude near the first of a week ago just out of Culverdon.
By now we had learned that my uncle had indeed died, a blessing for him
but great sadness for his immediate family and my mother, his beloved little
sister. Our hovering about the region was to pay off; we would be able to
attend his funeral with no inconvenience to our travel plans. We liaised with
our daughter in Waihi Beach to arrange a mutually suitable visit and headed
generally in that direction, on down toward Ngatea, still following the Seabird
Coast, on past the hot springs at Miranda which we briefly considered calling
into. In fact for a minute or few, we were quite excited at the prospect of
wallowing in the warm waters without the weekend crowds, but when we checked
out the entry price, we decided $28 was a bit steep for an hour long swim.
We joined the Thames road at Waitakaruru, then immediately turned south
on one of the many dead straight roads that intersect the drained dairy farms
of the Hauraki Plains, following the
line of the equally straight drains, tidal canals only navigable very near the
Firth. At Ngatea, we pulled into the council offices, behind which are dump and
water facilities, toilets and numerous parking spots today filled with
whizz-bang camper vans. This has become far more popular for the budget
tourists in the last year, probably since the councils have started enforcing
their freedom camping bylaws. Hats off to the Hauraki Council for providing
these locations for campers, where they can be regulated and the waste and
chaos that has been exercised in the past by these freewheeling “campers”, confined.
I put “campers” in inverted commas because so many are simply travellers
sleeping rough in cars, hardly “self-contained”.
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| Paeroa scenes |
We arrived in Paeroa early enough to secure a power point in one of the
Hauraki Council’s camping spots. Nowadays one pays the required $5 to the
Caltex Service Station across the road, an incredibly reasonable rate for the
facility. Here there is a dump, water and a big toilet block, beside which
there is now a large recycling rubbish bin. Of course Paeroa has become a
destination for cyclists who want to ride the rail trail, the further extent of
which we saw under development earlier in the day, up past Waitakaruru. It is
also a popular overnight spot for those same sort of travellers we saw at
Ngatea. We were able to have printing done at the library, and whilst there,
picked up five more books to add to our now own bulging in-house library,
discards at $1 each, which will serve well as swaps as we travel further
afield, after we have read them ourselves.
Chris had his hair cut, we picked up fresh provisions and after lunch
went for a long walk along the rail trail, then up Primrose Hill from where
there are lovely views over the township, then back to the other end of town.
The next morning, with batteries now topped up with mains power, we
headed through the beautiful Karangahape and Waikino Gorges to Waihi, and on
down to the coast to where Larissa and her family live. We stayed at the Waihi
Beach RSA Club, our now regular stopover place, and that night patronised the
restaurant in style, with our entire Waihi Beach family joining us for dinner.
How delightful it was to have such grown up grandchildren join us and to
participate in the table conversation.
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| Together with our older grandchildren |
The following morning we headed on down to Tauranga, passing through Katikati
where we dealt with a few administration matters. Clouds lay along the top of
the Kaimai Range, some looking like a draped shawl and some looking more like a
great expanse of snow laden ski fields. This road is familiar to us, having
travelled it over the years, and yet we were still surprised by the development
that had taken place through this horticultural landscape since last passing
through.
We found a spot down on the seashore, close to the city at Memorial Park,
and from there walked up into the city to attend a movie, “The Founder”, that
about the genesis of the McDonalds chain of fast food restaurants. While this
production does not warrant an Academy Nomination, it was most interesting to
learn the commercial history of this great giant of American commerce.
That night we parked up at the NZMCA Park at Tauriko, a few kilometres
up the road toward Hamilton; this too a familiar secure spot and sat the
folloing morning out, reading and readying ourselves for my uncle’s celebration
of life.
Funerals are always sad; sad for the widow, for the children, the
siblings and grandchildren, the closest friends, probably in that order, but
after that, mainly because they are simply funerals. I have attended funerals
of industry colleagues, relations of clients, friends and family of friends,
and every time I am overcome with grief during the service, often having had
little to do with these people on a personal level. It is simply hysterical
emotion, no less real to the sufferer, the woman wiping her tears away, but
confusing from an analytical way. My very tall Uncle Ron had not featured
hugely in my life; a visitor to my childhood home when my sisters and I used to
pull his skinny toes sticking out beyond the bedclothes at the end of our
single bed, a kindly uncle who brought us all back stuffed koala bears from his
first trip to Australia in abut 1961, a fellow traveller with his lovely wife
on a family canoe trip down in the Wanganui River in about 2001 and later part
of the family group who shared our honeymoon in 2003. But the older generation
have their time to share in these adventures with the younger generation, and a
time to leave life to us all and those generations that are lining up behind
us. It was kinder that he went earlier with his stroke than suffer a prolonged painful
cancer.
Worst and saddest of all was the fact that in such a wonderful gathering
of family, cousins met only on such occasions, my hearing did not allow quality
sharing of life’s experiences. Perhaps it is not only I who should be lining up
for a hearing aid, as my husband is currently doing.
We left Tauranga the day after this unplanned family gathering, staying
another night at the Tauriko Park, and headed to Hamilton, catching up with my
cousin, Pam, with whom I have more recently reconnected with. This is a
shameful fact; that I should have kept my distance for so many decades during
her life’s trials; rehabilitation, grief and loneliness. It is only since I
have been back from Australia and the two of us, only nine days apart and both
over sixty, that I have made any effort to do so. And given that it is I who
has the mobility and resources, I admit all fault. After such a grovelling
confession, I can report that we spent a very pleasant two hours in her company
before heading south again.
We had been amazed to find ourselves bypassing Cambridge on the new
expressway, and the next day after we left our hosts’ little lifestyle block
park over property near Mystery Creek, similarly amazed by the massive housing
developments on the south edge of Te Awamutu. Otorohanga was buzzing, even on a
Sunday; stalls lined the pavements outside shops which would otherwise not be
open, and the crowds of punters were busy spending their spare cash. We turned
off Highway 4 at the south end of Te Kuiti’s Rora Street, and took the direct
southerly route which would otherwise take you across the volcanic plateau
through Mangakino to Taupo or Rotorua.
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| Lunch spot in the Mangaokewa Reserve |
The Mangaokewa Reserve accessed beneath the rail viaduct just a couple
of kilometres south of Te Kuiti is a lovely picnicking spot, and even in the
heavy rain, a good spot to pull into for lunch. We have stayed here a couple of
times, a fact I have referred to before, as I have also suggested that I would
not wish to do so late in the week or over the weekend when the nasty natives
come out to play. But this day, even with the rain obviously set in for the
duration, there were several hikers setting off over the swing bridge to head
some way up the Te Araroa track.
After lunch we continued on through beautiful green farmland, passing
the large block that my father had managed at Puketutu nearly fifty years ago,
on to Kopaki where we farmed for some years, although the little school, all
that is left of the “township”, was only mine for a little over a term. The
post office and the railway houses that were once camp to the Fijian Indians my
father had to scrub-cut are all long gone, and now high pines block any
extended view of our old house high on the hill which once overlooked the
valley. The farm looks much better these days than it did in our years of
occupation, but then those were the days of breaking in the land and my parents
sold the farm in the early seventies.
We carried on, returning to the main southern highway, Highway 3, north
of Mapiu and drove up and down through the steep land that surrounds the
Ongarue River, finally arriving in Taumaranui, Alighting from the camper, I
recalled it had also been a Sunday last
time we had called, and the intervening years had made little difference. Then
there had not been the rain to deter the losers to sit and slouch about the
street, or their accompanying dogs to threaten us as we made our way about. But
even so, neither of us could bear to settle in Taumaranui, even on a quiet wet
day. Having said that, we were greeted warmly in the Information Centre and
offered advice we sought, and later when we drifted into the 4 Square, the
Indian proprietor aided by her toddler son, could not have been more pleasant
as we purchased our bottle of Shiraz, a small celebration to mark the real
beginning of our southern trip, because from here on in, we had no set route or
schedule planned.
We spent the night at the NZMCA Park at Piriaka, about ten kilometres to
the south, again tried and true, and like all such park-over spots, secure. But
still the rain did not stop.
This morning we left before 8 am, having been woken by keen working bee
folk, scraping the weeds from the concrete, with square mouthed shovels. The
day was an improvement on yesterday, so we were keen to make the most of it. We
continued on south, passing National Park Village, from where there should have
been views of Mt Ruapehu, but today all three of the mountains were all heavily
shrouded in rain cloud.
On through Horopito we went, where the wrecker’s yard recently featured
in “Hunt for the Wilderpeople” and before that in various New Zealand
productions, is to be found. The good
folk who collect and dispense the junk piled within the fenced yard, were also
those who rescued us many years ago when the suspension collapsed in our
caravan and the wheel came up through the floor. Now that was an adventure and
whenever we pass Horopito we reminisce.
We pulled into the layby to check out the memorial to the Last Spike,
where the north and southbound railway construction workers joined their rail
sections on 6 November 1908 and where the prime minister of the day Sir Joseph
Ward struck the last spike to mark the occasion. This day I took a photo but
somehow it has mysteriously disappeared from my camera. However it was not the
monument itself that appealed but the acres of flowering bright yellow broom.
Further south, we noted the fine rich soils all ready to receive the
next crop of carrots and the cluster of buildings surrounded by vegetable
crates; most of our carrots come from this region around Ohakune. Soon after we
turned eastward, onto the road that takes one through to Waiouru to join Highway
1, but instead we pulled into Ohakune and walked about, between showers, and
shopped for a few fresh provisions, dumped and sought further advice from the
friendly folk there.
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| The Manganui-o-te-ao River |
Then on across to Raetahi where we attempted a rain free wander up and
down the very wide main street, that sporting innumerable empty street-fronted
buildings and not having improved one bit since our last visit. This once had
been a thriving country town, and The Place to shop when my grandparents raised
their family in the area. Even the recent construction of the nearby cycleway
has done nothing to improve its fortunes.
With little to hold us here, we turned a little north again, then west
onto the Ruatiti – Mangapurua Road, a narrow sealed rod that takes one through
to the track through to Mangapurua, that planned for the morrow, weather
permitting. The road is winding and a maintenance nightmare, but very
picturesque, particularly as it follows along the papa cliff banks of the
Manganui o te ao River. Seventeen kilometres in on this road, having now come
onto gravel, we arrived at the entrance to the Ruatiti Domain, a spot we have
stayed before, but then during the busy summer holidays. Today it would seem
there will only be two parties staying overnight.
Once this river provided a navigable route through to the Whanganui
River, into which it flows, however these days one would be hard pressed to
canoe through the rocks and rapids.
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| Our camp at the Ruatiti Domain |
The Domain was set aside in 1952 as a local purpose reserve and has been
used for everything from grazing to a gravel quarry, however in 1990 it was
re-gazetted as a recreational reserve and has such has become a popular summer
camping and holiday spot. There are toilets, although pretty primitive, and one
should be advised to bring one’s own paper for that particular purpose. There
is a pack in-pack out policy, which means no waste facilities are provided, but
the natural features are spectacular. The reserve is like a peninsula
surrounded by the river, high papa cliffs on the outer banks of the river, and
the inner camp side banks, clean rounded stones. Kanuka, black beech, manuka
and mingi-mingi surround the mown grassed camping areas, and are filled with
tomtits, tui, bellbirds, North Island Robins and wood pigeons if the
interpretative panels are to be believed. This river is also home to one of the
country’s best populations of Whio or Blue Ducks. We did not see any as we
wandered along the river banks on our arrival; they are apparently very shy
birds.
