5 April 2019 - Parua Bay, Whangarei Harbour, Northland

The new financial year has ticked over, and autumn seems to have arrived, causing me to pull out my warmer clothing.

We have not been entirely nailed to our abode, if one can be so affixed to a mobile home. We have had some rain although very little until the last couple of days;  it is the solid rain of these last few days that has driven me back to the computer to update my blog. 

In the interim we’ve seen a couple of movies, “Celia” and “Daffodils”, both New Zealand productions and well worth the effort.  We call in to visit my mother every couple of days, or at least every third day to take our waste cassette to the dump in town.  We fetch our water in 10 litre jerry cans on a daily basis. These gentle activities ensure we do venture out occasionally.

A few days ago we pulled our kayak up out of its hiding place in the scrub and attempted to wash eight years of grime away,  no easy task when water is rationed by the fact there is no water on site.

Last Sunday we called on our son and his family, to hear about their very recent fortnight in California and to have him pull down the kayaking paraphernalia from the rafters of his garage. So now we just need some decent weather and convenient tides; our first re-entry will be in the arm of the bay below our section. I am a little anxious as to my paddling prowess; it is many years since we have been out and about on kayaking adventures. Hopefully my next posting will be full of the renewed wonder of wandering about the harbour, rather than stories of capsize and unscheduled dunking.

A couple of weeks ago we took the van down to Auckland, the main purpose an attempt to catch up with my younger son and his partner. Alas I have not seen him since my father’s funeral mid-December , and while I acknowledge our children have busy working lives, I suspect he is putting his efforts in to nurturing his new relationship and working through the hideous tangle of separation from his last.

I was well aware that he might conveniently avoid a catch up so we made plans so the weekend could be spent in a pleasant way even without that reunion, and so it turned out. We had a fabulous time, travelling down on the Friday, arriving early afternoon at the Tui Glen NZMCA park over property to find great changes had been made since our last visit. While we have always treasured this little club site because of its location, it was always terribly pokey and members with too large vehicles would arrive and hog several spaces with little consideration for others, although who is to say we wouldn’t do the same if we had a rig the size of some of these. The area has recently been extended, welcoming the smaller single axle vans to a spacious elevated area, and this and the lower section are now marked out with white painted battens to ensue everyone parks correctly. There is also a large jumbo bin for rubbish now, which takes the stress of where to stuff one’s little bags of refuse.

We spent Friday afternoon wandering around Henderson, this West Auckland suburb that has a varied and eclectic population and retailers as varied as say Otahuhu in the south of the city. It’s a great place to buy a sari or a mumu, although quite frankly whiteys like me look appalling in such gorgeous garments. We checked out the restaurants and later after a bottle of red in our own place, went out to a marvellous Indian restaurant which was sadly very quiet; perhaps we were simply too early.

On Saturday morning we crossed the Henderson Creek, walked up through the town to the railway station, to find that the western line was closed for maintenance over the weekend. Instead we caught the replacement bus which wound its way through all the little stations through to Britomart in the centre of Auckland; Sunnyvale, Glen Eden, Fruitvale Road, New Lynn, Avondale, Mt Albert, Kingsland, My Eden, Grafton, a long winded journey of an hour and a half. But rather than sigh and lament the tedious length, we enjoyed the journey, checking out the patchwork of suburbs, the volcanic cones, the massive construction going on in Newmarket, and finally the buzz of downtown Auckland.

Arriving on the waterfront, we joined the hundreds and thousands of tourists, many off the massive cruise ship tied up to the wharf, and walked the length of the Viaduct Basin, as far as the Silos and to the wharves where very impressive super yachts, encased in plastic, were berthed and undergoing renovation. Here too is Heritage Landing where a selection of classic yachts can be found bobbing about in the choppy harbour.

After lunching at Maccas, we walked up Queen Street, and the wonderful quaint and narrower High Street to reach the Auckland Art Gallery and then spent several hours there enjoying the exhibitions. We were fortunate enough to catch a dance show put on by students from the Manukau  Polytech; one group who danced in the style of Tahiti and another more contemporary group including three very overt gays, whose number started badly (in our opinion) with a collection of pretentious tableaux before we did see something that my husband could only just label as dance. Needless to say, I was more impressed with this show than my husband, but only just so.

The art exhibitions were varied and vibrant, including two particularly memorable ones: “ Pacific Sisters: He Toa Taera / Fashion Activists” which was reminiscent of the WOW exhibition in Nelson but  with a strictly Pacifica theme and” Guerrilla Girls : Reinventing the “F” Word – Feminism”  – posters and the like by a very angry group of international women, some witty, some confronting (I noticed that my husband did not linger too long in these galleries).

Since our last visit, the administrators of the gallery have seen fit to make it a user pay affair, unless you can prove you are a New Zealand resident. For those who are not, i.e. international tourists, there is a charge of $20 per head which I thought rather steep. 

We walked back down to Britomart to enquire about a more direct bus to Henderson, one that might take less than an hour and a half, and were assured that there certainly was such a service, but we would need to walk back up to Hobson Street to catch the correct bus. After a strenuous and hurried climb, detouring about construction work and getting a little lost, we encountered the right bus just as it pulled into the stop and were taken not only back to Henderson in a timely manner, but right to the bus stop near the Tui Glen Park.

The following day we had arranged to visit with our now ex-daughter-in-law and the grandchildren at 10 am , and were asked if we could sit with the children a couple of hours while their mother attended a tutorial at the University. Their other grandmother who is normally on call had gone away for the weekend, so it was a delight to have the opportunity to spend some quality time with the two boys; or more correctly the younger one, the older one finding his computer game and online buddies more attractive than his gypsy grandparents. So we played a very modern version of Monopoly with electronic money, sat and watched part of “Home Alone” and chopped firewood with young Matthew and the resident Newfoundland,  having an excellent time. Jess was held up excessively, however her mother returned from her weekend away and we left late afternoon and headed toward Whangarei, reaching our destination beside the Hatea River before nightfall, and in time to indulge in yet another Indian dinner out.

So what might have been considered an unsuccessful weekend, turned out to be a most pleasurable one after all.

Last weekend I had an entirely different experience; one that might be more common for your average woman, but alas my life is not the “norm” whatever that be. I travelled up to the Kerikeri markets in The Old Packhouse with my mother and sister; a thoroughly girlie thing to do, quite outside my normal behaviour.

The market is held on both days of the weekend, and certainly I can vouch that the Saturday market is immensely popular. This is the one that my husband and I went looking for the weekend we stayed up at Kerikeri; alas we were looking down in the main street where they used to be held. 

Here there are approximately one hundred stalls selling local produce, meats, seafood, deli lines, local wines and craft beer, baked goods, natural skincare, plants, artisans’ products, arts and crafts and so on. There is an in house bakery and two cafes. We bought ourselves morning coffee and pastries and sat watching the crowds and listening to the excellent musicians.

None of us had come with any intention of buying anything; however I came away with a bunch of radishes and another of bok choy, and my two companions bought other vegetables straining my little foldup shopping bag.

My sister had made a booking at The Pear Tree, a restaurant known as The Landing in a previous life, situated down beside the Kerikeri  River adjacent to the Old Stone Store, New Zealand's oldest stone building,  for midday. We were the first in but for one elderly lady eating alone,  however were  soon were joined by half a dozen other parties, people like ourselves. Years ago I had come here with a young family and joined others to dine in a noisy summer fashion; I had feared it might be still like this. Thankfully it was not.

We had a delicious meal, Mediterranean omelettes for my mother and I and a fulsome bowl of tagliatelle for my sister.  Terribly sensibly, we drank water rather than the wine on offer; it would have seemed unfair to have drunk of the grape while my driving sister stayed sober.

8 March 2019 - Parua Bay, Whangarei Harbour, Northland

Almost a month on and how the days are already closing in, although this is partly due to the artificial constraints of daylight savings, or at least to blame for the dull mornings. We wake to temperatures of about 13 degrees C but enjoy days where the temperatures reach the mid-20s. Until today, there has been little rain which has served us well, allowing us to enjoy the outdoors and to minimise the growth of our expansive “lawn”.

The little flock of quails, all eleven of them, are venturing out further each day, to our great joy, although the smaller flock of goldfinches which had fed on the seedheads directly below our camper have disappeared since Chris last felled the crop of weeds. In the evenings and early mornings, the wax-eyes and fantails enjoy the insects gathering in the privet which continues to flower in profusion, this causing us to stay with our daily dose of antihistamines.

One evening just recently, I was drawn out into the dusk by the strangest of cries, first thinking it might be a kiwi, given that kiwis were on my mind. Instead I found a quartet of kakas circling above our camp, squawking and screeching as only these native parrots can do, before disappearing over the pururi trees and across the neighbour’s farm.

Kiwi were on my mind because just a day or two before we had had the interesting experience of attending a “kiwi release evening” along at the community hall. Signs along the road had announced the upcoming event and we, along with several hundred other Whangarei Heads and Parua Bay residents, arrived in time to gather on the slopes above the rugby field, to be educated by a clutch of fanatical kiwi conservators and meet the  partly grown birds before they were taken down into the bush to be set free. The speaker held us spellbound for an hour before the birds were taken around to be introduced to us, then most headed home for their delayed dinner as we did.

The chicks had been taken from their nests in the local area and removed to Limestone Island in the Whangarei Harbour, the island acting as a predator-free nursery, then six months or so on, at a size large enough to defend themselves from errant cats or stoats, moved onto the mainland to join their kin here. In fact there are kiwi in our backyards here, although one is unlikely to meet them; we keep different hours. 

The good news is that with the vigilence of these people, and support of the locals, the kiwi population in the Whangarei Heads area has grown from just eighty in 2001 to over 500 in 2014; needless to say that statistic is a little out of date, which certainly leaves room for a much higher figure for today’s current population.

Apart from heaps of educational opportunities about kiwis at this gathering, there was a stall all about weed control, and here, not only were we informed about the ways to rid ourselves of the moth plant, woolly nightshade and other unwelcome flora, we were given a pottle of poison, some gloves and a book to guide us on our crusade against invasive flora.

We also had an opportunity to view the people who make the community in this part of the district rather wonderful.

Last week we managed to get away again, this sounding as if we live some sort of forced imprisonment, but not meant at all. We spent six nights away from our section; although all were within a day’s drive of Whangarei had we needed to rush back.

We left Whangarei via the north coast route, up through Tikipunga, past the Whangarei Falls and on toward Ngunguru. It’s a lovely drive through to the coast, and one we have done on numerous occasions although not lately. At the northern end of the seaside settlement, we drove out beyond the school to a spot with lovely views across to the Spit and back to the village strung along the estuary shore. Here we paused for a cuppa, and a small walk. The tide was out or at least on the turn, fellow tourists a scarcity.

On up the coast, following the road around the rugged scrub covered hills, we turned east just before Tutukaka and headed out to the end of the road, parking up in a delightful spot at Wellingtons Bay, or more correctly Whangaumu Bay. From here one can look all the way back to Ngunguru again, and down the coast toward Pataua and Ocean Beach. There is space for three campers here in a designated council blessed camping spot although by the time night fell, there were five of us squeezed in between the signs.

But before opening our evening bottle of red, we walked the length of the settlement, and marvelled at the development that has gone on here in the last few decades since we were last here. We returned along the shore, trying valiantly not to disturb the terns, oyster catchers and gulls resting on the hard sand, all waiting for the tide to reveal a natural feast.

The next morning we were fascinated to observe a fellow on the beach with his car and trailer gathering seaweed; we have yet to understand whether this was a legal activity, whether the gathering of seaweed for one’s garden or for sale is allowed? Perhaps he was just tidying up the beach, because it certainly looked pristine after he left.

Back on the road, we continued on past Tutukaka, Matapouri and Sandy Bay before heading west and inland again to Hikurangi where we pulled into Waro Lake for lunch, and stretched our legs doing the Yvonne Stewart Track around the lake.

Here the scars of past industry have been attractively covered up with plantings and the efforts of the Friends of Lake Waro, the community group formed in 1999. Today there are parking and picnic areas, and a well mown pathway wending its way about the lake edge and through the outcrops of limestone which escaped past mining, with well-placed benches on which to rest and enjoy the scene.

The area was quarried between 1922 and 1974 by Wilsons Portland Cement Company, now Golden Bay Cement. Prior to that and after the limestone rocks were uncovered by a fire in 1888, burnt lime was produced for agriculture on the site until 1917.

Beneath all of this, the Hikurangi Coal Company operated a coal mine from 1913 until it closed during the First World War, then reopened in 1921, finally closing in 1933 due to flooding. However the limestone quarrying continued on until 1974 when operations were transferred to a site on the other side of the main highway, leaving this for development for leisure pursuits.

There are no signs here to forbid camping, but nor are there any to encourage it, so we did file it in our memory banks as a possible future stopover spot, although we would be averse to staying here on any night between Thursday to Sunday. There has been a lot of work done in recent times to paint over the graffiti on the fluted outcrops of limestone, which suggest that the local riffraff like to spend time here too.

From here we travelled north on State Highway One to Kawakawa, then on north to Kerikeri where we found our way to the NZMCA Park at Rainbow Falls.  The club park over property was full of motorhomes and caravans,  proving it is indeed one of the club’s most popular parks. We checked out the falls and found the water levels lower than normal and a surprising number of folk swimming in the deep pool beneath the cascade.

After a night battling buzzing and biting mosquitos, we spent the following morning checking out Kerikeri, expecting it to be buzzing too. For a Saturday morning it was remarkably quiet, and not as impressive as I remembered. But there is a smarter class of people about here in this little oasis and we spent some time chatting with one of them after browsing in the real estate agent’s window. This lovely lady was an import from Auckland as so many of Kerikeri’s smarter set are. She seemed keen to have us join the set too; whether that was because she thought we would fit well or whether she just wanted to bolster her commissions, I guess we will never know.

We did come across an amazing sculpture in the domain that has been there since 2009, an arrangement of boulders up to eleven metres high topped by cast bronze shells, orchestrated by Chris Booth whose work seems to pop up all about the North. Perhaps we have seen it before, and if we did, then perhaps it’s not so amazing after all, to have not left an impression, however this time I did notice it.

Interestingly there was quite a furore raised over this; half a million dollars was donated by an anonymous donor and the council had to come up with another lump sum to cover the cost of the base and landscaping, much of this kept hush-hush until the incoming council in 2011 discovered there was still a $129,000 debt arising from all of this. I do wonder how much of this Chris Booth managed to pocket; he certainly doesn’t have the demeanour of a wealthy man, or at least did not when Chris and I attended an art exhibition of his about fifteen years ago.

After lunching near the dump, as you do, we headed up and out of town across mostly well farmed land to the coast on the northern arm of the Bay of Islands.  Some of this land is farmed by Land Corp and some by wealthy station owners, such as the extensive 1133 hectare Mataka Station and 338 hectares Mountain Landing Farm, both of which feature on the internet under the words “subdivision”, “private”, “high security hideaway”  and “conservation-minded wealthy”.

But we were here to revisit Marsden Cross, now the Rangihoua Heritage Park, a spot we had called and walked some years back. Since then there has been major development of this historic site, and we were absolutely delighted to find it so.

The mission settlement on the shore of Rangihoua Bay far below the park entrance was the first European settlement in New Zealand, its very existence thanks to the protection of Chief Ruatara whose pa can still be detected on a nearby hilltop. There the Reverend Samuel Marsden first proclaimed the Christian message in this country on Christmas day 1814, laying the first seeds of Christianity.

The well-formed track down into the bay is apparently a thirty minute walk each way, however it took us an extra half hour because we studied all the interpretative panels and displays along the way, all twenty of so of them.

Above the site, near the car park, stands a massive structure with little functionality but to screen the sun and rain from the visitor. The side walls are of rammed earth, and the roof appears to float above them like wings, framing the scene; the Rangihoua Pa site on the hill down to the right and the mission site at the base of the valley. The building was featured in the New Zealand exhibition at the Venice Architecture Biennale in 2016, which serves also to suggest it is indeed an interesting structure. The revamped site was opened in December 2014, two hundred years after that first service, something I think is quite wonderful.

Samuel Marsden who had been based in Parramatta after arriving in Australia in 1794, met up with Te Pahi, an adventurous kinsman of Ruatara and they formed what would be believed by each party, a symbiotic relationship. Much of this I learned about Te Pahi, saddened me; there were so many enterprising Maori around 1800 and thereafter, eager to learn the language and ways of those that came from the other side of the world, who did so well, that success measured by both cultures. Two hundred years later we seem to be overwhelmed instead by stories of how the poor Maori cannot get ahead and are held back (by their beneficiary attitude). What happened to stop the progress that was so vibrant one to two hundred years ago? Did the confiscations after the Land Wars poison everything to that degree? As I said, it just made me sad.

Anyway it was Ruatara who followed Te Pahi and had his own adventures, even travelling to England to meet King George III (unsuccessfully) and to learn the ways of the modern world in Australia. Ruatara spent eight months with Marsden in Australia, then reciprocated the hospitality. Chances are he did not quite understand to what degree that invitation would be accepted, because the mission lasted for some time down on the beach below the pa. But in return, the tribe were taught to read the Bible, wear European clothes, grown grain for bread, serve tea in dainty cups and generally become “civilised”.  

Although Ruatara died soon after the “Active”, Marsden’s own ship, arrived, his father-in-law, Rakau, honoured the agreement and continued the tribe’s protection while the mission remained.

Samuel Marsden established three missions in the Bay of Islands; this one, one in Paihia set up in 1823 run by Reverend Henry Williams and another close to Hongi Hika’s village at Kerikeri in 1819. However it was not until 1826 the first Maori man, a man called Rangi, succumbed to baptism; this preaching and business of religious conversion was a tough one.

By 1827 there were only two missionary families left at Rangihoua, and five years later, the mission closed with those remaining moving to the station at Te Puna about two kilometres west.

Samuel Marsden died in Sydney in 1837 just three years before the Treaty of Waitangi was signed. Apart from learning about his bringing Christianity to these fair shores when I was at primary school, we have come upon mention of him in various places about, here and in Australia as well as books I have read, and more recently I read of some less than positive attributes about the man. Alas these holy-rollers are not always the paragons of virtue we were brought up to believe. I must do some more research to dig up that scandal.

Needless to say we were hugely impressed by our visit to the Rangihoua Heritage Park, now more aptly named.

We returned to the mosquito haven at the top of the falls, but made sure we sprayed the van out with half a can of fly spray before retiring for the night.

The next morning we drove up onto the plateau of farmland inland from Kerikeri, past the airport, south east of the Pukeiti Forest, to Okaihau, to intersect with a small section of the Twin Coast Cycleway, which mostly follows the disused railway line.

Okaihau is perched on a high ridge at the heart of the Mid-North, 262 metres above sea level, which is quite high given its short distance from the coast and given that we are not considering terrain like Australia’s eastern escarpments.

 

From a European perspective, it too has been long settled, even by New Zealand standards. Chief Tamati Waka Nene (another name I learned of at primary school - our New Zealand history was not so lacking after all!) made 4,000 acres available to the government under the Homestead Act in 1864 so that settlors could purchase the land. Canadian settlors from Nova Scotia arrived at the land development frontier that was early Okaihau, and settled, building their log cabins and planting wheat. These earlier Europeans, alongside Maori, soon moved into flax processing, timber, gum, mining and farming. Descendants of these folk remain today.

But actually it is Tamati Waka Nene’s support of the British troops that I recall from my school days; he built a pa here in 1845 and fought beside the troops in their attack on the pa of Hone Heke near the shore of Lake Omapere.

I was curious to read that much later, much much later, the first Tongan licenced preschool in New Zealand was established here in Okaihau in the early 1980s. This is not something you would associate with the Mid-North, or more particularly, with Okaihau.

There is a little parking spot beside the cycleway, toilets and a couple of camping spots provided, but not level enough for a motorhome as big as ours. We ended up finding our way up to the domain where a group of locals were setting themselves up for a Country music jam session. They said we were welcome to join them; a gold coin donation was all it cost, however we had plans to do some exercise.

The cycleway has no distance markers, a disappointment for those on foot who wish to applaud themselves for every kilometre walked, but I reckon we walked five to six kilometres south toward Kaikohe, our turning spot well along the lakeside, although the path is some distance from the shore. We could see large flock of what were probably geese settled on the western side of Lake Omapere, identifying them as birds as opposed to abandoned fertiliser bags because they all rose into the air from time to time.

The builders of this particular cycleway have been frustrated by an unwillingness of some of the landholders to welcome or accommodate the thoroughfare for the fit, so some of the pathway takes a long winded detour through attractive patches of scrub and bush, thus making distance calculations even more complicated. It was a very hot day, and while clad in shorts, hatted sensibly and carrying water, it was hard work.

The dozen or so cyclists who passed us made much better time, but then they did not get time to marvel at the graveyard of port-a-loos down in the gully, or enjoy the flowering ginger and convolvulus , blackberries (which one does not dare eat here in New Zealand in case they have been sprayed), gorse, pungas and flax, or talk to the large herd of curious dairy cows, or wave to the farmer on his four wheel motorbike; walking has its advantages.

Back in Okaihau, we commiserated with the owner of the rather drab food store, a man of Indian origin with poor English, who suffered the pranks of the “naughty kids”  in and around his store, as much as the signs that had been vandalised in just the time it had taken us to walk our ten kilometres or whatever. I would have described these miscreants in stronger language, and he probably does too, when he holds his wife at night and wonders why they bothered coming here away from the city, and when they have to board their shop windows up, and, and and… Probably better here than owning a liquor store in South Auckland! I imagine the profit on the sale of a couple of ice-creams hardly made it worth keeping his doors open on this Saturday afternoon.

From here we drove back over the pleasant  rural landscape to Waimate North and parked up in the night at the Showgrounds where NZMCA members are made welcome and offered the convenience of power all for the modest donation of $10 (actually a monetary defined donation is no longer a donation, it is a fee). We have stayed here a couple of times before, and this time was even lovelier than the other times.  Absolutely no one came to disturb or distract our peaceful evening amongst the massive old puriri trees, not even to check on the adjisted horses nearby.

Our trip north had been suggested by my husband, so while I offered a few ideas as to how we might fill our days (walking that small portion of the Coast to Coast Cycleway being one of them) I left my husband and principal driver to call the shots. The next day we drove further up the coast, the loop that takes one to Matauri Bay and around to Kaeo via Whangaroa on the harbour of the same name, then back down Highway 10 to Waipapa near the Kerikeri Rainbow Falls park.

Chris had imagined us spending a good part of the day or morning at Matauri Bay; he forgets that it continues to be a disappointment. Matauri Bay is one of the gems of the north, or at least it was when we visitors used to sprawl ourselves all over it with no regard to its private ownership.

Since 2001 development and ownership and financial disaster have plagued the bay and the local owners, with debt at one point reported at $26 million. All I know is that when you drive down into the bay nowadays, that gorgeous most picturesque bay that looks like paradise, you first see the cluster of shanties on the southern end of the bay owned and housing the traditional owners, then pass through manicured subdivision which has remained unsold since it was developed over ten years ago, and are then confronted with signs to remind one that while you are welcome to visit and look at the beach, but to remember it is private, that you should park only in the designated car parks, walk only on the clearly defined pathways, take your rubbish with you, et cetera, et cetera. All of this is quite sensible and if the land were mine, I doubt I would be letting anyone on to it. It’s just so very different from when we stayed here over twenty years ago, and I miss that.

So with a repeat dose of disappointment, we drove up out of the bay, the road a twisting steep affair, and resumed our trip north. Not too far on are the gorgeous bays of Te Ngaere and Wainui. We pulled into the first, backed up to the edge of the beach and sat over lunch with the most divine views of glistening sea, white beach and brave swimmers. This was far preferable.

Before travelling over the hill to Whangaroa, we detoured to Tauranga Bay, duly admired it then drove out. This was all about Chris today; I would have paused and walked about a little, although I have to confess that my shin splints were painful; my new walking shoes were proving the adage about getting what you pay for.

When we regained the main highway, or at least Highway 10, we switched drivers and I drove back to our camp at Kerikeri, a feat I am rarely challenged to do; I prefer to drive the car to anything the size of our camper, however one must keep one’s hand in.

The next day was to be our last full day before heading home, our schedule restricted by appointments at the bank for my mother and I. We headed south to Puketona, then east out to Paihia, driving on through this charming but busy resort, so compact that future development cannot be imagined. At Te Haumi just over the hill from Paihia, we pulled into the large layby, busy for all those enjoying their lattes and ristrettos from the coffee cart. It is indeed a fine place to enjoy one’s morning coffee; it’s just that we settled for our cups of instant.

At Opua we were perfectly in time to drive on to the car ferry, along with half a dozen other vehicles, including a ute loaded up with bee hives. Strangely the middle aged women collecting money in exchange for tickets missed us and we were off on our way, remarking at the bonus trip but accepting an invoice might arrive in the mail one day soon. We reckoned this made up for the rip off ferry trips we have paid for on other trips, one near Fort William in Scotland immediately came to mind, and that it was all a matter of life going round and round.

We joined the Russell Road at the base of the Okiato peninsula and turned right instead of left for Russell. The road wends its way around the Waikare Inlet, then rather than turning on to the gravel road that takes one through to Kawakawa via Karetu, drove on toward Rawhiti, passing the lovely but very inaccessible Jacks Bay, Parekura Bay, and Waipiro Bay , finding space in the boat park at Te Uenga Bay.

We did leave the vehicle here and walk down to the beach, encountering a couple who had just come in off their launch after a week’s stint on the water. What lovely people they were too, or at least the lady and her dog; her husband was too busy loading up their ute with the pile of gear. It turns out that they own a house out here at Parua Bay, a place we could see if we could remember the exact street number, although are working on a property between here and Auckland. We did remind them that full-time retirement was quite attractive.

We lunched back in the van, away from the intimate but charming views of the beach, before returning to the road, which was not too many years ago, a dusty jangly route around some of the north’s loveliest coastal scenery. We continued on down to Ngaiotonga, bypassing Oakura, through Mokau where the well patronised marae is undergoing extensive renovation, past the imposing gateway to some rich Russian oligarch’s retreat, up the long Helena Bay hill until we emerged back out on Highway One at Whakapara just north of Hikurangi once more.

We briefly considered a rural POP nearby, then Waro Lake, and finally decided to come on down to Whangarei, where we found a spot by the Hatea River in the Town Basin, one of our favourite spots in the city, although our least favourite corner in this particular car park. But it must be said, again, that the Whangarei District Council really does go out of its way to accommodate motor-homing travellers.

The next morning we dumped, replenished our supplies at our faithful budget supermarket, did a load of laundry, called into my mother’s for coffee where we received a welcome that suggested we had been away for a month rather than six days then headed back out onto our section to set up once more. Soon the wet washing was pegged out on the line strung up between the cabbage trees and all was well in our world.

Since I set myself to write this up, it has rained steadily, and not just here; the cricket test down in Wellington has also been rained off. Many will declare the drought has broken and there will be many happy farmers about tonight, even if they have missed the cricket.

12 February 2019 - Parua Bay, Whangarei Harbour, Northland

Since last putting fingers to keyboard, we have managed a more serious break, although hardly serious by our scale. This time it meant venturing beyond a leisurely day’s distance from Whangarei  but still remaining within the daughter-guilt range; I am sure there will be some readers that understand this rather bizarre measurement.

In the last few weeks before we headed away, we had the power installed on to the section which  enabled me to indulge myself in activities I enjoy beyond travelling, walking and reading; blogging and genealogy to name but a few. I spent time editing through my blog notes of our last trip to the United Kingdom in the hope that when it arrives in book form, it will be in a better state than it was when it first hit the blog-sphere.  National grid power means unlimited armchair sportsmanship for my husband and while the Tour DownUnder is now finished, there was then the Australian Open and cricket to be followed. While we have had a fair electricity source from our more than adequate solar panels and an excellent generator, my husband, always over cautious as regards electricity usage, has been even more concerned with the house batteries coming to the end of their lives.

We walked The Loop in Whangarei a couple of times, once with our granddaughters and their father, a lengthy affair where every climbable tree and all playground equipment was checked out, bicycles discarded for such distractions. This walk is as wonderful sauntered along in such conditions as it is done at a brisker pace in an attempt to reduce the recently acquired weight gain. Of course that, the weight gain is not helped by the muffins served by my mother for morning tea whenever we call in, or the delicious meal we had out to celebrate our 16^th wedding anniversary, this latter at The Quay and an excellent evening it was, albeit keeping within our early routine.

Then finally we set off on Auckland Anniversary Day, joining the throngs heading back from the northern beaches in readiness for their children’s school year to begin. We were disappointed that we were unable to touch base with our youngest in West Auckland, but promised to remedy that on our way home if possible.

So with no social rendez-vous planned, we carried on through Auckland and out to the eastern shores beyond Clevedon, to Kawakawa Bay still on the edge of the Hauraki Gulf. There is a lovely spot at the northern end of the main bay where one can picnic and enjoy the outlook, however Anniversary Day was also an opportunity for all those from South Auckland who had not headed to one of the city’s excellent Regional Parks to do the same.  Alas there was little peaceful about the scene on this particular day; a little like heading to the beach in Queensland on Australia Day; perhaps that is a slight exaggeration.

So we did not linger there but carried on down the coastline, following the winding road up and over the hills and through lush native bush, alongside rushing streams,  until we came down to the Firth of Thames, mussel farms laid out before us as we reached Matingarahi. It is probably a couple of years since we have travelled this road; the scenery is familiar but the massive amount of road works was not. Evidence of erosion all along this road that hugs the coastline all the way to Kaiaua was quite astounding; what a nightmare for those charged with keeping the road open. In many places portable traffic lights were in use to marshal the traffic into an orderly one way system, so we were not at all inconvenienced although we might have been had we chosen this eastern route to hasten our journey. It was obvious that much of the northbound traffic resulted from conscious decisions to avoid the motorway south of Auckland.

Just south of Kaiaua, we pulled into Rae’s Rest, a wonderful camping spot for fully self-contained vehicles; there is nothing here but the white sandy beach and the plethora of shore birds protected in this sanctuary. We have stayed here on numerous occasions, listening to the gentle swish of the tide as it changes, and one night some years ago treated to nature’s fireworks display; a lightening extravaganza over the Coromandel Range just across the Firth. As night fell we could see the lights of Thames far across the water and the silhouette of the mountain range. We shared this lovely spot with a dozen or more campers, some who braved the salty brine and some who preferred to toast their bodies in the scorching afternoon sunshine. Since our last visit, loads of seashells have been added to the parking space and finding a perfectly level spot is not as easy as it used to be. I guess time and wear will eventually sort that small problem out.

The next morning we headed away south again, soon passing the Miranda Hot Pools where there is a lovely motor-camp for those who don’t balk at paying commercial camping fees. Here one has the use of the lovely pool complex as opposed to the plainer affair open to day-visitors, which does justify some of the tariff.

We came through to Ngatea, that tidy little rural service town on the Hauraki Plains, and popped in to check out the facilities near the Council Offices. The travellers in the whizz-bang vans were still crawling out of their sleep; it is a popular spot for the budget travellers to pull into and serves to keep the otherwise feral free-campers in one manageable spot. We have stayed here ourselves on a few occasions.

It’s less than an hour to Waihi Beach from here, travelling on through Paeroa, then Waihi where we nearly always stop to buy groceries at the very smart but small New World supermarket. At Waihi Beach we set ourselves up at the RSA, booking in for a couple of nights in their car park. Alas the Club has spent considerable money tarmacking the car park area where they welcome motorhomers, and it has been contoured so that rainwater runs into the centre and down into the revamped drainage system. While this is excellent from a drainage perspective, it does little to please the motorhomer who seeks an achievable level. Some of our fellows appeared to be set up at rather odd angles; maybe they are not as particular as we are.

We spent quite a bit of time with our daughter,  her husband and son when they were not working, but even teachers on holiday have to put in some hours at this late stage of the school holidays, so we were left to our devises some of the time. We used it sensibly, walking a couple of the tracks about the area. I had been up to the Trig on an earlier visit but Chris had not, so this time we set off up with Larissa and Sirius, the dog, on one of the hottest afternoons of this summer, tackling the hill and many steps, but mostly in the shade of the native bush and then the pine forest near the top.

The Trig walk is quite wonderful, although those with dodgy knees or hips are best left down on the beach. The views from the top are just spectacular, down the coast to Bowentown, across the Matakana Harbour to Mount Maunganui, out to sea to Mayor Island, and of course below, the long strung out seaside township of Waihi Beach. At a high point, above the Trig, there is a great tree stump cut out as a giant’s seat, and we gathered about that to rest before making the descent.

The following morning when we were left to our own devices, we were encouraged to take Sirius with us when we informed the family we were intending to undertake the Athenree Estuary walkway. This is a very flat walk well patronised by cyclists, dog owners and walkers, in that order. Alas our hearing is not very receptive to polite bell ringers, so we were nearly mowed down a few times, which is all the more serious when one has a poorly trained dog on a leash. However no one came to grief, and we enjoyed the birdlife on the mudflats and that in the scrub along the track; herons and gulls, tuis and swallows.

From Waihi Beach we travelled through to Tauranga calling on a cousin on whom we have been promising to call for some years now. She and her husband Brian are motorhomers like us, and like us have spent time travelling around both the UK and our own country DownUnder. We spent a delightful afternoon with Colette, and also found time to check out the coastal path at Matua Peninsula starting from Fergusson Park.  It’s a real bonus to find a new attraction in a city or area you think you know well, to prove that there is always something new under the sun.

We walked toward the city centre along this pathway, the mudflats revealed by the low tide starching toward the narrow channel that separates Matakana Island from the mainland, and the deeper one separating Mount Maunganui from Tauranga. Across the water, the port cranes stood tall, although not as tall as the peak of Mount Maunganui itself.

The coastal path passes some splendidly appointed homes, no doubt sporting million dollar price tags when they change hands, but more interesting were the places of historical interest along the way. Here can be found the remains of Otumoetai Pa which was the most significantly populated site in the Western Bay of Plenty between 1600 and 1865, its demise a result of the New Zealand Wars of 1864 when the land was confiscated by the government. Of course this is only part of the story and should only whet one’s appetite for further research.  

Here too are the sites of an old Catholic Mission and James Farrow’s Trading Post, Farrow the first permanent trader in the Bay of Plenty who traded Maori harvested flax for muskets and gunpowder from the 1830s. Later when the flax trade declined, more nutritious commodities were traded; salted pork, potatoes, wheat and maize.

I spent a few years living only kilometres from this part of the city in the mid-1970s but knew none of this. I guess I had other interests in those days….

After staying the night at the NZMCA Park in Tauriko, we pressed on along the Bay of Plenty coast, some of it on the “new” toll road that bypasses Te Puke, and what an excellent road it is! We pulled into Whakatane and wandered about the lovely CBD after chatting with an unlikely looking local who had recently purchased a smart new motorhome and was interested in where we had our tow-bar fitted. We learned that he was still a couple of years off retiring and had borrowed rather heavily to finance his new toy, much to the consternation of his more financially savvy children. But he and his wife wanted to practice using their motorhome before they set off on the road when he finally qualified for his hard earned pension. We were inclined to sympathise with his children but then we all come from different financial places and until one has walked in the shoes, one should not dare to judge. (Although you will have noticed that I constantly do so!)

Continuing on around the shoreline, bypassing folk we should have called on but had decided to do either on our return or on a subsequent trip, we arrived at Opotiki, which makes for a poor sister settlement to Whakatane. But then there is a very different population base here and the heydays of Opotiki are long gone.

We found our way to the new NZMCA Park here and joined the many others who had sought out the same level of security as we did. From there it is just a short walk up into what was once a thriving town.

Opotiki is the western gateway to Eastland so has captured the tourist trade for some decades now, whether the traveller decides to take the coastal route or the much shorter inland route across to Gisborne.  

After centuries of itinerant and warring tribes up and down the coast, the area was visited first by Captain James Cook in 1769, then in the 19^th century by traders and whalers from far across the sea. The missionaries arrived and began the business of “civilising” the natives, although in all fairness literacy always had to be a boon to any convert. Through the mid-19^th century there was fairly peaceful coexistence between the Maori and the European settlors, the former inhabitants embracing the European style of agriculture, but then through the 1860s came the Hauhau, hangings and all the bloodiness that followed. Eventually things settled back down and civilisation resumed, with it schools, banks, churches and hotels. Some of these still stand, such as St Stephen’s Anglican Church, but most of those that do are tired looking, reminders of yesteryears, with little hope of tomorrow.

Having said that, the people of the area are now doing their utmost to put some life into the place, developing cycle tracks to tempt the most active and intrepid and providing basic services for those who do bother to venture this way.

Refuelled with diesel, water and fresh food, we set off around the coast bright and early the day after arriving intending to travel only as far as Te Kahu and stay in a Council blessed free camp just north of the village centre, if it can be even called that. Chris and I have travelled this coast twice before together, and separately once before, but I have to say I had no memory of that south west of Te Kahu. It is quite lovely, with wide open bays between each rugged headland, and with tidy marae complexes  tucked into each of those bays. It was a Saturday and as such a good day for the locals to be gathering at their meeting places, giving evidence that community is still very important in these semi-remote areas. At Torere, we passed a posse of about ten police cars, and were overtaken by a patched Mongrel Mob motorcyclist, but otherwise there was nothing to support the reputation that has plagued this area in the past.

We crossed the bridge over the Motu River after travelling a few kilometres up the gorge and enjoyed the incredibly picturesque scenery immediately about us. This river is a surprising 110 kilometres long and rises 487 metres above sea level.  Years ago we drove “The Motu” in a car, a very rough road through the rugged interior which required some repair along the way; we were able to do this with a few fallen logs and breath holding as we crossed our rudimentary bridge. It is not a road to be taken in much more than a 4WD and certainly in nothing like our current motorhome!

At Te Kahu we dumped in anticipation of our overnight camp, paying the required $5 to the commercial camping ground to use their facility. While it is years since we have had to resort to using (and paying) for this service, we acknowledged the fee has remained at the same level for the past twenty years, and is fair enough.

Alas when we pulled on to the reserve and checked out the small area allocated to self-contained motorhome campers, we were unable to find any space that was near enough level, even using all our levelling blocks, so instead decided to press on again after lunch. It really is a delightful spot as will be attested by those others who managed to arrive before we did, and especially the owner of the very large bus-car rig who parked sideways taking up about three spaces. We watched tractors come and go as they launched their fishing boats, some of these old ex-agricultural vehicles held together with bailing twine and very little else. There were plenty of swimmers enjoying the apparently safe bay but we were satisfied to just wander about and observe.

East (and north) of Te Kahu , the bays are more intimate and rocky, offering less access but more appeal. Over Christmas they must be even more of a treat, when the pohutukawa trees are in full bloom. At Raukokore, we pulled onto the roadside to join twenty or more motorcyclists, this lot of the Ulysses Club variety, and checked out the charming Anglican old church which stands on the promontory. Years ago we called in here and were greeted by unfamiliar smells which were explained by a notice introducing us to the penguins nesting under the floor boards. This time the smell had gone but a little family of stuffed knitted penguins gracing the rail at the entrance support the remaining sign.

Access to the lovely bays along this coast is mostly through private land and while there are directions and contact details for those from whom permission should be obtained, one would have to be quite keen to bother. We satisfied ourselves with the drive-by. And once we reached Whangaparaoa, the road headed east and inland, much bordered by the scars of milled pines.  

Thirty three kilometres after leaving the coast, we arrived at Hicks Bay where there is evidence again of bygone activity, prosperity unlikely to be replaced even by the tourist trade. We had spotted a few signs saying “No Port here” in the same way one finds “No Mining here” in the Coromandel. This suggested to me that there is a move to have the timber being milled right through the area to be shipped out rather than transported out by the many logging trucks we were soon to encounter. Once these areas, from Hicks Bay down to Gisborne had abattoirs and wharves that welcomed shipping trade and transport. Now the abattoirs are crumbling concrete shells, relics of lost prosperity. And with greater distance to abattoirs, it must be a lot more costly to transport livestock out to those that do remain, costs that kill profits. It is from here at Hicks Bay and onwards that the large sheep and cattle stations exist, or did in better times if they are not now reverting back to native bush and scrub.

Nine kilometres on is Te Araroa, a wide bay with more services than anything since Opotiki, but still hardly enough to warrant the moniker “township”. Here is a long beach piled high with driftwood, even more than others passed along the route, a small grocery store, an expensive fuel outlet, a school and another NZMCA Park where we set up for the night. This one is very new, the plantings barely out of their nursery pots and has nothing but a flat surface and lock on the gate to offer security.

The next morning we woke to a lovely view back up into the hills and the promise of yet another superb day. Our written guides suggested that the best time to visit the lighthouse on the Cape was before sunrise, but we had still been abed; after breakfast would have to do.

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The twenty kilometre drive out to the lighthouse is quite picturesque, half of it on mostly sealed road and the rest on gravel. It is a slow road and has been subject to erosion as so much of the country about this region. The countryside opens out to good farming land at the end of the road, and we were greeted by a herd of pale coloured horses immediately below the hill on which the lighthouse stands. We parked up, proceeded by just one party, and set off up the eight hundred steps to the top, the lighthouse sitting 154 metres above sea level. Two further parties passed us as we struggled up, although we arrived soon after they did; slow and steady sometimes wins the race.

The East Cape lighthouse was originally erected  in 1900 out on East Island just offshore, but after years of earthquakes and subsequent erosion, it was decided to relocate it in 1922 to this hill at the end of the Cape. The cast iron tower stands 14 metres high, and the light which flashes every ten seconds, can be seen for 19 nautical miles. The light was fully automated in 1985 and the lighthouse keeper out of a job, as has happened all around the country, and no doubt all around the world. I guess there are not too many ex-lighthouse keepers left but there are probably an awful lot of grownup children who spent their early years in remote places such as this.

We pulled off the road on the way back, and spent a good part of the day just enjoying the sea raging on the flat rocks below us, reading the weekend paper and the last of our library books, the stock of which was quickly dwindling.

Back at Te Araroa, we wandered along to check out the giant pohutukawa tree, reputed to be the oldest and largest in New Zealand, supposedly over 350 years old and standing in excess of 21.2 metres tall, measuring 40 metres at its widest point. It is so massive and complex it is impossible to gauge if it has grown since we last checked it out. That too must be quite a picture at Christmas time.

The following morning we headed south across more scarred forestry land, coming down toward the Pacific Coast at Tikitiki, then staying inland as we continued on past the turn off to Ruatoria, once notorious as a den of crime, now location of the first New Zealand company to secure  a license to cultivate medicinal cannabis.

 

We had thought we might stop at Te Puia and have a swim in the hot pools there, as we did many years ago. In more recent years the hotel and the pools have been revamped which has no doubt been a good reason to up the price for a little dip. At $10 a head we thought it too much for a half hour or less in thermal water although I would have been happy enough paying three quarters of that; Chris not at all. So it was just as well we did not have to debate this matter further but instead pressed on down to the coast emerging at lovely Tokomaru Bay, yet another once-upon-a-time town. It does seem to offer more than Te Araroa by way of commercial enterprise, and the seaside reserve and facilities are most attractive. We parked up and lunched, Chris having a wee snooze while I wandered about the old part of the town and across the river.

 We had called into the Council Information office at Te Puia, to follow up on a matter discussed with the people in the information office at Opotiki a few days ago, this the camping permit offered by the Gisborne District Council during the summer months in specially allocated sites, starting from Tokomaru Bay and all along the coast as one comes on down to Gisborne.  At first glance it seems such a brilliant idea – permission and a rubbish bag for a series of options, the smallest being for two nights, the longest 28 days; $16.50 to $71.50 respectively. There is a long list of rules but mostly they are just matters of common sense health, safety and common courtesy, but the problem we have with the system is that offers little flexibility. The specific site must be selected for specific dates, which does not suit freedom campers in the true sense; we do not know for sure where we will be on any specific day, although I do acknowledge we had to conform to the rule when in the UK.   We had thought it might be nice to camp at Tokomaru Bay and then after Gisborne, Doneraille Park further south, but we did not exactly know which nights we would be there. As it turned out, it was just as well we did not go down this track because of having to abort our plans.

The other crazy thing is that you can go online to apply for the permit and they will post it out to you within so many days – what good is that? However there are places along the route you can purchase the permit over the counter, and the Te Puia office was one such. I would suggest this permit arrangement is best suited for those who go to one place for several days, or a week, normally a relatively local person or family, and not for the freewheeling tourist.

Instead when we arrived at Tolaga Bay, after checking out the free camping area, we decided to park up beside George & Mildred’s Supermarket, Thelma offering members of the NZMCA a relatively level and clear site for the modest fee of $5. Perhaps the location could be considered dodgy on benefit night, or over a weekend, but it was a Monday night and we figured that the good would spend their night sleeping and the bad were still sleeping off the effect of the weekend.

Tolaga Bay is of significant size and while having little to offer but food and fuel, it does have the feel  of civilisation, and it is after all, only 55 kilometres from Gisborne.  The name of the place seems to be a mystery because there is no bearing to its Maori name of Uawa, and has no relevance to any European who happened upon the place in the early days, however Tolaga Bay it has remained. I did read one explanation;  that Tolaga may have been a misinterpretation for the word te raki referring to a north wind blowing into the bay, but it sounds a bit tenuous to me.

Back in the day, here too was an abattoir and more importantly a significant wharf to accommodate the ships that came in. Sheep were introduced to the region in 1863 and have remained an important part of life here ever since.  In the early years of the land clearing, and establishment of the sheep and cattle stations, sea transport was the only efficient means of transporting produce away from the region. Initially small wharves in the Uawa River were used as loading out points for small boats carrying cargo to larger boats moored in deeper water. However as quantities grew this became very inefficient and an alternative solution was sought.

By 1875, Tolaga Bay was the largest European settlement on the East Coast, and the local port, that had begun its life servicing flax and whale traders, quickly developed into a critical component of the farming business that had grown up around the regon. 

In other places along the coast, a surf landing service was used to load cargo, which sounds very dodgy from this end of history. Here in Tolaga Bay port matters were a little more formal with the construction of the Hauiti Wharf up the river. But silting problems from inland floods restricted the use of the wharf and other remedies were considered including the use of Cooks Cove , more of this place later.

The political discussions regarding the establishment of an open sea wharf arose after the First World War, helped along by post-war resettlement of veterans, and in 1920 the newly formed Tolaga Bay Harbour Board decided to approach the Minister of Marine for recommendation of a suitable engineer to report on required harbour works, and so the slow process of bureaucracy began.

Cyrus Williams was the lucky man to be appointed to design and control the proposed construction works, and after tenders were invited, the contract to construct the 660 metre long wharf was awarded to Gisborne based contractor, Frederick Goodman, in 1924. Work started the next year and continued intermittently until 1929 when the entire structure was completed. At the time its completion was considered a technological and engineering feat of gargantuan proportions; never before had such a large and audacious project been attempted in an open and particularly hostile marine environment.

Obviously the completion of such an amenity changed life in the area. Records show that the busiest year for the wharf was in 1936 when 132 vessels visited Tolaga Bay. But global carryings on soon changed the glory years; the Great Depression of the 1930s effected primary industries such as pastoral vessels visiting, and then came World War II. By the end of the war the roads had improved significantly and there was no longer such reliance on the wharf. Less trade through the wharf removed maintenance funds and in by the mid-1960s the cost of shipping produce out of Tolaga Bay exceeded trucking costs. In 1968 the port was closed to shipping.

The wharf remained a tourist attraction but directly generated no income, thus damage by the elements slowly eroded the structure of the wharf until such a point there was a call for major restoration. At a cost of five and a half million dollars, the work was carried out in three stages, the first completed in the summer of 2001-02 by an outfit from Tauranga, and the second and ongoing maintenance by an Australian contractor, the second phase completed in 2006. Signs explain the complexity of the work in an attempt to justify the cost, all paid for by the Tolaga Bay Save the Wharf Charitable Trust who launced  what was probably the biggest fundraising campaign, per head of population, the country’s history. None of this is appreciated to the level it should be by the tourists who venture out to walk it’s length or those who fish from the end. Nor, I suspect, does the investment in the restoration even begin to be justified by the income these visitors bring into the town; the odd icecream, a loaf of bread, a bag of fish bait? Still I suppose the same could be said for many such works of restoration, especially in places of low population like New Zealand.

We checked the wharf out ourselves that afternoon we arrived, then gave the little town the onece over while eating icecreams, before settling in beside George & Mildred’s. The next morning we got away promptly returning to a spot neat the whar from where one can set off on one of the area’s loveliest walks.

The Cook’s Cove Walkway  is a two and a half walk up through farmland, then steeply down through manuka bush to an abosolute gem of a cove, one that Captain James Cook found refuge in 1769. Here he and his crew hauled their ship, the Endeavour , ashore and cleaned two years of weed and barnacles from its hull. Here too they were able to restock their water and fresh food supplies. To the north of the cove, there is a natural hole in the rock cliff giving one a framed view of the open sea;  a depiction of this scene painted at the time is shown on the interpretative panel in the cover. Little but the vegetation has changed over the almost 250 years.

Here on the walk we encountered John from Ruatoria, a man with a smooth complexion belying his years and his lifetime occupation as shearer.  We spoke of the maunga (mountains)  of the area to the north; the North Island’s highest non-volcanic peak of Mt Hikurangi at 1754 metres, and the surrounding maunga of Aorangi, Komapara, Aoparauri, Raukumara and Pungarehunui to name only those over 1000 metres. We spoke of erosion and forestry, and the juxtaposition of the two.  

We left John fairly early on the track, even though he was so obviously fitter than we were despite his relatively recent knee replacements. Later we encountered other walkers who we encouraged to walk to the very end of the trail, and others, foreign and obvioulsy time poor, just up to the lookout over the cove about half the distance. We decided the route was much changed from that we walked twenty four years ago, more strenuous but probably offering more options for shortening and certainly offering more in the way of seating and viewing platforms.

Back in the camper, a little before midday, we headed south again, and travelled through far more civilised countryside (if one considers evidence of serious farming practices as civilised), steep inland geography; we emerged once more to the castline at Pouawa, the site of one of these Council campsites and the most southern extent of the Te Tapuwae O Rongokako Marine Reserve and the equally protected sand dunes. Here we parked up and lunched, with the sound and distracton of dozens of logging trucks heading toward the port at Gisborne.

And then we went on again, soon approaching the one and only seriously populated place in Eastland, joining the queues of slow traffic causing mayhem with flying chip metal. The road had been recently sealed but the contractors had done an appalling job, and the rain of stones, upon the underside of the vehicles and flying at our windscreen, invited insurance claims and irate road rage.

Arriving beyond the worst of the stone-blizzard, we checked out the beach to the north of the city and the Taruheru River which forms the eastern boundary of the main city. Kaiti Hill sits above that entry route, and over the massive log storage yards, and more importantly for the campers arriving in the city looking for a free place to park their wheels, Kaiti Beach. We found this a most attractive and desirable place to stop over, but were also keen to go out to dinner and the walking distance from here to the middle of the CBD, ignoring the precise location of any would-be dining destinations; this would not suit. Instead we found our way to the Cosmopolitan Club, a place we had stayed some years ago, offering NZMCA members a secure park over spot, and their club facilties. We paid the requested $10 for the privelege of such convenient and secure overnight parking, and then without feeling any obligation to patronise the club, given we had paid a “camping” fee, walked out into the city early in the evening to dine at Bollywood Star, an Indian restaurant (of course) offering beautiful, bountiful and well priced meals.

The next morning while we dealt with household matters; dumping and laundry in a rather dubious suburb, we learned my mother had activated her St John’s call out alert and was in hospital. We completed our laundry task in an excellent little laundromat, shared with a Mongrel Mob patched mongrel who was there doing his washing with his two little children, conversing in the foulest language with a fellow mongrel. I wondered about those children; what kind of future could they hope for?

Over lunch after refilling with water and dumping our waste, we decided to abandon our travel plans to head further south along the coast to Wairoa, Napier, then up through Taupo, Rotorua and Hamilton, calling upon friends and family along the way, and head for home where we were needed.

Our route took us back up to Opotiki, this time up through the wine producing valley immediately north of Gisborne, reputedly the Chardonnay Capital of the World, on up through the land of the Tuhoe, through the Waioeka Gorge, this latter a fifty kilometre steep, narrow and extremely beautiful drive through bush and rugged terrain. The gorge cuts through ranges of steep sided hills rising from 400 metres near the coast to 1000 metres inland.

Through here since the 1890s, people have attempted to farm the Waioeka but a combination of depression, falling prices ad extensive erosion forced many to abandon their farms. By the late 20^th century, the government progressively added retired farmland to the Waioeka Gorge Scenic Reserve to protect water catchments. Regenerating bush helped reduce erosion, improve water quality and protect the Opotiki plains from flooding. Today anglers, kayakers, trampers, hunters and walkers enjoy the recreational aspects of the area.

Despite the late departure from  Gisborne we made good time through to Opotiki and set up once again at the NZMCA Park for the night. Next morning we set off promptly planning to drive through to Ardmore, a distance of over 300 kilometres, with the final leg back to Whangarei planned for the following day.

But life is rarely as one plans, and while our drive up the coast, pausing at Matata for morning tea, then through Te Puke, delibately avoiding the toll road travelled a few days ago, was all on track, as was the bypass of the expanding city of Tauranga travelling up through Maungatapu, the edge of Greerton heading for the Kaimais, our trusty camper went into limp mode on the steep hill as we approached Tauriko. 

I am sure I have documented here the previous like events, this being the third time this has happened, and we were confident the problem was yet again a wheel  sensor, the super sophisticated electronic Mercedes system screwed again. We managed to limp into the Gull self-service staton at the top of the hill and then spent a few hours on the phone convincing Mercedes that their f ancy components had failed us yet again. Eventually, after a false start with a too-small tow truck arriving to assist, we were transported through to Mount Maunganui to the Mercedes dealer, Ingam-Sears, who replaced the sensor, updated the onboard computor and we were free to leave late in the afternoon, the drama havng us nothing but delayed time. 

Our ride to the garage was quite something; the towtruck driver not having enough space in his cab for the two of us,  we rode in our own vehicle, safely strapped in our own seats atop the towtruck with elevated views, and a rather strange  wobbly ride, no doubt looking quite ridiculous to those who bothered to check us out. 

We returned to Tauriko, this time to the NZMCA Park, and the next morning headed off for home on the final leg, via Matamata, Maramarua, Auckland and on up the highway through to Whangarei. Despite having cut our trip short, we had had a wonderful time away, and planned to return to Gisborne as time and circumstance allowed and continue on our intended route.

Since then I have spent time with my mother who probably is more stricken with delayed grief than physical infirmity. Matters are no further resolved and for now my role has reverted to part-time carer, a role I learned late last year when my father’s farewell taught me so much. My husband has made the most of the hiatus to strip our trailer down to bare basics and rebuild it. I am impressed with his efforts and thankful for the good weather we are enjoying as our Northland summer progresses.