New Year

Summary of time:

· New Year

· Callum, Taupo Car Racing, Tauranga

· Being a local in Kawakawa

· Start the journey South

Handy hints –

§ Use I-Sites (Information Centres)

§ Have a good map

§ Make sure you have fluids, suntan lotion, and a hat, as well as your camera and binoculars

After Christmas, there was an opportunity to relax for a couple of days, as well as doing a bit of guarding, painting and building the shed.

One day Shirley and I headed out for a trip west stopping at a place where there were some very big boulders and rock formations. It was interesting to see native trees. We continued west arriving at Opononi, where you can see the tall sand dunes across the bay, and I got my first real sight of the Tasman Sea (which separates Australia and New Zealand). We then headed along the coast line, through the bush to an area where there are some of the largest Kauri trees, which at one time were extensively found all over NZ but were cut down, milled and not replaced. There are programs now to preserve this native tree. In the Waipoua Kauri Forest, the largest tree is Te Matua Ngahere (The Father of the Forest) has a trunk that is over 5m in diameter, with guesses that it could be around 2,000 years old. Unfortunately, I didn’t see that tree, but I saw Tane Mahuta, which is believed to be 1,200 to 2,000 years old, and over 50m tall. It is an impressive tree.

The last day of the year I was guard on the train. It is great to meet people from all over the world and chat to them. I stopped up watching telly, with my glass of wine to see the New Year / decade in, and rang Wales, it was slightly strange to think that we were in different decades!!!

At the weekend, Shirley and I went to Auckland to pick up Callum (Shirley’s grandson who was coming for a visit for 2 weeks), and whose flight was due to get in around midnight.

We left Auckland heading south, and stopped in Cambridge… I still find it strange finding places in other countries named after places back in the UK. This Cambridge was a horse racing/breeding town, and it was definitely not flat.

From here we headed to Lake Taupo, to meet up with Shirley’s brother and family, who were at the car racing there. We had fun at the car races, getting ‘behind the scenes’, and watching Shirley’s brother race... he didn’t win, but he certainly had some smoky wheel spins!!

After the racing we headed upto Tauranga to Geoff and Linda’s for fish and chips. Next day, Shirley was going to visit her mum, so Callum said he would help Geoff on the boat. We headed off to Whakatane, it was a grey miserable day, but I got to see the giant kiwi fruit, as we passed through the main kiwi growing area. On our return, we all went to see the boat.

I had it in my head that I was guard on the train on Weds, so we headed back up to kawakawa, it was a long day in the car, but we stopped for brunch at the Waikino Station Café in the Karangahake Gorge, and we saw the historic train arrive.

Our next stop was up at Wellsford for afternoon tea, before eventually arriving back at kawakawa. I had got my days mixed up and I was actually not on the train until Thursday (oops sorry Shirley).

We took Callum on the train though, which he thoroughly enjoyed, he rode the engine, several times!

Thursday I did a full shift as volunteer guard, and most of the rest of the weekend was clearing/cleaning and painting the apartment for the new tenant that was moving in, and also continuing to work on the shed with Mike and Callum.

One day we took the ferry from Paihia to Russell. Russell has a bit of a rough history, it was originally a Maori settlement known as Koroareka (Sweet Penguin). Its early European history was turbulent, with girls fighting (and then their families) over a whaling captain. In 1845 the government soldiers and marines garrisoned the town in the Northland Land War, as Russell was the first capital of New Zealand, but the capital was soon moved to Auckland, and then to Wellington. In its early days, Russell was filled with the rougher elements of society, for instance fleeing convicts, whalers, prostitutes, drunken sailors…. But this has all now changed. We learnt some of the history of Russell and stopped for our lunch, before taking the ferry back to Paihia. It was another overcast day, but not much of the very needed rain. Some of the land was starting to go brown, and in some areas people had to buy water to top up their water tanks.

The next day was a very different day….a day of blue skies and sunshine, very hot sunshine. Shirley, Callum and I headed north, first stopping in Kerikeri so I could buy some fabric for my mum (I didn’t find any that I liked), and then we headed to Matauri Bay. There was a big long white sandy beach, with blue sea, blue skies. After lunch, Shirley and I paddled. We continued up the coast stopping at various other bays, eventually arriving at Whangaroa, which is basically a marina with some very nice boats in it.

It was time to now sort stuff out as I was heading off for a few weeks, going south. We had to take Callum back to Auckland, as he had a very early flight (7am) on Saturday, and I would pick up a car at 6am to meander my way down to Wellington, where I would leave the car.