We started off our road trip by getting stuck in Auckland unable to find our way from the airport to the 1 going north for about an hour, awesome. At least I was able to keep my cool behind the wheel and didn't get too anxious like I did my first time drivingintherightsideofthecarontheleftsideoftheroad. When we were finally north bound on the 1 it was smooth sailing for the rest of the drive, until we accidentally took the scenic route to Kerikeri via the Bay of Islands. By the time we got to our final destination, it was already about 9pm (i think) and we had been on the road since 4.
We stayed with a friend of my sister's that I was meeting for the first time. It was very gracious of her to let us stay for a few days in her home. Kristina was the best hostess and even prepared dinner and breakfast for us before we were off on our daily adventures in Northland.
By Kristina's recommendation, our first stop on Sunday was to visit the Stone Store, one of the first Western settlements in New Zealand, and one of Kerikeri's most historical sites.
After visiting the Stone Store and Rewa Village, we headed all the way up North to Cape Reinga. On the way we couldn't resist stopping at Cable Bay on this beautiful beach covered in shells, my favorite!
On the drive to Cape Reinga we passed some pretty bad weather, but once we got through to the tip of New Zealand, we broke through the rain clouds and had some pretty decent weather.
The next day we booked a horse trek in Hokianga, my first time riding a horse EVER!!! I was soooo excited, I had been waiting for this for so long, but for some reason, it never seemed to work out.
The horse I was riding was called Mavrick, and Tanya's was called Kiki. I have to be honest, it was a bit nerve wrecking being on a horse for the first time. It didn't seem as high off the ground as I thought it would be, but still, high enough that it would suck if I fell. I was also surprised that it didn't feel as secure in the saddle as I imagined it would be.
We took the horses from the stable, along the Waimamaku river to the beach. There were some pretty sketchy parts of the trek where we went along a really steep hill on the most narrow trail, and for some reason, Mavrick really liked to walk as close as possible to the edges. When we finally got to the beach, this was the only picture I could manage, not wanting to drop my iPhone and having no easy access pockets that I could store it in.
This is also about the time that Mavrick decided to do some trotting to catch up with the others as his walking pace was a bit slower than the other horses. That took a bit getting used to, but by the end, I think I got a little more comfortable with it.
On the way back, Mavrick did a few things that were a bit crazy. He was a bit of a trailblazer that one. There was one point where he took me over a hill and I thought he was going to jump over a piece of driftwood, but thankfully he went around at the last minute. On the really steep part on the way back he also tried to make his own trail, but I had to pull him back on course. It was really funny when the horses would try to stop to get a snack, but we had to pull them up to stay on course. I swear Mavrick was communicating with me the whole time. He would look back at me like "are you seriously going to make me walk through this mud right now?" and "really? You're not going to let me eat this grass, but you expect me to carry your ass around?" and you could tell that Kiki had hierarchy over him, because at times when he would trot to keep up, she would shoot him a look not to go in front of her and he would stop. I was a bit sad because throughout the Northland trip, I was hoping to find a paua shell, and I actually did see one on the horse trek, but because I was so high up and couldn't stop to get off, I didn't get to pick it up =/ oh well, it wasn't meant to be. Anyway, the horse trekking was AWESOME, I loved it!
We were done by around 1pm, and planned to check out the sand dunes and surf down them, but by the time we got back to Opononi, the last boat to the dunes was finished and we missed it. Since we still had the whole afternoon, we decided to go to the kauri forest and see Tane Mahuta, the largest kauri tree.
That night, we turned it in early and spent some time visiting with Kristina. It was really nice to hear her perspective on the Māori culture. The next morning we woke up early to catch the whanau and say goodbye before they left for school and work. Before heading down to Auckland to visit with our friend Shelby, we took a detour to the Bay of Islands. We wanted to take a boat around the area, but it was a bit pricey and the weather wasn't the greatest that day, so we passed on the boat and walked around the town for a bit. We also took some time to chill out on the beach and look for more shells. When we had our fill of the Bay of Islands, we returned to find a parking ticket on the car, New Zealand has awful signage, I did not see a no parking sign or a parking meter anywhere =/
It was a really nice trip to Northland, but I was ready to head back down toward Hamilton for more adventures.
No comments:
Post a Comment