Paihia 1
Trip Start
Sep 03, 2007
1
127
220
Trip End
Jun 17, 2009
Paihia, North Island, New Zealand
Tuesday, May 27, 2008
We drove up to the headland to look at Goat Island and the reserve area. It was quite breezy and we spotted several pied shags nesting in the trees. Suddenly the bird swapped places with its partner and instantly two chicks sprang up in the nest, clamouring to be fed. The parent disgorged fish and fed them, a fantastic sight.
There was no road along the coast, so we had to turn inland back to Hwy 1 for a while before we could turn back to the coast. The rain was intermittent and varying from drizzle to downpour as we twisted through cloudy forests heading north.
Back on Hwy 1 we stopped for lunch at 'Whangarei', a large town at the head of an inlet, where it poured down. Continuing out of town we stopped at the 'Whangarei Falls', a normally pretty 26 metres high cascade but today it was a raging torrent that looked awesome. I walked down to the bottom of the falls for a photo and got drenched in the whirling spray from the falls.
We set out along a road for the coast, alongside flooded fields and seriously swollen rivers until we reached 'Tutukaka harbour', a popular sheltered inlet used as a base to sail to the 'Poor Knights Islands', rated by Jacques Cousteau as one of the top ten dive sites in the world. If it's good enough for the Capitain, then it'll do me. We called in at the dive centre, open! They were out on Thursday, for which there was a good weather forecast. OK, something to work on.
We continued round the coast and back to the rain drenched Hwy 1, through 'Kawakawa' and then up to the seaside town of 'Paihia', which is on the edge of the 'Bay of Islands'. This is a great bay, studded with islands and a very popular holiday area. It is also another excellent diving area, especially with the wrecks of the Greenpeace 'Rainbow Warrior' and a Royal New Zealand Navy frigate 'Canterbury'. We found a local dive centre and they were going out on Saturday. Talk about it never rains but it pours!
Spending the night at a local motel, we shuffled options. One complication was that this coming weekend was a national holiday to celebrate the Queen's birthday (now - that's a good idea!) and the last holiday weekend before winter. It poured down all night.
Distance driven 253 Km 157 miles
Wednesday 28th May
The rain had stopped and it was a glorious sunny morning.
Decision time!
We still wanted to see the north of the island but our flight out was booked for next Tuesday. What we wanted was more time. So we rescheduled our flight to Melbourne for Saturday 7th June, extended the car rental period and then booked a dive from Paihia for Saturday. We phoned and booked a dive in Tutukaka for Thursday.
Oooh - All this thinking is hard work!!!!!
Knowing that we were returning on a holiday weekend we found another motel and reserved an apartment. Now we were ready.
