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Published: January 12th 2010
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Silver Fern
The underside was used as an early cats eye by Maori when hunting at night And now, I decided, for something completely different. Leaving the rest of the Kirra group to do their own thing, I headed off on day 8 with a completely different and smaller group to meet the big T in Maori culture. Rob, our local Maori driver and guide drove us west from Paihia to the Wairere (flying water) Boulder Valley. Twenty years ago, this area off just trees and rocks was seen by the locals as having no potential. However, and Austrian civil engineer and his wife were visiting the area, and had a vision for the future. Together, Fritz and Hilda (ok, I am guessing their names) have tuned this area into an orderly, safe and clearly labelled home for native trees of NZ. They have planted native trees here, built walkways and bridges, and constructed paths through their forest for visitors to enjoy and learn from.
Within the forest are some unusually large basalt boulders. According to Rob, these would have been thrown from one of the many volcanic eruptions that have taken place recently (in the last 100,000 years). However, what makes these basalt boulders very special is so called fluting. This is a clear sign of
Fluted Basalt
Water could not have created these grooves in such a hard rock, but acid from the Kauri tree leaves would have done the trick erosion in deep lines running vertically down the side of the boulders. Basalt is so strong, normal water or wind erosion would not cause such deep channels, so how did these come about? Scientists conclude that the area would have been sheltered by very tall Kauri (pronounced Cody) trees in times before the settlers arrived, and the acid from the leaves would have been dissolved by falling rain, which in turn would have made the large cuts in the rock over time.
On the tree front, all species are labelled, and of the 5 native NZ ferns, 3 were seen here. These are the black fern (very tall), the ponga fern (used for building Maori homes), and the iconic silver fern (as used on the All Blacks rugby shirts). Rob showed us a trick used by Maori using the silver fern. The leaves of this fern are green on top, but silver underneath. When the Maori were hunting quietly at night, they would lay a silver fern leaf upside down on the ground in the moonlight, and this would show others where they had gone. As they returned, they would turn the leaf back over, so the silver would
Our guides
Rob (r) and Tarferty (l) introduce us to Tane Mahuta not be caught by the moonlight.
Moving on, the group was taken to another area of forest and introduced to Tarferty, a local Maori guide. It was exxplained that we were going to meet The Lord of the Forest, Tane Mahuta in Maori, and this was both an impressive tree as well as the name of one of the Maori Gods. After a short walk we came into a clearing,and there he was - Massive does not begin to describe the size of this Kauri (pronounded Cody) tree. It is 13m round, 51 meters tall (up to the first branch) and about 2000 years old. Tarferty was a stocky guy, but he was comp;letely dwarfed by this tree. It's such a shame that this tree is so good for building canoes, ships and other construction projects, as only 4% of the original trees still exists, and it takes many lifetimes to grow replacement stock. Tarfery treated us to a few songs, speaches and prayers, all in Maori, with English translations. His voice was both powerful and moving.
Our final stop was for a great Fish and Chips lunch overlooking the Hokianga estuary. This is the place where Kupe
Tane Mahuta
The Lord of the Forest - see how small the people at the foot of the giant look. set sail to return to his home, and also the place where in the middle of the 1950's, a dolphin called Opo was so tame, he allowed local children to ride on his back.
A great day out - loads of stories from both Rob and Tarferty about life as a Maori now and a generation ago, and the chance to see what is claimed to be the biggest Kauri tree (by voolume) in the world (or at least, in New Zealand).
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