Blogs from Cape Reinga, Northland, North Island, New Zealand, Oceania - page 4

Hey! Just want to do a quick post about our day trip to the top of New Zealand before I do a blog about the rest of what's been happening with me! So on Saturday just past we got the bus at 7am to do the tour of pretty much the whole of Northland, our bus was actually a lorry, modified to get people on like a bus. It needed to be a truck cause the route is on a lot of rubbish roads, as well as a beach. So we headed pretty much straight up to the Cape, only stopping off at a bakery (top bakery in NZ - think that was a pun tbh) for morning tea and in a forest to look at the Kauri trees which are seriously old, they can live ... read more

On Saturday October 17th, I had finally gone on my rescheduled trip up north to Cape Reinga- the most northern point in NZ. (There’s actually a cape that’s slightly more north, however there’s virtually no way to get there). Cape Reinga is quite amazing. The walk up to it is a winding road and all you see if the ocean to the east and the Tasman Sea to the west and a lighthouse straight ahead. Once you get to the peak, you actually see the waves of the Tasman Sea crashing into the waves of the Pacific Ocean forming an arrow type symbol. Cape Reinga is of spiritual significance to the Maori. It is believed that when a Maori dies, his soul leaves this world through Cape Reinga and ends up in Hawaiki - the Maori ... read more

So we’ve stocked up on food, gas and petrol and then make our way north towards the northern most point of NZ. We stay one night at a campsite by the sea and next to an old house called the Subritzky Homestead (we only discovered the latter part when we pulled in to the campsite and saw the sign for the house). We had a nosey around and it’s an old homestead from 1862 which is being renovated and you can see the lovely old range still in the kitchen. I think the campsite is in the old grounds of the house as it’s well tended parkland with large old trees. After our stay there, we head further north and after a few hours, reach the top - Cape Reinga, which is so spiritual to the ... read more

English version Don't miss the videos at the bottom of the page (click url=http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3AU-7WUt5jU&feature=PlayList&p=AD614367607E6EF8&index=0&playnext=1here if you want to see them all together, rather than having to click on each of them individually) and pages 2 and 3 if you want to see more pictures! As I sit in our lounge and ponder over where to start this new blog page, I can't help looking up every few seconds to look at the views from the window... and feel a strong urge to pinch myself. It's siesta time on a Friday as I start writing this and it's wonderfully peaceful; it's also rather warm so hopefully I won't fall asleep! The corrugated bit of metal you can see in the first picture is our garage's roof, the green field is a college's sports ground. The blue bit ... read more

The first experience on NZ soil was an unmitigated disaster. What started out as a leisurely mid-morning flight from Sydney to Auckland was delayed beyond all comprehension and eventually landed at about 10.00 pm in the driving rain in Auckland. We’d experienced a mere 3 brief showers in the three months in Australia, so the cold and wet didn’t brighten the mood. The situation was compounded by our failure to book a hostel. We’d decided to wing it, given our anticipated earlier arrival and the first couple of phone calls proved the magnitude of the mistake. The general story was no room at the inn except for the odd dorm bed, even in the factory hostels in the city centre. We spent our first night on NZ soil in what can only be described as the ... read more