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Published: March 13th 2007
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Bruno and the driveway
This is high tide on the way out to the mussel farm / bills boat. At low tide the boat can't make it up. Great Barrier Island was amazing. To get there we flew from Auckland with Great Barrier Airlines to Claris (the main town on GBI) and on to Okiwi. Very cool little towns, especially Okiwi where we landed on a grass strip! The island taxi driver (Mike) met us at the airport and took us down to Port Fitzroy on the west coast of the island (Auckland side) where we met my cousin (?) Sue.
Sue lives with her partner Bruno on the far side of the Port Fitzroy harbour at a great spot which is only boat access. Their place is set up with solar power and a wood fired stove / hot water so very comfortable especially with the location.
The trip across the harbour was very cool - getting our first glimpse of the mussel farms and Gannets diving for fish all over the place. To get up to Sue and Bruno’s there is a creek (the driveway) which is accessible depending on the tide. When we got there the tide was just about perfect so no problems right up to the dock at the bottom of the garden.
Up at the house it was party night.
Bills Boat
Beoudin (appologies for spelling if you read this!!) telling Bill and Joe fishing stories maybe?? Sue in the white hat and Barbara in the yellow pants in the background. Sue and Bruno had a couple other backpackers (Boudijn and Barbara from Belgium and the Netherlands) there at the time who had hitched by boat from the Bay of Islands down to GBI 4 or 5 days previously and also a couple of their friends (Bill and Joe) had shown up earlier in the day by yacht. Rest of the evening was passed drinking Bruno’s homemade plum wine and absinthe and eating all sorts of fish soup and homegrown veggies.
Next morning it was off to Bill’s yacht for coffee and then on to the mussel farm to check it out and pick up some mussels and snapper for dinner. Snapper fishing was quite interesting with everyone except myself and Sue catching a fish and Bruno landing 6 of them. In Sue’s case she didn’t catch anything because she was busy working with the barge and didn’t try to fish…. For me it was only because I was a lot better at feeding the fish than catching them… Back to the house on night 2 it was mussels etc for dinner and peach crisp (flambéed with some of Bruno’s homemade spirits).
Day 3 on GBI our task was
Brown Teal Ducklings
These ducks are endangered and I think are only really on GBI now. We did a duck count one day and came up with 44 but that didn't include these little ducklings and their mothers. to fix up a line on a neighbouring mussel farm that was sinking as the crop grew heavier. From there we salvaged a couple mussels, cooked them up on the barge then off on the boat to a beach picnic before back to the house. This afternoon also Beoudin and Barbara headed off to try and catch the barge to Auckland since it appeared their attempt to boat-hitch to Corremandel wasn’t going to work out.
Last day on GBI it was raining and we were worried about our flight getting out. Sure enough the airline said that the grass strip at Okiwi was too soft so could we please get a ride down to Claris? Luckily Mike was up to it and took us from the warf at Pt Fitzroy across the mountains on the island and down to the airport at Claris. Arriving at the airport we found Beoudin and Barbara once again having found out the hard way that the barge from Tryphena didn’t have service on Wednesdays. They figured that it was beginning to look like they weren’t ever going to get off that island (having been there for 10 days or so by that time)
Dinner!
Catch of the day fresh from the mussel farm. and had decided to get on the plane and continue on their way south. In Auckland, Lydia (one of Sue and Bruno’s daughters) picked all of us up from the airport and took us back to the house.
Next day we took off to the north (northland), up to the Bay of Islands briefly before crossing over to Omapere for the night. Stayed here at a great backpackers joint called Globetrekkers Backpacker. Next morning we headed back down the Kauri coast (west coast of Northland along the Tasman Sea) stopping off to visit Tane Mahuta. This is the largest living Kauri tree in New Zealand and an important part of the Maori mythology - being the tree that parted the sky and earth and is the father of all other living things. Mythology aside this is one very impressive tree, absolutely massive. From there we stopped off for a couple hours at the Kauri museum (a museum dedicated to the history of the Kauri tree and forestry in New Zealand). Very neat in here - they had working versions of most of the machinery used in the early forestry and also a really cool set of photos documenting the
GBI at Sunset
From the front deck at the house last of the massive kauri that was felled in the area (a lightning killed tree that was taken down and milled in 1996). Also around the museum they had some exhibits showing off the kauri gum which can be polished up and/or carved into some pretty intricate shapes. Much to Pam’s delight we found one of the exhibits that was of a guy known as “Tatty the gum digger”…. I have a feeling that picture is going to make it in…
After the Kauri Museum we carried on down to Auckland and went to visit more of the New Zealand Tattersfield clan. Sue’s brother James lives with his family on farm in a beautiful valley at the south end of the Kaipara Harbour where they have some sheep and cattle. We stayed with them to visit over dinner and went with James to check out the property and whatnot before heading back in to Lydia’s place in Auckland for the night.
Our final day in NZ was spent packing up various travel brochures and clothing we no longer needed to post to Canada (Terry and Connie they’re coming your way!) and getting our packs in order. Had a
bite to eat for lunch and said our goodbyes to Lydia and Elsa before Amyl took us down to the airport to head back out to Aussie.
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Dad
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GBI
I had heard that this was great place, I can't wait to see more pics. Is Tatty the gum digger a relative? Are you now known as Tatty the wallet loser??