Bay of Islands, December 15-20

We had been looking forward to this part of our trip since the very beginning. Many people had told us how great it was, so we had some high expectations. We stayed in one of the many hostels, or as they say here, to assault my basic grammar, “a backpackers”, in the middle of the town of Paihia. The Pepper Tree backpackers had a massive, well equipped and always-busy kitchen and two lounges, one of which was next to our room. This gave Emma and Lara somewhere to play, and it was also a nice place for to work on the blog and have adult talks instead of just going to bed at 9pm. The hostel’s other big attraction was free use of their bikes and sea kayaks. Sea kayaking was another of our unrealistic dreams of New Zealand- paddling happily between icebergs and groups of whales, each with a child on our lap perhaps? Of course, in reality Dorka and I ended up kayaking separately, while the other one babysat, but it was still nice to get out and about, and paddling between the many islands was lots of fun.

Since before this trip, we had been looking forward to Emma swimming with Dolphins, but it turned out to be prohibited for little ones, so instead we took a tour boat to just look at them. This was great. We got right up next to a pod of dolphins three times, and were able to look right down at them from a few metres away. These were bottlenose dolphins, about 2m long and very beautiful. They were also completely wild. The captain was quite an expert, and explained that they were never fed by people, the boats could only approach if the dolphins were not feeding, and that no more than 3 boats at a time could “park” next to them. It was all very regulated. Of course they could swim away at any time, so all the time they were with us, they were probably as curious about us, as we were about them. The trip also included the famous “hole in the rock”, an island with a massive hole right though the middle of it. But the journey there was so bumpy that everyone had trouble concentrating on this marvelous sight.

On a wet and windy Thursday we walked over to the Waitangi treaty grounds. These were pretty well presented, but still not too much fun. There was quite a good Maori singing show though. We forgot to tell Emma what to expect so she was a bit alarmed by all the men shouting the Haka challenge. In case you’ve never seen it, this is warrior challenge where the Maori scream scary words and make strange faces to scare off their enemies. Emma could do quite a good impression of this, complete with wide, rolling eyes and a poked-out tounge. You can see a lot of tounges and wild faces in the carvings too, which were all over the Maori Wakas (war canoes) and the maraes (meeting houses).

On our final morning in Paihia, we decided to have a go at Parasailing, where brave souls dangle from a parachute, attached by a strong cable to a motor boat, which pulls you along. We kept Lara down in the boat of course, but Emma and Dorka went up with the parachute to a height of 900ft or nearly 300 metres. That is extremely high. Emma had a wonderful time, though Dorka was so worried about Emma that she could hardly enjoy it. I also went up, and let me tell you, the view is great! It does feel awfully exposed at first, with absolutely nothing beneath your feet, but you soon get the hang of it!

Now we turned and began our long route south. This would eventually take us onto the South Island and down across it until almost the southern tip of the country. On our first day though we went a little too far perhaps. We took a little detour to view some Kauri trees, which are hard to find south of this region. These are famous for their size and age. Though not as large as a giant redwood, they are still massive trees. The ones we saw were only 300 years old, but they were easily 3 metres in diameter and I would guess 50 metres tall, though actually we couldn’t see the tops clearly in the dense jungle. They towered straight up for about 30 metres before the first branches, which is what made them so popular for ships beams and masts when the first Europeans came. Unfortunately, this led to a huge logging industry that almost drove these magnificent trees to extinction.

Back on the road, we pushed on all the way to the Goat Ísland Marine Reserve. This is an island just a few metres off shore famous for the sea life around it. (Interestingly, the name come from the fact that goats were released onto the island to breed and multiply, to make a source of food for sailors who might be shipwrecked there. How’s that for forward thinking?) The snorkelling itself was unfortunately not very good. There was so much plankton in the water, that it was like swimming in swirling soup. Sometimes there were clear bits and I found myself surrounded by multicoloured fish, but most of the time it was just (fish) soup. Dorka and the girls stayed dry and warm on a glass-bottom boat, which is (as the name suggests) a small boat with a glass bottom for those, who want to see the beautiful marine life without getting wet, but saw even less than I did! But Lara still had a great time climbing and crawling around the boat.

Even though the snorkeling wasn’t very good, we had a very special experience at the Goat Island: Emma was so fascinated by the traditional tattoos of a Maori man, who was just diving there, that she asked Dorka to get talking to him. They had a lovely chat, and at the end they said goodbye in the traditional Maori way: by touching their noses together. This ritual is called sharing the breath of life.