KariKari - Cape Reinga - Apihara

Hey! Me again! Here's where we've got to in our last few days.

We ended up staying at Tokerau Beach for 2 nights. It was a free campsite and a 1 minute walk to the massive, quiet beach. The nearby beach 'Maitai' was very tropical. In fact, it's renowned for how tropical it is. On the 5th we tried to find somewhere to watch the Super bowl - seeing as Scott could watch it in the daytime for once. We couldn't find anywhere around KariKari! To be fair, most pubs weren't open and when I asked one pub, that was open, if they were showing the game, he asked what the Superbwol was! No such luck. We had a beach day instead. 

We decided we needed an umbrella to give us some shade on the beach and we wanted to try body boarding. We found a body board in The Warehouse for $20 so we went for it and a 1.8m umbrella. Otherwise, we'd still be burning within 15 minutes even with 50+ on! Most people (even the locals) bring a tent or brolly for shade. However, since buying the brolly, it has rained everyday. Anyway, on our way to Awanui, we stopped at an old gum digging spot. Giant Kauri trees would have stood there and the resin it produces would have been collected for many uses including lino, varnish and tattoo ink. We also found a factory that use kauri logs that they've found to make beautiful wooden bowls, wine holders etc. You can also walk inside a 45,000 year old kauri tree. Certainly the best staircase I've been on. That afternoon we hunted a couple of walks. Now, I think I'm pretty good at map reading but oh my, it is impossible to find some walks around here or the road just stops and it's private land that you can't go through. Very weird. We've stayed in Ahipara a couple nights and are still here at the moment. The campsite is the best we've found. They have an awesome inside chillout lounge. This has been perfect for getting our of the rain and we've met others who are staying here too. While staying in Ahipara, we've sorted out our WOF (it's like our MOT and we need to get our van checked every 6 months), sorted out the yearly road tax for our van, we've been in to Kaitaia and Awanui, visited the local Okahu Winery where we got to sample 8 of their wines, checked out Lake Ngatu, tried out our body board for the first time, enjoyed chilling playing board games in the campsite and I have booked surfing lessons tomorrow for Scott's birthday. We are very excited. I'll let you know how we get on. For Scott's birthday, yesterday, we drove up to Cape Reinga. It was pretty grey but we didn't mind. It meant it was less busy. The views back to the east and west were spectacular. Also, you can watch where the Tasman sea and Pacific ocean come together creating awesome waves. We then headed to the giant sand dunes in Te Paki. We had so much fun sliding down the dunes on our body board. It was raining, so by the end we were covered in a sand/water paste ha. We saw the Ratana Temple in Te Kao (ratana combines Christianity with Maori spiritual belief) and Houhora Heads. That night the rain continued. We cooked up some veg and make pitta pizzas for Scott's birthday dinner. Back at the van I surprised Scott with a birthday cake and a bottle of a local red wine. We spent the rest of the evening in the lounge drinking the wine and playing cards.

That's me for know. Thanks for reading my blogs! I hope you can follow our journey and are enjoying what we've been getting up to. We are heading down the West coast next and maybe heading back to the Bay of Islands if we're still needed for work at the winery in Russell.

Below are some more snaps. We were very pleased to find that it's easy to cook corn on the cob in a pan. It's like $3 for 5 so that's great news!

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